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After the Atlanta game....---

From the missed meeting until today! Wow! What a turnaround.

I keep reading references to the vets on D being so excited about the O. That stuff about how they were watching that first drive in amazement and having to run to stay warmed up for when they went back in.

On the radio, DV said tonight [Sept 27]  someone looked up the last time the Rams had drives that long in plays and time. The answers were something like 1991 and 1990.

In general,  I am rational about hopes and realistically optimistic. But these guys are turning on their heads those "normal" principles of what is plausible according to laws of probability. I look at this team as it is right now and I look around the league, and I'm telling you what: predicting 9-7 or even 10-6 is to "damn with faint praise"! The FACTS of the team and the league are making it unrealistic NOT to expect some very exalted achievements! In fact, apart from killer injuries, if we win FEWER than 11 or so with this bunch, I will feel that we underachieved badly. I really will!

In the NFC, I feel that ONLY MN and GB have the talent to play with us. Wash. has a lot of O, apparently, but apparently not much D. Dallas is old and has few dimensions. Who else? Is Ditka's D really good enough to hold us to where Ricky can be a factor---by himself? The Whiners can't match us with no secondary and no running game.

If I step back and look at what I am saying and apply those normal principles of common sense, I think I'm nuts, talking like deluded fans talk.

It is impossible, unbelievable, not to be credited. No one in the league replaces 11 guys and wins immediately. Yet it is a fact. We have a top-5 offense. It is as simple as that.

We can't say any more than that, because we have not proven we can execute in playoffs and all the rest like a Favre and a Marino have (like the Vikings HAVE NOT yet done!). So I DON"T know if we are ready to roll in the playoffs. That's a long way off and we have that running thing. The big game might be a year away.

But aside from not knowing what we can do in the clutch, I'll tell you this: we have the most lethal, explosive offense in the league. And if KW holds up, we just may have the league's BEST offense!

But when I look at what we have done this year, how we have just rolled over two of the league's best Ds, the sheer NUMBER of receivers we send out who are all OPEN play after play, I think that these outrageous claims are, well, reflections of the reality!

And it's what I see with the vets on D: Lyght, Lyle, Carter, Farr. They are hungry--really hungry, as in Lyght's comment on wanting not just the meat but the bone.

Remember this--the weak links, the guys  so aptly called "faux leaders," are gone.

The vets who have done the losing AND WHO ARE STILL AROUND, are some pretty tough guys. And they have been around the block in this league.

They know something: they know an outstanding offense when they see one. They know what your posts forget: while ATL is down and BALT has O troubles, and on and on, we have played most of the top Ds in the league in pre-season and in Games 1 & 2. Few of the teams we face the rest of the way have Ds any where near that good.

And these vets stood on that sideline during that 1st drive against a Super Bowl D (with few injuries) and their jaws dropped. Read what they say about it in the PD! Think about what Farr has said repeatedly about KW, hoe the TEAM knows how good he is while no one else does. Their profession is stopping NFL Os and they saw something incredible.

Their reaction? They went out and played like wild men.

See, if you have hungry, competitive players who are TIRED TO DEATH of losing (throw Bruce in here too!), and if you give them a real shot at winning, they will bear down and lay their souls on the line!

The phenomenon operating here is the same one that lit up the Falcons last year. All season long, it was the Falcons against the world. No one believed they could do anything. Then everyone figured it was because of the easy schedule. But those guys KNEW they were good and they were TIRED of losing. Clearly, a major factor in beating the Vikings in the playoffs was that they were hungrier, meaner, wanted it more than those spoiled, self-congratulating 'Queens. The 'Queens are in the playoffs every year, and not even when they had the incredible offensive streak going could they overcome their diffidence and do the job. It took far more guts to get to where the Falcons had brought themselves than it had for the 'Queens to draft Moss and throw all year.

I see that in the Rams. There were quotations in the paper about how those vets are not going to blow the year like they did in 95. And it isn't just bravado or empty resolution. They KNOW what the league is about and they KNOW that this team has far more talent than that '95 team did. And they are NOT going to tolerate defeat.

Sunday, they played the first big game of the year. The pressure was on, the opportunity was there. How did they play? Tell me!

They EXECUTED their asses off! The whole damn team. That's how they reacted to pressure. Compare it to the few big games we had last year!

When a hungry team acquires a critical mass of talent, overcomes early adversity (TG's injury) and then shows week after week that it can execute, you know what you have?

A winner! A stone cold winner. They will not let down this year. They are seasoned pros who FINALLY have a chance to win and win big!

I think all the years of losing have brough us to a very narrow point in the river. These guys feel they can reach across and touch the goal. That's how they were all pre-season, just dying to get on the field and make it come true.

As for me--I trust them. For the first time since 1969, I TRUST the Rams! I have loved them, hopoed in them, suffered with them. But never before this year have I TRUSTED them. This year I do, because I see a stunning combination of talent, grit, good coaching, and leadership coming from all parts of the team.

Remember last year, after, say, the Jets game? We'd looked good, and we all wanted to believe it could happen again. We kept telling ourselves that we could play Miami, but deep down we knew that we didn't have what it took.

I feel SO different this year. I expect this team to fly---AND IT DOES! Of course, we still have developmental hurdles to overcome---like playing a poorish but dangerous team this week. But when I think that way, I think of the critical mass of talent we have and I think of how disciplined, confident, and effective these guys have been all summer/fall and how hungry they are, and how they got through the TG injury so well, and I just feel, "We'll be all right!"

It's a confidence I've NEVER had, even in the old days, because the Rams have never had an overwhelming O like this. In the old days, the D would play like Hall of Famers and the O would grind it out, but Fran Tarkenton would beat us with a cheap play. This year, it'll take 5-6 cheap plays to beat us!