The Arizona Cardinals will head into their showdown with the Los Angeles Rams with momentum on their side after stunning the Seattle Seahawks, 34-31, on Saturday. It was a morale-boosting win for the Cards, who finally snapped their two-game losing streak. With their victory against the Seahawks, the Cards improved their season record to 6-8-1 as they notched just their second road victory this season.
For the Cards to make it back-to-back road wins against LA, they will need to get another sterling performance from David Johnson. His three touchdowns against Seattle gave him 20 for this season, a franchise record. Johnson also leads the NFL in total touchdowns this campaign and now has amassed a whopping 33 TDs in 31 career regular-season games.
He will have his work cut out for him, however, against a Los Angeles defense that’s allowing just 336.5 total yards per game this season, 10th-fewest in the NFL. Arizona got a taste of that stingy defense back in October, losing 17-13 to the Rams in their first meeting this season. The Cards have now lost two of their last three games against the Rams. Arizona is 2-1 ATS in its last three meetings with LA.
The Cardinals are 2-5 ATS on the road this season.
The losses just keep on piling for the Los Angeles Rams as they suffered a gut-wrenching 22-21 defeat to the San Francisco 49ers on Saturday. The Rams’ feeble defense had a tough time stopping Colin Kaeparnick who accounted for 281 yards and three touchdowns. It was another disappointing result for the Rams who squandered a 14-point advantage with just 10 minutes remaining in this said ballgame. The Rams have now lost 10 of their last 11 games, including each of their last six outings.
It’s paramount for the Rams that they sort out their offense ahead of their season finale with the Cardinals. The Rams managed only 177 yards from scrimmage against a San Francisco side that came into their clash allowing 424.9 yards per game, at least 24 more than anybody else. The onus then is on Jared Goff and Todd Gurley to sign off with a huge performance this coming Sunday. Gurley ran for only 67 yards on 23 carries in the loss to the Niners. He has now failed to reach 100 rushing yards in 22 of his past 23 games. Goff, on the other hand, went just 11-of-24 for 90 yards, a touchdown and two interceptions in that ballgame. That’s quite disappointing for this year’s top overall pick considering he faced a team that had allowed the fourth-highest opponents’ Total QBR this season.
