Who Were Those Guys in Ram Uniforms Who Beat Chargers, 23-21?

Sunday night provided Ram fans with a full 60 minutes of such free-agent madness as Gerald Harris running behind the lead blocks of Dave Toub and Jon Shields.

There were punt returns by Kwante Hampton, pass routes by Loren Richey, interceptions by Larry Kelm, touchdown receptions by Damone Johnson. There were trap-blocks thrown by guys making per diem; guys, as reserve quarterback Hugh Millen put it, “who will be working at their cousins’ cleaners in a few weeks.”

And these were guys playing in the first half.

All the same, the Ram reserves stuck it out to the end and beat the reserves from the San Diego Chargers, 23-21, on a 30-yard field goal by Mike Lansford with four seconds left at Jack Murphy Stadium.

For the Rams, who improved their exhibition record to 3-0, it was a game in which some of next week’s cuts received a rare chance to make today’s news.

And all because 19 players on the Rams’ active roster did not even dress for Sunday’s game because of injuries. The Rams’ sideline chorus line included such wounded celebrities as Eric Dickerson, Ron Brown, Henry Ellard, Dennis Harrah, LeRoy Irvin and Vince Newsome.

Not to be outdone, the Chargers held out quarterback Dan Fouts, running back Gary Anderson and an assortment of other starters.

It all added up to one giant and sometimes exciting scrimmage. It was a game in which million-dollar quarterback Jim Everett at one time would gaze down at his offensive line and see, from left to right, Robert Cox, Tom Newberry, Shields, Toub and Jackie Slater. Slater and Newberry he knew. So what gives with those other guys?

When starter Mike Schad, who was playing for starter Harrah, got knocked silly in the first half, the Rams had to do something. So they threw in Toub, who most recently could boast of being the strength coordinator at the University of Texas El Paso.

“He was a strength coach and now he’s playing the whole game,” said Millen, amused by the statement.

Shields, by way of Portland State, was also forced into the first half when center Doug Smith was kicked in the back and knocked out of the game.

Everett, by the fact that he was standing and talking at game’s end, was living testament that even weight trainers can block.

“It was different,” Everett said. “I told Jackie (right tackle Slater) that he had more experience than the other four guys combined.”

Harrah, who watched from the sideline with a bruised calf, admired the effort.

“You had a guy like Toub in there, and sometimes it didn’t look pretty,” Harrah said. “But he kept scrapping and kicking and was doing the job.”

The Rams trailed by a point at halftime, 14-13, despite 58 yards rushing by the Georgia Southern free agent, Gerald Harris, who is about 400 fathoms deep on the team’s depth chart.

It was Harris’ five-yard touchdown with 5:12 left that gave the Rams a 20-14 lead, at a time when the Rams had replaced their starting reserves with backup reserves.

It seemed that Harris’ touchdown might hold up, but the Chargers took the lead back with 2:47 left on a 48-yard scoring pass play from Mark Vlasic (sounds like the pickle) to receiver Jamie Holland.

The Rams’ last chance rested on the arm of the young quarterback, Millen, and his cast of football stagehands.

So, guess who came back?

It seemed only fitting that on a key fourth-down-and-five play at the San Diego 40, Millen would look and find an open receiver named Loren Richey for a 21-yard gain and a first down at the Charger 19.

Harris then used a couple of carries to set the ball in the middle of the field for Lansford, who kicked through his third field goal of the game with relative ease.

“I liked the fact that no matter who was in there, they seemed to be trying,” Robinson said. “They came back and found a way to win.”

Afterward, reporters waited for words from Harris and Richey, a free agent out of Utah who finished with two catches for 41 yards.

Somehow it gave Richey, listed a distant fourth on the Ram depth chart, new hope.

“I feel good after this,” Richey said. “I don’t want to get too high. I don’t know about my chances. I don’t know what the coaches are thinking.”

He did know, though, that several members of his family were videotaping the game just in case things don’t work out.

The Rams began the game with five starters missing on offense. Yet, it didn’t stop them from taking a 6-0 lead on field goals of 31 and 52 yards by Lansford.

Mark Herrmann, who started at quarterback for the injured Fouts, got the lead back for the Chargers with 5:20 left in the first half when he passed 31 yards to an unguarded Tim Spencer for a touchdown.

A bit later, Everett erred when he thought he could float a screen pass over the head of San Diego defensive end Lee Williams, who stands 6 feet 5 inches.

Williams intercepted the pass and returned it 10 yards to the Ram 15. Then Rick Neuheisel, who had taken over at quarterback, threw for eight yards to first-round choice Rod Bernstine, who bounced off Ram cornerback Jerry Gray at the goal line and did his version of teammate Anderson’s famous dive into the end zone.

It put the Chargers up, 14-6, with 1:52 left in the first half.

But with only a minute left, Tag Rome fumbled a punt back to the Rams, setting up an eight-yard scoring pass from Everett to Damone Johnson with seven seconds left to pull the Rams within 14-13.

But in the end, this was a night for the likes of Richey and Toub and Harris.

“How many yards did he have?” Robinson asked afterward about Harris. The answer was 91 yards in 31 carries.

“I know his uniform was dirty and that he did a solid job.”

Robinson, of course, couldn’t say that Harris would even make the team.

“That’s a decision to be made down the road,” he said. “But we’ve been thinking seriously about him from the start.”