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ATLANTA — Austin Blythe said coaches needed just four words
for him.
“You’re staying in there,” the Rams right guard remembers
hearing after a 34-0 Week 2 shutout of the Arizona Cardinals.
Blythe was excited.
Williamsburg, Iowa native Austin
Blythe took over a starting job for the Rams this year, and quickly emerged as
one of the best interior linemen in the NFL.
The Williamsburg, Iowa, native had snagged
the job after a season of spotting at center with the Colts in 2016 followed by
tagging in for 20 percent of Rams snaps in 2017. Then came a two-game
suspension for Rams right guard Jamon Brown. Brown had pleaded guilt to speedy
and aggravated DUI in a February 2017 arrest. Blythe played so well
filling in that he never relinquished his post.
“I was happy,” he said while preparing for
Sunday's Super Bowl against the Patriots. “I continued with the mindset that
that was my job to lose and no one was going to take it from me.”
Forget starts. No other Rams player took even a snap during the season
from Blythe, who stayed healthy and intact enough to suit up for all 1,100
plays in the regular season and 148 more so far in playoffs. The
consistency was key to a Los Angeles line that maintained its five starters
through the season. Blythe, left tackle Andrew Whitworth, left guard Rodger
Saffold, center John Sullivan and right tackle Rob Havenstein were each on the
field at least 94 percent of snaps.
So
much pro playing time was new for Blythe, who manned the offensive line at the
University of Iowa. But the technique, he says, was familiar.
The
owner of three state wrestling titles in Iowa, Blythe says he was already
working on leverage at 6 years old.
“Everything in wrestling translates to
football,” he said. “Hand placement, leverage, keeping your elbows in, bending
at the knees not the hips. All that stuff translates directly to offensive-line
play.
“Ultimately, wrestling teaches you all about
life. It’s you. There’s no excuses.”
No
excuses for lapses on the field, Blythe preached, as he allowed zero sacks all
season. No excuses when facing the league’s sixth-best run defense in
divisional-round opponent Dallas. The Rams offensive line powered running backs
Todd Gurley and C.J. Anderson each to 100-yard games, Anderson gashing Dallas
for 123 yards and two touchdowns after ripping off 167- and 132-yard
performances as soon as he signed with Los Angeles to spell Gurley in December.
“They’ve been doing a hell of a job up
front,” Anderson said. “They played with each other very snap, haven’t missed a
snap, which is unheard of at the offensive-line position in the trenches. We go
back and forth how we see things, try to see the game the right way, try to see
cuts the right way.
“They don’t tell us how to run. We don’t tell
them how to block.”
Blythe did make headlines telling fellow
linemen how to block the Cowboys, when he said he’d identified Cowboys D-line
tendencies well enough to predict “plus-90 percent” of Dallas play calls based
on defensive tackles’ pre-snap movements and alignment.
A week later, after the Rams’ overtime win
against the Saints, he became an NFC champion.
He
thought back to the four words and the 1,248 subsequent snaps on his journey from
NFL backup to right-guard stalwart for the best team in the NFC.
Then Blythe glanced down at his phone where a
video message from his cheering 2-year-old son, Reed, waited.
This time, the message took six words: We’re
going to the Super Bowl.
Twitter:
@JoriEpstein
