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The Rams run defense may not have been as bad as you think against the Eagles
The Los Angeles Rams finished their season last Sunday with a heartbreaking loss to the Philadelphia Eagles. They came 14-yards away from hosting the NFC Championship game, falling just short. Watching it back, it became clear that overall the Rams played the better game. However, there were five or six devastating moments and another handful of missed plays that ended up being the difference.
It’s one thing to give up three touchdown runs of 40 or more yards. However, combined with missed opportunities and it’s hard to recover. In the first half, Tyler Higbee catches a pass and cuts towards the sideline. If he runs upfield, it’s probably a first down. On the following play, the Rams have a screen set up to Kyren Williams that may end up in scoring range. Instead, Oren Burks makes an open field tackle. Higbee and Puka Nacua had two drops in the second half on back-to-back plays. During the final sequence, Kevin Dotson and Beaux Limmer have a miscommunication as Higbee runs open over the middle.
Still, there was also a lot to like about the Rams season and how they performed against the Eagles. Let’s jump into the final film review of the season.
Against the Eagles, the Rams couldn’t allow one thing to happen and that was explosive runs from Saquon Barkley. They gave up two of them, both of which were devastating in the moment. The Eagles running back finished with 26 carries for 205 yards and two touchdowns.
Multiple things can be true when it comes to Barkley’s performance. The Rams defense needed to do a better job limiting those explosive runs. At the same time, throughout the course of the game, they did a good job containing Barkley. The long runs were more about the Eagles taking advantage of specific defensive looks. On the first touchdown run, the Eagles have a 3rd-and-4 and Hurts checks to a run with the Rams in their lighter dime look on defense. The result was not enough big bodies at the second level to make a play. The second touchdown run was poor gap discipline.
On the other 24 runs, the Rams held Barkley to just 2.7 yards per carry. It’s not as if he was gashing them six or seven yards at a time. It was almost diabolical that Chris Shula pulled out Vic Fangio’s 6-1 front that stifled McVay for 18 months against the Eagles. On the play below, you’ll see the defensive front completely takes away any cutback lane for Barkley.
This is not to say that the Rams run defense was great against the Eagles. However, the big picture shows that they did well. Unfortunately, there are a few stains that take away from the performance as a whole. The defense could still use an upgrade over Christian Rozeboom and another gap-eating nose tackle....
