How the Los Angeles Rams' youth movement is bucking the NFL trend
The surging LA Rams are helmed by a 31-year-old head coach (and a 23-year-old quarterback), but NFL youth movements are anything but a sure thing
If there are two things we have been told about the millennial generation, it is these: 1) they are somehow the cause of every problem across the globe; and 2) the entirety of their nourishment comes from eating avocado toast at every meal.
While the avocado toast intake might be slightly exaggerated – although please understand that avocado toast is truly delicious for breakfast, lunch or dinner – the claim by olds that millennials are a drain on society is clearly not true. We know this because the Los Angeles Rams, coached by 31-year-old Sean McVay, are a surprising 7-2 so far this season and have the highest-scoring offense in the NFL. Any team would love to be ruined like that by a young whippersnapper.
There is no way to overstate how well McVay has done in his first season on the job. When the Rams tabbed him to replace Jeff Fisher back in January, healthy skepticism about handing over a franchise to such a young coach accompanied the announcement. Previous “youngest ever” NFL coaches had all been failures, from Lane Kiffin to Harland Svare, and it was hard to see someone with so little experience turning around a team that hasn’t had a winning season since 2003. It was even more difficult to believe that Rams owner Stan Kroenke would make a good decision.
But McVay has passed every test along the way, beginning with his decision to hire Wade Phillips as defensive coordinator. With Son of Bum keeping Aaron Donald and the Rams defense rolling, McVay has been able to focus his magic on the offense.
McVay’s innovative system has turned Jared Goff into one of the most efficient passers in football. Feared to be a bust after his rookie season, Goff is on pace for 4,200 yards, 28 touchdowns and just sevne interceptions in Year Two. Robert Woods, a middling contributor through his first four NFL seasons with the Bills, is suddenly one of the league’s top big play threats; he has TD receptions of 94 and 52 yards just in the last two weeks alone. And running back Todd Gurley, after slumping in his sophomore season in 2016, is back to churning out yards on the ground and is now a dangerous receiving option out of the backfield, as well. Meanwhile, the Washington offense that McVay coordinated last year – after being third in the league in total yards in – has dropped to fifteenth without him calling the plays.
Goff says that it is McVay’s creative playcalling that has enabled the Rams offense to separate from the rest of the league.
“We have some plays in there where we’re like, ‘What are we doing this for?’” Goff told the OC Register. “And sure enough, we see it and we’re like, ‘Oh, it’s going to work.’ That happens weekly.”
The road is about to get much tougher for McVay and the Rams. Five of their final seven opponents – the Vikings, Saints, Eagles, Seahawks and Titans – all have winning records. But even if the Rams stumble a bit down the stretch, McVay’s success will surely open the door to more young coaches as NFL head coaches, right? Maybe not. Because after McVay, other non-gray beards aren’t doing so well.
Kyle Shanahan
McVay wasn’t the only thirtysomething head coach hired by NFC West team before the season. The 49ers, in the ashes of the Jim Tomsula and Chip Kelly experiments, handed things over to 37-year-old Kyle Shanahan. But while McVay already has almost doubled the four wins the Rams had last year, Shanahan’s 49ers have yet to reach the two victories San Francisco posted in 2016. The Niners are 1-9 and only posted their first victory last Sunday against the lowly Giants. Some 49ers fans have to be wondering if the team chose the wrong, young, supposed offensive mastermind to lead the franchise. McVay also interviewed there last January, but the job was given to Shanahan.
That said, the 49ers don’t have near the talent the Rams have in place. There’s no Aaron Donald or Todd Gurley and the quarterback is not a recent No1 overall pick, but CJ Beathard – the 104th pick of the 2017 draft. Atlanta, where Shanahan coordinated the offense last year, has seen its high-flying attack drop across the board since he left, as well. Shanahan will be given time to turn things around in San Francisco. And, at his age, time is something he has in reserve.
Adam Gase
Gase, age 39, built a reputation as a playcalling mastermind as the offensive coordinator of the Denver Broncos in the 2013 and 2014 seasons. Looking back, it seems more like he just happened to be a guy holding a clipboard near Peyton Manning. Since taking over as Dolphins head coach a season ago, Miami has not exactly lit up the scoreboard.
As one critic said of the offense back in September: “Just garbage.” Or as the same critic called the Dolphins in October: “The worst offense in football. It’s hard to go lower than that.” The name of that critic? Adam Gase. Yes, the architect of a Miami attack that is dead-last in the NFL in scoring at 15.2 points per game. Gase doesn’t even have Shanahan’s excuse of lack of talent. Jarvis Landry and DeVante Parker are talented receivers; Mike Pouncey and Laremy Tunsil blue chip offensive linemen; Jay Cutler the quarterback Gase hand-picked after Ryan Tannehill got injured in training camp; and, until two weeks ago when they trade him to Philadelphia, the Dolphins had Jay Ajayi, who was coming off of a 1,200-yard season. Gase isn’t yet in danger of losing his job, but he might want to see if there are any job opportunities available to stand near Peyton Manning during commercial shoots.
Ben McAdoo
While the Giants head coach has Michael Douglas’ hairstyle from 1987’s Wall Street, he’s only 40 years old. Really. But a season like the Giants have had can age a man. Fancying themselves Super Bowl contenders at the start of the season, the Giants are 1-8 and see themselves now as a team in the mix for the No1 overall draft pick. Whoever they do end up picking in the 2018 draft likely won’t play for McAdoo, however. The Giants have clearly quit on McAdoo and team management will likely quit on him after the season mercifully ends next month.
“Ben McAdoo is our head coach and has our support,’’ a statement issued by ownership on Monday read. “Our plan is to do what we have always done, which is to not offer a running commentary on the season. It is our responsibility to determine the reasons for our poor performance and at the end of the year, we will evaluate the 2017 season in its entirety and make a determination on how we move forward.”
That was a long way to say: “Ben McAdoo will be fired after this season.” When he is, it will be interesting to see which generation the Giants look to to fill the void. Maybe McAdoo, who the Giants hired at age 39 and is now 40, is simply too old and set in his ways to have success in today’s NFL. Maybe the Giants need someone a good bit younger, like Sean McVay, to turn their team around. If you decide to go that route, Giants, just make sure to have a lot of avocado toast available at interviews to impress your candidates.
