It Was the Longest Second of the Year

So where were you when Steve Grogan dropped back for one final pass and looked into the end zone . . . and looked some more . . . and began counting red ski masks in the crowd . . . and planned Christmas dinner . . . and finally cocked his arm to put the Rams out of their misery?

Hiding behind the living room sofa?

Praying to the Big Ram in the Sky?

Cringing and vowing to swear off this nasty habit once and for all?

LeRoy Irvin, Ram cornerback, was in mid-scramble, tailing his man in the back of the end zone and wondering if the weather had frozen time, along with everything else.

“Damn,” Irvin kept thinking, “he’s got a hell of a lot of time back there.”

Ram Coach John Robinson figured it was “about 20 minutes.” Ram receiver Henry Ellard, suffering on the sidelines, had it clocked at “two hours, at least.”

Finally, Grogan let it fly.

His target, wide receiver Hart Lee Dykes, was alone in the end zone, straddling the end line. The ball hit Dykes in the hands, but Dykes couldn’t keep his feet in bounds.

Nor could he keep the football. The ball fell to the artificial turf--incomplete--and dozens of Rams, at last, could see their breath again.

“Oh my God,” Ellard said as soon as he could exhale. “Why do we put ourselves through this?”

Because, Henry, you’re the Rams. The only way is the hardest way.

Just wince, baby.

“I don’t know what to say,” said Robinson through chapped lips and gnashed teeth. “We’ve had about seven of these this year.

“We are not a football team that’s in control. We’re erratic. Efficiency is not a word we know how to spell or define . . .

“But, we’re fun to watch.”

Yeah, a regular barrel of nervous breakdowns. If you’ve got the time, they’ve got the Maalox. Team PG-13.

During the convulsions of Sunday’s final seconds, Ram quarterback Jim Everett had to laugh. Ahead, 24-20, with their backs to the Sullivan Stadium wall and Grogan four yards away from ruining their holidays--for the Rams, it’s the only way to fly.

“I kept thinking, ‘This is just so typical of our season,’ ” Everett said, shaking his head. “It was a situation where I could definitely say, ‘We’ve been here before.’

“Call us lucky, but sometimes, you have to be lucky in this game.”

You can also call the Rams, at long last, playoff participants. Sunday’s victory got them in, sending them to Philadelphia for a wild-card bash on New Year’s Eve, snow-bound again.

“This was a great showcase for us,” Everett explained. “It was very cold and that’s something we’re not used to. We had to get adjusted. If we want to continue on in the playoffs, we have to play in the cold.”

And how cold was it down on the artificial tundra at Sullivan Stadium?

The official low was 20-below, windchill factor included, but don’t take the thermometer’s word for it.

Take a look at the Rams.

It was so cold that Damone Johnson’s fingers nearly froze, costing the Rams a first-quarter touchdown when Everett hit his wide-open tight end right in the Popsicles.

It was so cold that the football shivered, depriving Mike Lansford of a 50-yard field goal by swerving just enough to plow head-on into the left crossbar.

It was so cold that Greg Bell, nothing but a subplot in balmy California, actually became the main story again. Reared in the blizzards of Buffalo, Bell knows how to skate and Robinson was forced to turn him loose when Air Everett had to be de-iced.

Bell slayed ‘em, too, plowing for 210 yards and the game’s decisive touchdown, coming on a three-yard run with 1:55 left.

With the Ram defense, that, of course, was time aplenty for Grogan. The 15-year veteran, summoned from the bench when starter Marc Wilson began looking like a Raider again, rallied New England from a 17-3 deficit and seemed on the verge of beating the clock his last time down the field.

“We would’ve liked to have had Wilson,” Irvin had to admit, “but we got the old guy. When he first came in, he was kind of stiff and methodical, but then the crowd got behind him. He’s a smart guy and he moved the ballclub. He got everything he could out of them.”

After 313 passing yards, Grogan had the ball at the Ram four with nine seconds and three throws left.

First, he went after Irvin, lobbing a pass over his head to Irving Fryar, who caught the ball out of the end zone.

Next, he went to ex-Ram Eric Sievers, aiming for the unkindest cut. But revenge was averted when Grogan fired high and wide.

Finally, with one second on the clock, Grogan faded into the pocket and, from the Rams’ perspective, into eternity.

“He had so much time,” Irvin said. “In this league, you give a man that much time and he usually finds a guy.”

But not this time. The only guy Grogan found was already out of bounds.

The Rams were spared, and grateful for it, although not altogether proud of it.

“It’s good to go into the playoffs, but I’m still disappointed with how we played,” Irvin said. “That team wanted to give away the game, but we forced ourselves to play a lot harder than we had to.”

Irvin shrugged.

“This was good sparring for us,” he said. “Now, the real men come to town. Now, we’ve got to stop Randall Cunningham.”

Sparring?

Scarring is more like it. The Rams were nicked but not knifed, and for that reason, they live to see the light of a wild-card game.

All things considered, they’d rather be in Philadelphia.