YAWN, 7-0, YAWN : Rams win, 16-0, but Their Lack of Offense Is Becoming Even More Glaringly Apparent

Next door to the “Show Me” World Series, the Rams prepared for their own moment of truth Sunday.

With a 16-0 victory over the Kansas City Chiefs, their dynamic defense and special teams dragged their anemic offense into a mid-season showdown with the defending Super Bowl champions from San Francisco at Anaheim next Sunday.

The Rams (7-0) remained one of only two undefeated teams in the National Football League--the Chicago Bears (6-0) play Green Bay tonight--and lead the NFC West by a fat four games. But even if they beat the 49ers, will anyone believe they are again the dominant team in the division?

“No, people will say we beat the 49ers, ‘but they’re only 3 and 5. The Rams need to play somebody like the Bears,’ ” Eric Dickerson said. “You can’t win. The only way you can win is when you win the Super Bowl.”

Free safety Johnnie Johnson, who had one of six interceptions off Chief quarterback Todd Blackledge, said: “Most people are thinking, ‘OK, this is the week the Rams will bite the dust.’ We don’t care what outsiders think.”

Linebacker Mel Owens agreed. “I know what people are trying to do: set us up so they can say, ‘I told you so.’ ”

And if the critics don’t yet accept the Rams, Owens added, “We don’t accept the critics.”

Not even those who would point out that the Rams netted less yardage, 245 to 184, than a team they shut out?

Well, maybe they’ve been saving their offense for the playoffs. Coach John Robinson’s new passing attack must have come with a label, “Don’t open until Christmas.” Since the Bears aren’t on the schedule, they may not need it until then.

Fortunately, the Rams have the attitude that if they can’t play offense, nobody else will, either. They have allowed only 89 points, a league low, and now share the league lead with Dallas with 18 interceptions--one more than they had all last season.

Their secondary scored a grand slam Sunday, distributing Blackledge’s largess among right cornerback LeRoy Irvin (2), left corner Gary Green, Johnson and strong safety Nolan Cromwell, along with one for linebacker Mike Wilcher, who tipped it to himself. Irvin also had two when the Rams picked Steve DeBerg for four at Tampa a week earlier.

For a while, they were worried that Cromwell wouldn’t get one. Then Green, enjoying a triumphant return to his former home stadium, tipped a long throw to Stephone Paige into Cromwell’s hands in the end zone with 49 seconds to play as the Chiefs tried desperately to avoid their second blank of the season.

They never got closer than the Rams’ 29-yard line, and their strongest scoring threat was Nick Lowery’s 50-yard field goal attempt on the game’s opening drive. It was wide to the right, only the second time Lowery had missed in 14 attempts this season.

The unseasoned Blackledge, to the Rams’ delight, started in place of injured veteran Bill Kenney and went all the way. He completed 14 of 32 for 161 yards, but only three went to wide receivers Carlos Carson and Henry Marshall.

Subtract 18 yards for the time he was sacked by Wilcher and 15 yards for the interception returns and Blackledge netted 128 yards, hardly worth the trouble.

Dale Hatcher, the Rams’ rookie punter, made it even tougher by keeping the Chiefs pinned in their own end, where they had to start all but one of their drives from the 26-yard line or worse.

It was the fifth shutout in the NFL this season, the third time the Rams had held an opponent without a touchdown and their first shutout since the 9-0 NFC title game win at Tampa in 1979 launched them into the Super Bowl. Their previous regular season shutout was a 24-0 win at Seattle the same year.

“That (a shutout) is the ultimate,” said defensive coordinator Fritz Shurmur, who couldn’t recall the last time he had coached one. “The payoff is in points. When they had a chance to hang that goose egg up there, they weren’t gonna let that get away.”

The Ram offense’s fireworks continued to fizzle. A frustrated Dickerson ran for only 68 yards in 26 attempts (2.6 average), while quarterback Dieter Brock completed 9 of 20 passes for 68 yards--6 to Dickerson and only one to a wide receiver, Henry Ellard. The other starting wide receiver, Bobby Duckworth, left the game early with a hip-pointer.

But, as Robinson likes to say, the offense was quietly efficient, meaning Dickerson didn’t fumble and Brock threw no interceptions.

The plays may work better when right guard Dennis Harrah and left tackle Bill Bain return full time, but their absence had nothing to do with Rams dropping three of Brock’s passes Sunday.

The offense didn’t take everything its own defense gave it Sunday. Blackledge’s six interceptions topped a Chief record for misguided passes, and the Rams dropped about four others.

Cromwell also recovered a fumble, but although the offense four times took possession on Kansas City’s side of the field, three times it had to settle for Mike Lansford’s field goals. He was 3 for 3 from 33, 37 and 30 yards.

The only touchdown, scored by Dickerson on a one-yard run around right end, followed a grind of 69 yards in 14 plays that consumed 7:58 on the game clock, overlapping the first and second quarters.

By halftime, the Rams held a 13-0 lead, which made them a sure thing the way Blackledge was finding the Ram receivers, and most of the 64,474 fans in Arrowhead Stadium were chanting for Kenney. It was the Chiefs’ third straight defeat and their first at home, leaving them 3-4 and two games behind in the AFC West.

“Seven and 0 is great,” Robinson said, “(but) we’re just not playing great offensive football at this point.

“We’re not running the football. Our offensive line is a little bit makeshift, but I think we’re gonna break loose. It may be January. It’s just slow in coming.”

Brock implied that the Rams’ defense was playing so well that the offense didn’t need to play fast and loose, “especially late in the game. When you get a lead like that, the first instinct is not to blow it. It takes away some of your aggressiveness.

“When I see (the defensive backs) dropping out of there, my first instinct is not to force anything deep. It’s not fun because we’d like to score some points, but it’s fun winning.”

Dickerson, whose longest run was 10 yards, said: “We’re not playing laid back because of that, not because we want to.”

The Rams have tried to break their running game loose by returning part-time to a two-back offense, with Barry Redden fronting Dickerson. Redden had two runs of 13 and 14 yards, netting 39 with an average of 5.6, indicating that defenses are still keying on Dickerson.

“Sometimes I think, man, what’s wrong?” Dickerson said. “Is it me? Then I look at the films. It’s just not there. You can’t ask the guys to block. Sometimes they know where we’re running. Sometimes they guess right. Things are just not working.

“I know I’m ready. I’ve been ready. Even in my holdout I was ready to play.”

So was the Ram secondary Sunday. Green, happy to be traded away from Kansas City--or, more accurately, from Coach John Mackovic--before last season, said: “My biggest deal this week was trying not to get over-excited about it.

“We mixed up our coverages today, trying to make the young quarterback read the defense in his drop.”

Irvin called Green, “the best all-round cornerback in the league.”

But Shurmur said of Irvin: “One of these days they (opponents) are gonna decide they’d better find somewhere else to throw it.”

That’s something for Joe Montana to think about.

“It’ll still be a big game for us,” Johnson said. “There’s a lot of respect because of who they are. You never know when they’ll rise up to be the 49ers of last year.”

But Johnson had a twinkle in his eye when he added: “You know the last time a Ram picked (intercepted) Montana? It was Rod Perry in 1982.”