Delpino Is an Unlikely Scapegoat
The Rams don’t crow after football games anymore. They caw, making buzzard and vulture noises as the scavengers of the working media circle around the locker of the anti-hero of the week, this week’s being Bobby Delpino.
“Be a politician, Bobby,” guard Tom Newberry instructed from a few stalls down.
Sorry. Bobby couldn’t oblige.
The best he could do was be himself, better late than never, because Delpino was anything but himself on the football field earlier Sunday afternoon.
An entire season without fumbling and Delpino drops the football at the Kansas City 39-yard line, leading directly to a Kansas City field goal.
An entire season without fumbling and Delpino drops the football at his own 23-yard line, leading instantly to a Kansas City touchdown by way of linebacker Derrick Thomas’ sideline recovery and rumble.
“I cost us the game,” Delpino said, standing up, needing no prompting. “I cost us 10 points. Ten points against a good team. Ten points in a close game. Our defense played its ass off, our offense moved the ball all over the field, and I give them 10 points.
“I lost the game for us.”
The Rams lost, 27-20, because, against stultifying odds, they found a new way to lose. Get this: Bobby Delpino, the begin-all and end-all of the Rams’ 1991 highlight package, the league leader in touchdowns, the Ram leader in reliability, the emergency solution and salvation to Cleveland Gary’s fateful fickle fingers, fumbles twice in one half--once at the worst moment imaginable.
Score tied.
Two-and-a-half minutes to play.
First down sweep at the Ram 23.
Kansas City safety Deron Cherry pokes a hand in . . . and in a blur of red, white and the blues, Thomas is dancing in the end zone with the football and the Rams are wallflowers once more.
“A stunner,” Ram Coach John Robinson called Delpino’s fumble. “Like a lightning bolt out of the sky.”
“Bobby is a dependable back,” Ram quarterback Jim Everett said. “Bad things keep cropping up. I hope to God they end soon.”
Before Sunday, Delpino had rushed the football 142 times, caught the football 31 times and returned the football three times on kickoffs. He had not fumbled once.
He played another half, rushed 12 more times, caught three more passes, still no fumbles. “My job is to hold onto the football,” Delpino says. He was giving the Rams another honest day’s work.
The streak ended with 5:19 left in the third quarter, on first down, with the Rams driving for the potential tying field goal or maybe more. No one hit Delpino until the football was gone. He squeezed it under his right arm pit as he approached the line and then it squirted free, into the air and finally into the arms of Chief safety Kevin Porter.
Kansas City ball on the Chief 39. Nick Lowery field goal and 20-14 Kansas City lead coming right up.
The Rams could withstand one temporary glitch in the system. In the fourth quarter, they drove 88 yards to tie, only to have kicker Tony Zendejas, the only other unblemished Ram through the first nine games of 1991, miss his first extra-point attempt of the season. Three things the Rams could depend on--Delpino’s hands, Zendejas’ right foot--and all of them were failing them now.
But it wasn’t the end. The score was still tied, 20-20, when Delpino was handed the ball again and told to sweep right end.
A good percentage play, right?
Couldn’t happen again, right?
“I think I saw an invisible hand come up and tick the ball loose,” said Everett, trying to inject a little levity. “I’m going to ask our stadium crew if they can take care of that.”
Actually, the hand belonged to Cherry. Delpino figured it would be coming. “I knew they’d try to strip the ball,” he said. “That’s what they teach over there. They try to tackle the football on every play.”
Delpino said he tried to straight-arm Cherry. “I was trying to get a few extra yards and get out of bounds. I was concentrating on holding on tight.
“But the ball came loose. It was amazing. It seemed like the ball just went floating on its own.”
Delpino wished the football would have rolled out of bounds, but it didn’t.
Delpino wished he’d have committed these fumbles in Atlanta, “when we got stomped and it wouldn’t have mattered,” but he didn’t.
“It comes down to being professional, and I wasn’t,” Delpino said. “You’re not professional when you leave two balls on the ground against a team like the Chiefs, in a game you should’ve won. . . .
“The first one cost us great field position and gave them three points. The second one, they ran back for a TD. That’s just carelessness. You can say, ‘Well, these things happen,’ but to me, that’s B.S. We have a job to do, just like you (reporters) do. If you print a misprint, that’s not very professional. You have to take the blame for it. Well, so do we.”
Delpino took no solace in the fact the Rams had hung in for 60 minutes with one of the best teams in the league. “They hung in with us,” he said. He took no solace in the words of encouragement Robinson had earlier offered. “When we do get to playing playoff-type football,” Robinson said, “I will give the football to Bobby Delpino in that same situation. He’s one of the best football players in this league and he’s one of the best at running the football in the clutch.”
“That’s thoughtful,” Delpino acknowledged, “but today, it’s very obvious. I cost us the ball game.
“Every week, it’s someone else,” he continued, speaking barely above a whisper. “The whole year, it’s not me . . . and now it’s me. Two fumbles. Two major ones. It’s a scary thought. Can’t we go through a game without throwing it away? Can’t we? Will it ever stop?”
Delpino provided his own answer.
“It has to.”
Delpino didn’t sound convinced, but considering the moment at hand, and considering his hands at the moment, it was all the faith he was going to muster.