Rams Fans United - Los Angeles Rams Fan Discussion Forum

PER RAMSWIRE:
Rams LT Andrew Whitworth was on Colin Cowherd Show on January 22 and agreed with Cowherd assessment that the Rams struggles of 2019 were because they lost the services of two outstanding Interior Linemen, Rodger Saffold and John Sullivan.

Whitworth went on to point out how great Saffold has shown in the NFL Playoffs for the Titans and said he "texts Titans OT Taylor Lewan regularly about how mad he is at him for having Saffold".

Withworth also said that whilst Noteboom and Allen might equal the production of Saffold and Sullivan "eventually in their careers".....BUT...
"it was unreasonable to expect them to perform at such a high level immediately."

ME: Extrapolating a tad, clearly Andrew Whitworth is joining me in urging the termination of Aaron Kromer as Rams OLine Coach for 2020, eh!!

Seriously, Whit identified the loss of Saffold and Sullivan as the boiled down root cause of Rams struggles in 2019. Hard for Kromer backers to argue that Whit doesn't know what he is talking about, eh!

Anyhow, McVay will populate his Coaching Staff how ever he feels appropriate......but Whitworth's comments reinforced for me what I have felt since last August......IE. Kromer oversold the readiness of Noteboom and Allen, and either advocated, or at the very least, signed-off on the two not having to perform any PreSeason snaps. Had McSnead been shown how unready Noteboom and Allen really were, maybe they could've found some last minute Free Agent help for the 2019 Rams OLine Interior.

What a clusterfook decision to start those two yutes!

As for Kromer rallying the yutes into a serviceable unit later in the 2019 season.....HA!!
Pittsburgh....3 Offensive Points scored
Baltimore AT HOME...6 Offensive Points scored
Dallas IN A MUST WIN GAME...7 Offensive Point scored during first 56.5 minutes....then two garbage time TDs......also 14 carries for 26 rushing yards...1.6 Yds/Carry versus Cowboys....a 8-8 non-playoff team.

Yeah, Kromer for President!!!

I just dont know how much Kromer has to do with personnel decisions.. perhaps he snowed the brass, or perhaps the cap killed the line after all those signing last off season.
Either way, the astute audience here at RFU was worried about what happened to the online last off season ahead of time.

Me thinks Kromer or no Kromer, the problem will be addressed before we take another snap..

Hacksaw wrote:I just dont know how much Kromer has to do with personnel decisions.. perhaps he snowed the brass, or perhaps the cap killed the line after all those signing last off season.
Either way, the astute audience here at RFU was worried about what happened to the online last off season ahead of time.

Me thinks Kromer or no Kromer, the problem will be addressed before we take another snap..

It seems that Saffold and Sullivan's experience were greatly missed in the rushing game. I think both of them left a lot to be desired in pass-pro but crippling the running game had a ripple effect on the offense.

Granted, it wasn't as if the offense was humming along for much of the second half of the '18 season but had Saffold at least stayed, continuity wouldn't have been such a prominent issue and the scheme adjustments could have happened more quickly in '19.

Hacksaw wrote:I just dont know how much Kromer has to do with personnel decisions.. perhaps he snowed the brass, or perhaps the cap killed the line after all those signing last off season.
Either way, the astute audience here at RFU was worried about what happened to the online last off season ahead of time.

Me thinks Kromer or no Kromer, the problem will be addressed before we take another snap..

If McV wanted to move on from Kromer, that moment has passed. In fact his original impulse in 2017 was to hire Bill Calahan, but he wasn't available. Well Calahan was free for a while recently after being fired in Washington. He was free, but then the Browns signed him.

So McV had that chance plus of course many others to move on from AK, and did not. That's in a time where he also replaced 4 coaches. A transition time. You can pretty much bet if he kept a guy, he believes in him.

Of all Rams fans I read and am familiar with all over the net, there is really only one big outspoken Kromer critic.

Kromer has a long, very deep, very good career building OLs in New Orleans, Chicago, and Buffalo. Whatever went wrong with the OL in 2019, it was a lot of things, and IMO does not reduce to simple coach blame. Besides it was a mixed bag anyway. They certainly missed Saffold, and other things went wrong too. But then toward the end they were doing things like hanging tough against the SF defense in a close game, and that's with 3 injury replacements including 2 rookies. 3 injury replacements on the OL is usually the kiss of death. Yet the OL in that game played better than the 2018 OL did against the Patz. So anyway yeah the OL started out a mess in 2019 but actually showed promise with the newbies toward the end.

I don't buy Kromer had a hand in Saffold leaving. In fact, I'll bet he wasn't too happy about it. But position coaches don't get involved in that aspect. The head coach, GM and Demoff are the ones who determine how much to pay a guy. And they felt the money needed to go elsewhere. They were wrong in that, for sure. It was a calculated mistake. But the blame should go above Kromer's pay grade.

I would think IF Kromer said, "yes coach, these young guys can cover for Saffold and Sullivan with no problem, I'll bet my job on it", he'd be gone. I don't think McVay believes for one NY second that this was Kromer's fault, or he'd be gone. I think it may be a case of they wanted to pay Goff. They paid Higbee (which turned out to be a good move). They knew they would have to pay Kupp, Fowler, Littleton, etc in the very near future AND they had a stable of young guys who were due to move up on the O line. Unfortunately they got injured, which was not Kromer's fault.

In other words money drove the loss of Saffold and Sullivan, not Kromer. It was a calculated decision made by McVay, Snead, Demoff and Kromer. But what a short memory we have as Sullivan wasn't exactly a favorite of many Ram fans.....in fact many believed he was the weak link on the OL (along with Blythe) and wanted him replaced. I do agree with Whitworth that OL continuity caused a lot of problems for the offense in 2019. The performances of Whitworth and Havenstein didn't help either.

I’m really tired of seeing Sullivan tied in to this conversation, he was washed up and would have signed for a bag of Cheetos. He may have even been worse than what we saw, if he even made the team. As it was nobody else wanted him either.
I’m also sick of the “Saffold effect”. Tennessee was a damn good rushing team in 2018, (even better when they gave the ball to Henry instead of Lewis) and finished with the same 9-7 record as the 2019 team did.
No, the Rams problem with the o-line was that it underperformed. Whatever player evaluation was used, was a total failure. Whatever scheme was built around the current roster, addressing their strengths and weakness, a disaster.
Nice of Whit to deflect blame, but Kromer did a poor job. San Fran played without both of their starting tackles and they didn’t skip a beat. A1 posted many other teams who had lines composed of castoffs and low drafted linemen.

dieterbrock wrote:San Fran played without both of their starting tackles and they didn’t skip a beat. A1 posted many other teams who had lines composed of castoffs and low drafted linemen.

Was it because they were better coached? Their line coach taught them how to block better? Or was it the offensive scheme that knew how to play to whatever their strengths were?

I think McVay's scheme was figured out by defenses. And that made things difficult to execute for everyone. They did seem to improve in pass protection later in the season. So there is hope going into next year.

I for one sure hope our young savant HC isn't just a one trick pony. He lost a lot of coaching help from his breakout year as the win total declines...

Whitworth needs to take some of that blame as well. He really fell off the cliff last season.