NOTEBOOK : Landeta’s Punts Land the Rams in Some Jams

Even Sean Landeta cannot do this at will--take a football, kick it while a bunch of guys rush at him and then watch it settle inside the five-yard line, with the aid of a bounce or a teammate.

But he does have a pretty good idea of how to get it done, as witnesses Sunday at Anaheim Stadium can attest.

As the second half of the Rams’ 31-7 loss to the New York Giants wore on, the Rams were hoping for some decent field position.

Landeta was most uncooperative. On three consecutive punts, he pinned the Rams at their three-yard line.

“I’m not gonna sit here and tell you I can do it all the time,” Landeta said. “But you can kick the ball in a way to get the bounce.”

And what is the art of the bounce?

“There are four ways the ball can bounce,” Landeta said. “And three of them are good--right, left or back.

“Basically, there are two things you can do. You can turn the ball in your hands a little bit, and you can try to kick the ball high to get it to come straight down. If you do that, you’ve got a great chance. But if you drive the ball, by the fact that it’s a line drive, it’s likely to carry into the end zone.”

Twice the Giants intentionally took delay-of-game penalties to set Landeta back five yards.Twice he responded with kicks that landed inside the Ram five. Landeta irritated the Rams all afternoon with punts averaging 46.8 yards, including a 53-yarder.

Kevin Greene does not come quietly, or unannounced.

But when Phil Simms was dropped for one of Greene’s two sacks, he swore he was taken unaware.

“I didn’t see him coming,” Simms said. “It’s hard to imagine Kevin Greene sneaking up on you, but he did.”

Troy Kyles, who joined the Giants as a free agent out of Howard University and had not caught a pass all season, burned the Rams twice. Both times were on plays in which he cut cross-field, against the flow of the zone.

One went for 35 yards, the other for 17.

“They didn’t know who he was, so they covered everybody else,” Simms cracked. “The play that was called put the defense they were playing in a tough position.”

Ram kicker Mike Lansford missed his only field-goal attempt Sunday, a 40-yarder in the first quarter wide left. He is now eight-for-15 this season.

In his last three games, Lansford has made two of his five attempts, and is three-for-nine from 40 to 49 yards this season.

But Coach John Robinson said Lansford’s miss Sunday wasn’t anything to be overly concerned about.

“Well, I thought it was a hard kick, and it was up in the air, just slightly wide,” Robinson said. “I think Mike will have a good last half of the season.”

Last season, Lansford was 23-for-30 and was eight-for-10 on kicks 40 to 49 yards.

Razzle? Yes. Dazzle? No. With 14 seconds remaining in the first half and the ball on their own 46-yard line, the Rams tried a little trickery.

Quarterback Jim Everett threw a pass to tight end Pete Holohan. Holohan caught the ball and, in almost the same motion, threw a two-handed scoop lateral to fullback Buford McGee, who was trailing the play.

The play gained only seven yards, however, when Giants’ safety Greg Jackson, who had been covering Holohan, was virtually guided in for the tackle by simply following Holohan.

Talk about your soft zone defenses. How far off the receivers were the Ram defensive backs Sunday? Well, on a third-and-eight situation in the third quarter, quarterback Phil Simms’ pass to Stephen Baker was tipped by Ram defensive tackle Brian Smith, and Baker fell down. But cornerback Latin Berry was playing so deep, Baker caught the wobbling pass lying on his back for a Giant first down.

Robinson, who took pains to say he wasn’t blaming officials’ calls for the loss and emphasized he was only responding to the question, said he disagreed with two key calls.

One was an intentional grounding penalty on Everett in the first quarter, when the Rams were deep in Giant territory. The other was a hands-to-the-face call in the second quarter on defensive tackle Alvin Wright on a successful Giant field goal. The Giants decided to accept the penalty, thus taking three points off the scoreboard, and scored five plays later on a Simms to Mark Bavaro pass.

“Obviously, something has come down from the league,” Robinson said about the intentional grounding call. “I was watching the television this morning and in a similar situation they made it intentional grounding. So they’ve changed the rule.

“The ball went right over one receiver’s head. Our quarterback was trying to ground the ball, he was trying to throw the ball out of bounds, but I think we’ve gotten used to a standard that appears to be changing. I wish we knew when they were changing it.”

And on the Wright call: “They called one of our defensive linemen for striking one of their people in the face. You know, in that melee that goes on, it’s like a rugby scrum, it’s just pushing and shoving that goes on. I’ve never seen it called--just a very unusual call.”

Times staff writers John Weyler and Tim Kawakami contributed to this story.