Just to Show They Can Be Offensive, Rams Turn Surly After a 28-10 Win
The Rams’ offense, often cited as the missing link in the team’s Super Bowl plan, may yet command some respect. Or else.
On Sunday, with Dieter Brock passing for 256 yards and two touchdowns, the Rams rolled through the New Orleans Saints, 28-10, and then took on the media.
“He’s probably not much of a quarterback but he’s 8 and 1,” Coach John Robinson said sarcastically. “I’m sure somebody here will find something wrong with him today.”
Some of the 49,030 spectators in Anaheim Stadium suggested at times that Brock wasn’t playing a perfect game (15 of 30, no interceptions). Robinson, his self-appointed public defender, has come to expect the bad reviews, even as Eric Dickerson has become disenchanted with the press and its persistent forays into his psyche.
“Anything I say or the guys on the team say, it never gets printed right,” Dickerson said. “So I have nothing to say.”
That’s why he shut off interviews last week, but he did finally open up after Sunday’s game, which was his second-best effort of the season: 108 yards in 23 attempts, including the Rams’ first touchdown on an 11-yard run after an 80-yard drive.
The Rams moved 81 and 60 yards for their next two touchdowns and netted 366 yards in offense.
Dickerson was helped off the field with 2 1/2 minutes remaining after suffering what was called a mild sprain of his right ankle, but that isn’t what made him testy.
At one point in his post-game remarks he invited journalists, including a female reporter, to “let me take the pen, you take my uniform and I’ll get you out on that field.”
Brock believes he has the right attitude, though.
“Yeah, I heard ‘em (booing) a few times,” he said. “But I don’t read the papers, so I don’t know what is said.”
Brock was told that Robinson is still his number one supporter.
“That’s good to know,” Brock said. “I guess I’ll be playing next week.”
Dickerson said he will, too, despite the ankle and the fact he won’t lead the league in rushing this season. He has 543 yards after playing in seven of the nine games.
“Oh, I’ll play,” he said. “I’ll be ready. I don’t care if I wind up with 900 yards (for the season). If we go to the Super Bowl, I won’t care.”
Keep in mind that this happy group has a three-game lead in the NFC West, with seven to play, and was coming off the trauma of its only loss. But it didn’t appear that the 49ers had tied the Rams to a railroad track.
The defense in particular came back with more fire than before, sacking Saint quarterback Dave Wilson nine times and intercepting him three times. The only points the Saints got were the result of Ram fumbles, or the Rams could have had their second shutout in three weeks.
Brock’s scoring throws went 17 yards to wide receiver Henry Ellard for a 14-0 lead in the second quarter and 29 yards to tight end Tony Hunter to make it 21-7 in the third.
Charlie White scored the Rams’ last touchdown with 1:42 remaining on a five-yard dash off left end one play after cornerback LeRoy Irvin collected his fifth interception in four games and returned it 29 yards.
Gary Green and linebacker Jim Collins also had interceptions. The sacks--one short of the Rams’ club record set against Atlanta in 1969--were distributed among newcomer Dennis Harrison, Gary Jeter and Shawn Miller with two apiece and safety Nolan Cromwell and linebackers Mike Wilcher and Mel Owens with one.
The Saints, dropping to 3-6 en route to their 20th consecutive non-winning campaign, scored early in the third quarter after linebacker Scott Pelleur slapped the ball out of Dickerson’s hand and rookie Jack Del Rio recovered at the Rams’ 11-yard line.
“It was a good play on their part,” Dickerson said. “They were going for the ball and they got it.”
Three plays later Wilson scrambled around until he found Eric Martin, who made a diving catch in the end zone, just beyond the reach of Ram safety Johnnie Johnson.
Otherwise, the Saints were unable to drive deeper than the Rams’ 28-yard line without help. The Rams twice threw them back out of field goal range with sacks--two in a row by Jeter on one series.
Jeter also dropped Martin for a loss on an end-around after the Saints recovered Ellard’s fumble on a punt return, but Morton Andersen was still close enough to kick a 51-yard field goal.
The Rams were greeted by a large banner in the south end zone reading: “Eric-Rams Offense, Earn Your Pay Today.”
With that encouragement, they threw a pass on their first play of the day, good for 24 yards to Hunter after a rollout by Brock.
That set the tempo for Hunter’s best day in the National Football League: 6 catches for 113 yards and the touchdown, on which he faked out one defender and ran over another before plunging across the goal line.
Hunter, a third-year pro from Notre Dame, came to the Rams from Buffalo in the swap for Vince Ferragamo. By coincidence, Hunter officially “arrived” at Anaheim Sunday on the same day Ferragamo was benched in Buffalo.
Hunter, with 26 receptions this season, is helping to give the Rams the offensive balance Robinson keeps talking about. On Sunday, they ran 32 times for 130 yards and passed 30 times for 256 yards, less 20 for the three times Brock was sacked.
“He’s big and can get open over the middle,” Brock said of Hunter. “We were effective this week because we had a balanced attack.”
Brock apparently wasn’t bothered by the kidney stone that put him in the hospital overnight after the previous week’s game against the 49ers.
“I have a little pain down here,” he said, touching his lower right side. “I don’t know if it’s from the stone. They’ll check it out tomorrow.”
The problem seemed to bother him more than the booing or other criticism, which seemed to bother Robinson a lot.
“I feel like the man played an outstanding football game,” Robinson said. “And yet I think there’s been kind of an atmosphere created, for whatever reason, that when he throws an incomplete pass he gets booed. Maybe that’s the way with quarterbacks forever, but I find that disappointing . . . that the fans don’t have a sense of what a great competitor this man is, how hard he’s worked, what a great job he’s done.
“When he gets sacked, I’ve never seen anybody have to help him up. He never blinks. Today Jackie ran over to help him up and he tried his best to get up before Jackie could get there, and I know he was hurting.
“I just feel so strongly about the guy and the way he’s played that I frankly resent the (criticism). And I don’t pretend to be objective. But I am right.”
Brock talks about the criticism without rancor.
“I’m not a runner,” he said. “But I think I do a good job of moving around in the pocket and coming up with some nice plays. I feel like I’ve got to improve, but I haven’t done anything different from when I started here.”
Brock’s counterpart, Wilson, had seen better days around Anaheim, where he grew up. As a rookie, he led the Saints to a 21-13 win over the Rams in 1981 and directed a futile comeback in relief of Richard Todd last season.
On Sunday, he completed 19 of 35 passes for 156 yards, but he paid for it in pain.
The Saints’ most serious offensive thrust of the day was their first play when Earl Campbell burst for 36 yards, his longest run in two years with the Saints. But he pulled a hamstring on the effort and carried only twice more in the first quarter before retiring for the day.
The Saints were ill-equipped to compete coming in, with tight end Hoby Brenner’s sprained ankle and their best running back, Hokie Gajan (also hamstring), missing his fifth game. Brenner lasted about a quarter, and kick returner Carl Roaches was lost later on.
But the Rams showed no mercy. They have their own problems pleasing critics they perceive as being impossible to please.
