Los Angeles Rams: The most important player to stop Lamar Jackson is…

The Los Angeles Rams are going to have their hands full this Monday against an 8-2 Baltimore Ravens team with the most unique offense in the NFL.

The Los Angeles Rams are on the outside looking in with the NFC playoff picture and are probably going to need to lose no more than one game the rest of the season to make the playoffs. With how competitive the NFC playoff picture is, it may take an 11-5 record to get the second wild-card spot.

The 6-4 Rams are trailing the 8-3 Minnesota Vikings and 8-2 Seattle Seahawks for a wild-card spot. With a 4-3 conference record, the Rams likely won’t have the tiebreaker if it comes down to a tie as the Vikings are 6-2 in the NFC while the Seahawks are 5-1.

Of course, anything can happen, but the Rams are going to need some help from both teams while also making sure that they finish no worse than 5-1. The problem is that the Rams have not looked that great, have a really tough end to the season and could even see that one loss coming this week against the Baltimore Ravens.

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The 8-2 Ravens are the most explosive team in the league right now and many would say are the best team in the league. Their resume speaks for itself, even if the team only has the third-best record in the league.

They are the only team to beat the New England Patriots this season and have also beaten the Seattle Seahawks and Houston Texans in the last month. All three wins, against Seattle, New England and Houston, were by 14 or more points.

They had one flukey loss against the Cleveland Browns and a close game that came down to the wire against the Kansas City Chiefs.

What makes the Ravens so dangerous is the unique offense that John Harbaugh and the team have created for Lamar Jackson. The Ravens have given Jackson the perfect offense to work with.

The team often utilizes three tight ends to give Jackson more blocking, as this is a run-first offense with him and Mark Ingram, while also having speedy playmakers in the receiving corps that can make plays happen.

The problem with playing the Ravens is that if you blitz Jackson he will either find a crease out of the pocket and burn you with his legs or can dump it off to one of his three tight ends.

If you sit back and don’t pressure him you are only giving the Ravens more time to get guys open downfield, and thus far, Jackson has done an excellent job in making all of his throws.

It is an offense that can feel impossible to stop, so much so that Los Angeles Rams’ cornerback Jalen Ramsey reached out to Michael Vick to ask how to stop Jackson and the Ravens offense. Talk about a compliment.

Despite what Vick tells Ramsey, the most important player in stopping Jackson on Monday won’t be Ramsey, although he can play a big part if he shuts down Marquise Brown. The most important player in stopping Jackson won’t even be two-time Defensive Player of the Year Aaron Donald, although he will have a big impact as well.

If the Los Angeles Rams’ defense is really going to put it all together and limit Lamar Jackson then the defense is going to need a big day out of Cory Littleton. Littleton has been fantastic for the Rams dating back to last season and his strong play needs to continue.

Littleton’s reads, judgment and coverage are going to be the most important aspects of this game. Littleton is a great coverage linebacker and is going to need to shut down the tight end dump-offs and any routes to Mark Ingram down the middle. Luckily for the Rams, history indicates that he will do just that.

More importantly, though, is what Littleton does when the Ravens run options plays. He needs to be the first guy meeting either Jackson or Ingram in the second level to limit these runs to three yards or fewer.

Littleton needs to be all over the field and is going to effectively be the “big-play stopper”. All it takes is one missed play, one missed read and Lamar Jackson will be off to the races.