By Warner4Prez

As the NFL season runs towards a dramatic conclusion for our Rams and the NFC West, things don’t get any easier for this team as they learn to piece together a winning season. Just as coach Spagnuolo’s team had clawed their way to a .500 record, they travel to New Orleans to face the reigning World Champions. Sure the Rams took that Saints team to the final minutes in a meeting last year, but it wasn’t a game nearly indicative of either squad…back then.

Fast forward to our current state of the NFL, both of these teams have a reason to smile as they stand. The Rams are rising, and quite quickly, but the Saints are on the rise as well. Sure they are trailing the ‘Hot’lanta Falcons right now, but they Saints are on fire and getting healthy at the same time. Reggie Bush is healthy after a broken leg and is a center piece to what this team attempts to do offensively, Pierre Thomas is set to return after a badly sprained ankle that has held him out the majority of the season, and the only other noteworthy name on the injury report is tackle Jon Stinchcomb who is sick. The team formerly known as the “Aints” is lucky to be peaking right at the precise moment with four games to go and two of those being important division showdowns.

So what can the Rams expect from this game? Well, Drew Brees, of course. Lots of him. He’s averaging 40 pass attempts per game and with Ron Bartell and Justin King’s health hanging in the balance–you know what the focal point of this Saint attack will be. Marques Colston gets the lions’ share of looks in the passing game and rightfully so as he is well on his way to a fourth 1,000 yard season. Beyond Colston the Rams can pick their poison of any combination of Lance Moore, Robert Meachem or Jeremy Shockey who combine for 14 TDs and 1,400 yards. This Ram defense isn’t terrible against the pass though. They rank at 19th in terms of yards allowed which isn’t the best spot, but they’ve only given up 15 passing TDs which is a respectable total given that they’ve played a few of the games’ top QBs.

This week Brad Fletcher, Kevin Dockery and Jerome Murphy had better bring their A+ game to the table. The pressure will be on the secondary to hold the Saints passing attack at bay, but they’ll have some help from the guys on the line as well. The front four has been relentless all year. Even though the Saints offensive line has been able to keep Drew Brees off of his back for much of the year, if Stinchcomb is out or even playing at 90% Chris Long and the Rams defensive line can and will capitalize. This defense has also been solid against the run much of the year and they’ll get a test against rookie Chris Ivory who is averaging 5.2 YPC and with the return of Thomas the backfield will cause a few personnel problems for Rams coaches.

Player 2 Watch on defense: James Laurinaits is in charge of this defense, and he’s the man that will lead a rag-tag group of LBs against this Saints offense. It remains to be seen which players will get the start on which side, but Laurinaitis will be the man responsible for putting this defense in position to succeed. He saw this Saints team first hand last year and surely has some notes to help better the defensive output.

The Rams will be fielding a truly different offense from what they put out last year. With Sam Bradford under center the Rams are able to roll out and move the pocket more, there’s also more stability with Roger Saffold starting at LT over Alex Barron. There are some different looks at the WR position also with Danario Alexander in at WR and Laurent Robinson providing a few targets for Bradford as well.

The Saints defense may be taken off guard by some of the wrinkles that the Pat Shurmur offense has added in the past year, but they are a much healthier unit than we saw. Last year Jabari Greer was out with injury, as well as Shaun Ellis. The Rams were able to take advantage of a few key injuries and took the game down to the wire. It will be a much tougher test this week with clear health along the board and Malcolm Jenkins coming into his own as a solid FS.

Bradford has been able to use his accuracy to turn short passes into great field position, especially when defenses play zone coverage and the offensive line has done an excellent job in pass protection. The Saints defense doesn’t get a lot of pressure on opposing QBs, with most of their sacks coming from DT Shaun Ellis and DE Will Smith. This quick strike offense can effectively neutralize the New Orleans pass rush.

Steven Jackson was a big reason for the Rams success against New Orleans last year. He piled up 131 yards against the Saints. This year their defense is giving up 107 YPG and they’ve been improving against the rush. The ground game may not be as big of a factor for this Rams team if they fall behind early, and jumping out to an early lead is something the Saints will definitely try to do. The Rams should try and incorporate some more screens and swing passes to Jackson and Darby this week so keep the New Orleans defensive line off-kilter.

Danario Alexander needs to be more involved in this game. He offers this offense a different dimension and is a big mismatch for opposing defenses. I’m not advocating that Bradford should just chuck it deep to Alexander every other play, but if both guys are on the field at the same time, that’s something the defense needs to be aware of. Danny Amendola and Brandon Gibson have both proven to be reliable targets in this offense, but they’ve really been the only two that could be counted on much lately. If Bradford can get the ball spread out more to Alexander or maybe Daniel Fells, then this Saints defense has lost the ability to load up against Jackson and Amendola, which is something we’ve been seeing the past two games.

Player 2 Watch on offense: Steven Jackson seems to have a target on him every week and deservedly so. This week could be the biggest game for this team in quite some time so Jackson needs to be prepared run hard and run often. His effectiveness early on will set the tempo for this entire offense.

It’s certainly not going to be an easy game Sunday. The case could be made that this Saints team is a better team than the Atlanta Falcons, and they will be playing hard to close the gap in their division. It just seems that with the rash of injuries on the defense, the Rams drew a short straw at the wrong moment. I don’t expect them to roll over for these Saints though; they’ll make them work for it. The Rams fall short to the Saints, 17 to 24.