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There were penalties. And defensive miscues. But this one comes down to the ineptitude of the offense.
The Rams went into San Francisco and held the Niners to their fourth-lowest scoring output of the year. The defense did enough, especially in the ground game where the vaunted Rams defensive line helped limit the Niners' three running backs to just 62 yards on 26 carries for less than 2.5 yards per carry. That's stellar.
Pass defense wasn't sparkling with the repeated Anquan Boldin conversions, but overall it wasn't horrible. The Rams held their opposing quarterback under 300 yards and to just one touchdown. I'll take that every week.
Unfortunately, the Rams couldn't do much on offense when the refs weren't capping them off. Zac Stacy was unremarkable, though he did pick up some chunks that would seemingly make things easier for the passing game.
Nope.
Drops from across the team helped nothing. Chris Givens caught just two passes on nine targets. The Rams never unlocked Tavon Austin. Isaiah Pead had a functional role.
It's not entirely fair to Kellen Clemens to expect him to not be Kellen Clemens. That is not something that will change nor is it something to propel this offense.
All things considered, this is kind of where we are.
At this point, the Rams have to use the remainder of this year to build on what they have and what's staying around. It's worth paying attention to.