Sean McVay's Rams Face Major Special Teams Changes

Sean McVay was as angry as we've ever seen him after the loss in primetime to the Bills. He was going to make changes. He did fire the punter, fire the kicker. We'll see what happens with their entire special teams apparatus. But do you expect McVay to coach any differently or be different going forward with their team now two and three and they're three and a half games back after week five of the 49ers? Does that change things in terms of the way McVay is going to approach the rest of the year? I actually do a little bit. you know um yeah i do and to answer your question matt i was surprised at Sean McVay's play calling and look i went back and looked at that series once they got to around the 35 yard line they got in field goal range in overtime after the fumble recovery by Aaron Donald punched out by Nate Landman that you know um made it look like the rams are going to go down and win he gets to the 35 and most people thought he looked a little conservative on on some of those plays if you look at one of the first plays of that series he had like a a texas route for Kyron Williams to pop off and rotate to the center of the field kyron has the wherewithal i think to see that they're thinking he's going to kind of curl around so kyron just starts streaking down the center of the field he's wide open and Matthew Stafford you know maybe he did a three-step drop he's throwing off his back foot as the pocket's collapsing he misses him by maybe a yard or two that's a touchdown there's no safety back there that is a touchdown that's a play that Sean McVay probably wishes he has back Matthew Stafford wishes he has that throwback because we're talking about the Rams with a walk-off touchdown winning over time instead of that they then throw get five yards I think to Puka on second down and third down I think Sean tried to you know maybe get cute catch him off guard with a with a rushing play to Kyron Williams it goes nowhere for no gain but if he had busted that you know there's something else I don't think I'm wondering if And I didn't get a chance to ask him yesterday, but I'm wondering, Matt, if in Sean McVay's head, he saw what happened between Washington and the New York Giants earlier in the week where they couldn't get the playoff and that game ends in a tie. They couldn't even get a field goal off. He sees James Cook fumble the play before. I'm wondering if he's like, you know what, let's just be conservative and kick the ball here and get out of here with a win. um whereas most of the time he doesn't he's never really had the confidence in Harrison Miv as the thicker kicker for those 50 and greater yard kicks he just hasn't and he hasn't with any field goal kicker since Greg Zuerlein you know back when he first came here almost 10 years ago uh and so and they've and they've looked like they've been penny pinching on the special team side of the ball for a long time now and look justifiably so because you know special teams can help you lose games of course as we've seen over the years with the Rams but they're not going of help you win games to the point where your offense and defense are on the field, which is for like 95% of the snaps. And so he tends to try to bargain shop when it comes to those positions and hiring Bubba Ventrone to fix this unit in the off season was a step in the right direction. That's going to take time. We're seeing some of the same mistakes, but they've already moved on from their punt returner, Xavier Smith. Um, I'd like to see him give Dean Connors a guy, a chance. They call him like the mini Christian McCaffrey. I think he'd be a great return guy, uh, rather than uh Alex Bachman who they promoted off the practice squad right now who's at least more reliant at catching the ball and making better decisions but he's not you don't have any fear that Alex Bachman is going to take it 60 yards to the house so there's things they can improve and to answer your your question from the beginning i think because of that and because of what's happening with this field goal unit until you know Blake Rice you know the little Blake he's going from the thicker kicker to the little guy uh until he can prove he can consistently make those 50, 55 to 60 yard field goals. Sean McVay is going to be going for it.