St. Louis Rams Pass Rush Took a Step Forward Despite Another Near Collapse

There were still backward steps for the St. Louis Rams defense during a 28-26 win over the Seattle Seahawks.

There was a 52-yard run for Seahawks quarterback Russell Wilson. There were the 303 yards allowed in the second half, which nearly ended in a familiar collapse and a lead of at least two touchdowns evaporating again. The Rams were also burned repeatedly by the read-option and unable to contain Wilson, who ran for 106 yards.

But the forward steps defensively weren’t steps at all; they were bounding leaps and hope fuel regardless of the result (though, yes, winning is always nice).

A Rams pass rush that wasn’t rushing passers at all prior to Week 7 quickly returned to its 2013 form. It was as if, before our very eyes, the Rams’ front four recalled that, yes, we are expected to regularly introduce the opposing quarterback to the inner workings of the turf below.

St. Louis entered Sunday with a mere one sack, and it was one of only four teams in league history to record fewer than two sacks over the first four games of a season.

Then, when the Rams failed to sack San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick this past Monday night, their place in history grew. They became the first team with only that single sack over the first five games. That all came after they finished third in 2013 with 53 sacks.

Then Aaron Donald happened, and he kept happening.

The rookie defensive tackle was the motor driving a Rams pass rush that had been getting close to the quarterback over the past few weeks but still wasn’t seeing results. Remarkably, the Rams sacked Wilson three times Sunday after setting the wrong kind of pass-rushing record over their five previous games.

Even more incredibly, two of those sacks came on one drive. The Rams’ new sack tally then:

Sacks over five games	Sacks today	Sacks by Aaron Donald
1	3	2

As we saw with the 49ers offense and Kaepernick, the solution to neutralizing Donald and defensive end Robert Quinn—who recorded his first sack of the season Sunday—has been simple yet effective. Opposing offenses were structuring a game plan around short, quick-hitting passes that left the ball in their quarterback’s hands for only a little over two seconds.

A few seconds was more than enough time against Wilson. Sure, he may have run forever, scoring a touchdown on the ground and setting a new franchise record for the longest run by a quarterback. But there’s a reason he was escaping from the pocket so much aside from the designed read-option runs.

Often, anywhere but the pocket was his safe place. He still made his now standard wizard plays, highlighted by a scrambling throw to tight end Cooper Helfet that required a tip-toeing sideline catch for a touchdown. But if you’re forcing any quarterback to go full wizard to beat you, as a defense you leave satisfied.

With Donald now a regular starter (he made his second start Sunday) there's no reason to think the Rams won't continue to get pressure going forward.

Having defensive end Chris Long healthy would certainly help, and he'll return later this year. But with Donald creating constant disruption up the middle sacks should keep falling into the hands of either Quinn or defensive end William Hayes when opposing quarterbacks are flushed out of the pocket.

A lack of pocket comfort has returned fast. Just as it was last year that should be the foundation for everything the Rams do both defensively, and offensively when it leads to better field position.

More satisfaction came on the ground, where Marshawn Lynch was held to only 2.9 yards per carry. The Rams run defense had been allowing 139.8 rushing yards per game. While the problem of containing a mobile quarterback still needs to be corrected posthaste, Seattle running backs were held to only 65 yards.

So yes, there was significant forward movement even during another near-collapse which necessitated a fake-punt call late in the fourth quarter and a whole lot of courage. When asked about that call during his postgame press conference, Rams head coach Jeff Fisher said he was ready to do anything if it meant not giving the ball back to Wilson with his play in the second half. Per ESPN.com:

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"You guys saw the flow of the game. We were having a hard time stopping Russell. There was too much time left on the clock right there, and I didn’t want to give the ball back to him, and I thought that was our best chance to get a first down."

"

It was a call that would either win or lose the game after more sputtering. But you still have to earn a lead to blow it, and now the Rams have led the Seahawks, Dallas Cowboys and 49ers by at last 14 points in the first half.

Go ahead and focus on the sunshine here, Rams. It’s been raining tears in St. Louis for long enough.