Davante Adams set the tone, holds Rams to high standard instead of riding high horse

The Rams could have looked at the scoreboard Monday night, congratulated themselves on restoring order and called it an evening.Davante Adams had spent three hours reminding everyone that he remains a problem without an obvious solution.Matthew Stafford was delivering the ball with conviction.

And the misery of Australia finally had some distance behind it.There was plenty to feel good about.Feeling satisfied is another matter.For a team with the Rams’ ambitions, Monday’s win over the Giants was as much a reminder of what remains possible as evidence of what still needs work.“The cool thing is there’s a lot of stuff we can clean up too,” Rams coach Sean McVay said.Cool might not have been his preferred description when the ball was hitting the ground.But his larger point holds up.The Rams won 28–6, outgained the Giants 481–182 and got 327 passing yards and four touchdown throws from Stafford.And still, there were stretches when they seemed determined to make the evening more complicated than necessary.Kyren Williams’ fumble at the Rams’ 11-yard line handed the Giants three points.A better opponent might have turned it into a touchdown.

Stafford forced a throw into double coverage.Dropped passes turned opportunities into frustrations.Those are the kinds of mistakes a team can survive against an opponent struggling to generate much of anything.

And remember, the Giants played nearly the entire game without quarterback Jaxson Dart, who went down with a knee injury on the opening drive.It doesn’t need to be explained how the calculus changed once he left and James Winston replaced him.Point being, the mistakes the Rams made Monday become considerably more expensive when the caliber of opponent improves.That starts on Sunday when the Rams head to the Mile High City to play the Broncos.

That distinction belongs in any honest assessment of Monday night.So does the understanding that identifying flaws in a comfortable victory is hardly a reason to p...