How Rams staved off humiliation, saved Super Bowl hopes with epic comeback

Just in the nick of time, the Rams stopped their season from becoming a collection of excuses.For why a roster built to chase a championship was already chasing the rest of its division.For why another trip to Philadelphia ended with another reminder of everything they still couldn’t do.

For why October had barely begun and a team with such grand ambitions was already running out of room.Call it what you want, but with so much money poured into the roster and so much hope pinned on a Super Bowl run, the Rams were staring at something far more troubling than a slow start Sunday.They were on the brink of disaster.Instead, they finally found a way to beat the Eagles.And in doing so, they might have saved themselves from a humiliating year.The Rams’ 24-20 comeback victory Sunday at Lincoln Financial Field deserves to be viewed through that lens.They erased a 10-point fourth-quarter deficit against the opponent that keeps turning their aspirations into frustrations.

They also pulled themselves back from a place that would have made the coming weeks considerably more desperate.“Plenty of plays where we didn’t get the result we wanted,” quarterback Matthew Stafford said.“But we got the result we wanted at the end of the game.”Consider the alternative.A loss would have dropped the Rams to 1-3, three games behind the unbeaten 49ers, who already own a head-to-head victory over them.

The Seahawks, at 3-1, would have been two games clear.Then consider who comes next.Buffalo visits this week, bringing the possibility that a bad start could have become a 1-4 crisis before the Rams even reached the middle of October.There is a difference between having time to recover and giving yourself a realistic chance to do it.Especially when the teams you are trying to catch keep winning.The Rams were dangerously close to learning that distinction.Then, in the blink of an eye, the Rams finally looked like the team we expected them to be.And they did it without Myles Garrett...