Kansas City Chiefs vs. Los Angeles Rams, 1968

Kansas City Chiefs

Vs.

Los Angeles Rams

August 23, 1969

Dawson's Shotgun Rips Rams, 42-14

KC Quarterback Passes for 418 Yards, Four TDs

BY BOB GATES

The Kansas City offense, for years a terror in the American Football League, was finally seen in all its majesty Saturday night in Los Angeles as Len Dawson delivered four touchdown passes to shoot down the Rams, 42-14, before 58,303.

It was the fourth appearance in the Coliseum for the Chiefs, who had fallen on their helmets here three times- losing the first Super Bowl game to Green Buy, 35-10, and then a pair of preseason games to Los Angeles, 44-24 and 36-16.

Most Ram fans had begun to think the Kansas City story was a myth. The Rams, too, after smashing them twice were thinking unprofessional thought about the Chiefs. Dawson changed all that in a hurry, hustling to a 28-14 halftime lead and adding the two rout touchdowns in the fourth quarter.

He completed 22 of 32 passes for 418 yards as Kansas City matched the biggest score yet against a Ram team coached by George Allen. Dallas last summer won an exhibition here, 42-10.

Offensively, Dallas and Kansas City are similar outfits, preferring multiple formations and various kinds of tricks- and it was with a trick offense, the shotgun formation, that the Chiefs finally won in Los Angeles.

As President Nixon and his party watched from seats on the 45 yard line, Dawson repeatedly dropped back in shotgun sets to befuddle and then knock out the Rams.

Although the home pros were losing for the second week in a row, they had been held to a field goal last week when Cleveland won 10-3. This time Roman Gabriel came out fighting with Dawson in a furious 14-14 first quarter.

Moreover, in the third quarter, Gabriel mounted a 69 yard drive that looked for all the world like a touchdown drive. Had the Rams scored, they might have gone into the last period close enough- 28-21- to have pulled it out.

But, Kansas City’s defense was equal to a goal line stand there as, on fourth down at the one yard line, Willie Lanier broke up a favorite Los Angeles short-yardage play, the Gabriel rollout.

In other years, Gabriel has seldom failed to make this one work. But Lanier has become one of the game’s better middle linebackers, and he was ready for the play.

When the Rams misfired after their strong march through Kansas City, they were obliged, shortly thereafter, to run on fourth down midfield. The Chiefs welcomed that play, too, stopping Jeff Jordan.

This opened the door for Dawson’s short drive to a 35-14 lead, and with that kind of score against them in the fourth quarter, the Rams gambled with an all-out pass attack that brought an interception setting up Kansas City's last touchdown.

It might not have been a rout if the Los Angeles team could have changed the momentum with a touchdown in the third quarter, but almost certainly, the Chiefs were going to win.

Dawson, in his first 12 years as a pro, has rarely played a game of this quality and it could be said that he has never played this well against a powerful defensive team.

Kansas City spokesmen, In fact, were saying just that. Each of his four touchdown passes was a different kind of play. The first one, in the first quarter, was the bomb, a beautifully-timed long pass to Frank Pitts for a 72-yard touchdown. It was a 40 yard pass and a 32-yard run.

Dawson's second scoring strike, in the second quarter, came on a rollout. On a 33-yard play, he darted out, set up and threw to Gloster Richardson at the goal line.

For his third scoring pass, also in the second period, Dawson used play-action, faking a handoff to Mike Garrett, who drifted out to catch an eight-yard touchdown.

Finally, in the fourth period, Dawson cleverly called- and cleverly executed- a screen pass at the Ram 10-yard line, reaching Robert Holmes for the touchdown.

None of Kansas City's points came on shotgun plays, but these were used continually, as part of coach Hank Stram's game plan, to overpower the Ram defense.

What happens on surprise plays of this kind is a crimp in the defensive team's self confidence. When the Rams couldn't put a stop to them, they were shortly not stopping anything.

It was Red Hickey, the former San Francisco coach, who invented the shotgun, a formation in which the quarterback lines up eight or 10 yards behind the line and takes a direct snap from center.

Dawson in the shotgun series was the only man in the Kansas City backfield. His three ends and his two running backs were all up on the line as pass receivers in various double and triple-wing deployments. Most teams feel they can beat such an offense if they see it often enough. But although Stram has incorporated shotgun plays in his system before, he has seldom used them this extensively. And one result was an ineffective rush by the Ram front four.

Deacon Jones and Merlin Olsen occasionally piled through Kansas City blockers for all eight yards to get within touching distance of Dawson, but they never got the man himself. With close timing, he regularly delivered the ball just before the deluge.

He was throwing to a network of excellent receivers- Pitts, Richardson and Otis Taylor and both backs, Garrett and Holmes.

Indeed, Kansas City's personnel are equaled in few football cities. Taylor, for instance, who caught five for 114 yards, is a 6-foot-3-inch sprinter who yields to hardly any other end in the country when he is on his stick, which is frequently.

Holmes, who crashed for 58 net yards, averaging 4.5, is one of football's leading fullbacks- and Garrett is the AFL's best halfback.

On defense, Kansas City faced Gabriel with a front four that resembled an NBA basketball team, including 6-7 Buck Buchanan and 6-5 Aaron Brown and Ed Lothamer.

Gabriel nonetheless started fast, marching 52 yards from the opening kickoff to a one-yard touchdown scored by Larry Smith, whose second strong performance at halfback for the Rams was obscured by the Kansas City circus.

And after Dawson had made it 7-7, Gabriel came back with another touchdown march which he sustained 66 yards. Jack Snow catching the last pass on a 37-yard play.

Again Dawson caught Gabriel. 14-14- still in the first quarter, and the happy Coliseum fans congratulated themselves for showing up. But in the last three quarters strangely, the Rams rolled three blanks as Dawson scored twice in the second quarter and twice more in the second half.

Are the Chiefs that much better than the Rams? Probably not, but when their offense is moving they're a match for any team.

The Ram defense depends on a tough rush. When the front four is hurrying the quarterback, the secondary is skilled enough to upset most pass attacks. This was proved all last year when Los Angeles led the NFL in total defense. Kansas City proved here Saturday night that an imaginative offense can destroy a rush- once anyhow.