LOS ANGELES — The Los Angeles Rams have fired special teams coordinator Chase Blackburn, sources told ESPN’s Adam Schefter.<\/p>\n
The move marks the first in-season coaching change that Rams head coach Sean McVay has made in his nine seasons in Los Angeles.<\/p>\n
Rams assistant special teams coach Ben Kotwica will take over and become the lead special teams coach, a source told Schefter.<\/p>\n
The Rams, 11-4 and second place in the NFC West, lost to the Seahawks on Thursday night in a game that included a Seattle punt return for a touchdown and a missed 48-yard field goal by Los Angeles kicker Harrison Mevis.<\/p>\n
The Seahawks (12-3) overtook the Rams for first place in the division and the top overall record in the NFC thanks to the 38-37 overtime victory.<\/p>\n
Though the Rams have lost only four games this season, three have involved special teams miscues. In the Rams’ first loss of the season, 33-26 to the Eagles, Los Angeles had its final two offensive possessions end with blocked kicks.<\/p>\n
In the Rams’ Week 10 victory over the Saints, kicker Joshua Karty missed an extra point and a 39-yard field goal attempt. After the game, McVay said the Rams’ special teams issues “can’t continue like this.”<\/p>\n
Los Angeles replaced long-snapper Alex Ward with Jake McQuaide and Karty with Mevis, who had not missed a kick until Thursday night in Seattle.<\/p>\n
Blackburn, 42, was in his third season as the Rams’ special teams coordinator. A former linebacker for the Giants and Panthers, he also has worked as an assistant with Carolina and Tennessee.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"LOS ANGELES — The Los Angeles Rams have fired special teams coordinator Chase Blackburn, sources told ESPN’s Adam…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":358683,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[49,48,153378,82],"class_list":["post-358682","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-los-angeles-rams-sports-football-team-team-statscom-343","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/358682","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=358682"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/358682\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/358683"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=358682"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=358682"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=358682"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}