Rams Become Trailblazers Again
You never could rely on the Raiders and the Rams when they were here, so should anything be different now?
Pre-game tale of the tape:
Won-lost records: Raiders 4-0, Rams 0-5.
Average points scored per game: Raiders 40.5, Rams 14.8.
Quarterbacks physically unable to play: Raiders 0, Rams two. Quarterbacks going head-to-head: the Raiders’ Rich Gannon, bidding for his fourth consecutive 350-yard passing game, versus the Rams’ Marc Bulger, bidding to survive his first NFL start.
On paper, this was a bigger mismatch than Los Angeles versus the moving vans, 1995. Bigger than “Today’s Round-Table Debate: Georgia Frontiere versus Al Davis on the merits of the passing game.”
Final score from St. Louis: Rams 28, Raiders 13.
One week after scoring 49 points against Buffalo and two weeks after scoring 52 points against Tennessee, the Raiders managed two field goals and a meaningless fourth-quarter touchdown against a banged-up Ram defense that had launched a full-scale retreat in a 37-13 loss to San Francisco seven days earlier.
Bulger, forced into the lineup because of injuries to Kurt Warner and Jamie Martin, pierced the Raider defense for three touchdown passes en route to an economical, efficient 14-for-21 performance and 186 passing yards.
Who is Marc Bulger, and what is he doing taking down the NFL’s last undefeated team?
He’s a second-year pro from West Virginia, originally drafted by New Orleans in the sixth round in 2000 and did not play a down for the Rams in 2001. He spent a lot of time watching Warner, and evidently he’s a bright kid, because after losing, Raider Coach Bill Callahan paid Bulger the ultimate backhanded compliment: “He understands the system.”
Intriguingly, Bulger made his historic debut on the same day Raider wide receiver Jerry Rice turned 40. There’s a chance these two events are not totally disconnected. For those wondering if the Raiders’ old legs and lungs would hold up through Christmas, the answer may have been provided Sunday: They might not make it through Halloween.
The Rams also won on the same day the Minnesota Vikings defeated the Detroit Lions, 31-24, at the Metrodome. The Rams and Vikings, two playoff perennials waiting until Columbus Day Weekend for their first victories of the 2002 season. Ordinarily, no victory over the Lions is worthy of celebration, but the Vikings doused Coach Mike Tice, oh-for-the-NFL no longer, as they moved from 0-4 to 1-4.
Thus on Sunday, the football team from Minnesota ended a season-opening losing streak at four games as the baseball team from Minnesota concluded a four-game losing streak. Tough times in those Twin Cities -- the Twins’ season is over, the Vikings still have much to do before they salvage theirs. Go you Timberwolves!
Victories by the Rams and the Vikings left the NFL with only one winless team after six weeks, and you didn’t need six weeks to figure out the last team standing would be the Cincinnati Bengals. The Bengals lost to Pittsburgh, 34-7, dropping them to 0-6 for the fifth time since 1991. Coaches change, quarterbacks change, divisions change, but the Bengals are always there when you need them, as the 1-3 Steelers most definitely did.
“They did us a favor out there, let’s face it,” said Steeler safety Lee Flowers after intercepting Bengal quarterback Jon Kitna twice to double his career interception total.
Trying his best not to bite the hand that had just fed him, Flowers did what he could to be kind to Kitna, who was sacked five times and intercepted three times. “Not bad-mouthing Kitna,” he began, before deciding to bad-mouth him anyway, “but I thought he made some bad throws. It wasn’t like we had to make great breaks on the ball.”
This was volatile stuff, bulletin-board fodder, remarks to be stored away and used for inspiration the next time Cincinnati and Pittsburgh get together.
Except these are the Bengals.
Kitna pretty much agreed with Flowers, maintaining that he had never played a worse game in his life, and “I’ve been playing since the fifth grade.”
Kitna’s blocking back, Lorenzo Neal, on hand to lend emotional support, added, “We’re the laughing stock of the league. It’s embarrassing. It’s a disgrace. Teams just look at you with no respect.”
The traditional routes of franchise improvement aren’t working for the Bengals. Trades backfire. They sign the wrong free agents. The Bengal war room on draft day sounds like a Comedy Central pilot.
Obviously, the Bengals need to look for players in different places.
Obviously, the Bengals need to sign some New Jersey Red Dogs.
Sunday, they were beaten by a quarterback, Tommy Maddox, who used to play for the Red Dogs, indoors, for the Arena League. Maddox, who threw for 62 touchdowns for the Dogs in 2000, completed 16 of 25 passes for 216 yards in the rout of the Bengals.
Maddox’s favorite target that season in New Jersey? Wide receiver Michael Lewis, who scored 15 touchdowns for the Dogs in 2000 and had 356 combined return and receiving yards Sunday in the Saints’ 43-27 triumph over Washington.
Among those 356 yards: a 90-yard kickoff return for a touchdown and an 83-yard punt return for a touchdown. Lewis also had a 58-yard pass reception to set up a field goal.
Long live the New Jersey Red Dogs ... except that proud franchise has been defunct for more than a year. They’ve gone to a better place, or at least a better place than the Bengals find themselves today.
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*--* Happy Returns Returns for touchdowns in Week 6: PLAYER TEAM AGAINST RETURN FOR TD ANTWAAN RANDLE EL Pittsburgh Cincinnati 99 yards (kickoff) MICHAEL LEWIS New Orleans Washington 90 yards (kickoff) MICHAEL LEWIS New Orleans Washington 83 yards (punt) IFEANYI OHALETE Washington New Orleans 78 yards (interception) PATRICK SURTAIN Miami Denver 40 yards (interception) CHRIS CLAIBORNE Detroit Minnesota 20 yards (interception)
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