Blackburn’s pink slip is a lump of coal from Rams

WOODLAND HILLS — The scoreboard glowed 30-14, Rams, and the neon numbers hummed like a lullaby sung too quickly.

Ethan Evans — a punting prodigy, the hidden scalpel in Sean McVay’s arsenal of weaponry — despatched a spiraling punt crusing towards the Seattle night time.

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Rashid Shaheed gathered it on the 42, tilted his hips, and in seven seconds of sideline deftness, flipped the sector, flipped the sport, flipped your entire narrative arc of a season.

Fifty-eight yards. One seismic rating. Lumen Area exhaled 4 quarters of pent-up thunder.

2:11 streaked on the clock when Harrison Mevis — rookie leg, spotless slate, ice in his cleats and hearth in his intestine — planted his left foot and swung his proper.

Forty-eight yards stood between the Rams and the division title, between certainty and chaos.

A crisp snap, a maintain good, a swing pure. But, the ball sailed proper, stored crusing, kissed nothing however Seattle air. Broad proper. The scoreboard blinked, unchanged, unforgiving. The division, the quick monitor, the dream — all of it suspended in that second like a snowflake that by no means lands.

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The flight residence was a coffin with wings. Because the engines droned a funeral dirge, few folks spoke; there was even much less laughter.

Chase Blackburn sat in his seat, movie, looking for solutions.

However, movie do not lie — punts do not both.

However folks do. Individuals mislead themselves about management, about certainty, about positions within the NFL, and the unwrapping of items which might be by no means assured.

Saturday morning arrived like a creditor.

Blackburn was relieved of his duties because the Rams’ particular groups coordinator.

Three losses. Three kicks — blocked, missed, shanked.

One unit, one blade, one Achilles heel, debilitating the entire physique.

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The pink slip hits Blackburn like a preverbial lump of coal, the blackest lump any man may discover in his stocking three days earlier than the vacation.

One punt. One miss. One pink slip. Christmas ruined.

It is the enterprise of the NFL. You produce, otherwise you’re changed.

Study Evans’ 53-yard punt.

4-second grasp time. Good placement. And but, one play erased 16 weeks of execution.

The numbers inform a crueller story. Three of the Rams’ 4 losses wore special-teams fingerprints.

Week 1: Eagles, 33-26, two blocked kicks within the closing six minutes.

Week 10: Saints, victory regardless of Joshua Karty’s missed additional level and a 39-yard chip shot.

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Week 15: Seahawks, 38-37 additional time, the punt return and the push vast.

“The problems cannot proceed like this,” McVay stated in October. They continued.

Now the accountability arrived, wrapped in crimson tape as an alternative of ribbon.

Ben Kotwica inherits the particular groups’ wreckage.

Christmas got here early this yr — got here with out containers, with out bows, got here with a field of pink and a bunch of blame.

The Grinch did not climb down a chimney; he strode by means of glass doorways in Woodland Hills, whistled “You are a Imply One” and left behind solely the echo of a raveled unit.

One man misplaced his job. Eleven different males misplaced their certainty. A crew misplaced its foothold on the NFC West. The Seahawks (12-3) now personal the division; the Rams (11-4) personal the mess.

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What was meant to seal the sport as an alternative sealed a destiny —  a bevy of missed kicks and expensive choices.

Mevis was good till perfection mattered.

Because the season rolls ahead — Inexperienced Bay’s snow, Philadelphia’s chilly, the Chicago frigid January air looms like judgment.

The ball will launch once more, and the Rams should determine who writes the subsequent chapter — the leg, the autumn man or their inside hearth.

Blackburn will awaken tomorrow and not using a whistle, and not using a assembly, and not using a crew.

Christmas morning will unwrap empty for his household, the tree lit however the presents lacking one paycheck, one goal, one career.

For him, the Grinch stole Christmas. The Rams stole it again — and in its wake, left a pink slip.