Bob McManaman

Arizona Republic

LOS ANGELES – The big one finally hit.

Don’t worry, California and the City of Angels are doing just fine. It’s the Cardinals that got swallowed up into the earth on Sunday and slid into the ocean. After the 34-0 rout the Rams put on them, it’s fair to wonder if this team will ever see the surface again.

The Cardinals haven’t managed to keep their heads above water yet, getting exposed badly in each of their first two games now and getting outscored in the process by a whopping 58-6 margin. That’s not just bad. That’s complete dysfunction.

They crossed midfield only once all afternoon at Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum – with 30 seconds left to play – and their five total first downs ties their fewest in a game since 1950. They allowed 354 passing yards by Jared Goff and watched Todd Gurley rush for three touchdowns and a pair of two-point conversions.

The Rams didn’t even need their star kicker to kick the Cardinals’ tail. After Greg Zuerlein left the game with a groin injury in the first quarter, punter Johnny Hekker came on to handle kickoffs and also contributed with a 20-yard field goal and an extra point.

“Tough times and turmoil, you really find out who you are and what kind of men we have in this locker room,” Cardinals right guard Justin Pugh said. “And we’re going to find out. You go 0-2 with two really bad losses, there’s no hiding behind anything.

“We got our asses kicked today, so we’ve got to go to ground zero and start building this thing back up.”

BOX SCORE:Rams 34, Cardinals 0

The question from here is, will the Cardinals continue to try and self-repair with veteran quarterback Sam Bradford under center or with rookie first-round draft pick Josh Rosen? It’s fair to ask given how unproductive Arizona’s offense has been so far with Bradford, who on Sunday connected on just 17 of 27 passes for a measly 90 yards.

His longest completion was a second-quarter, 15-yard pass to Larry Fitzgerald, who would aggravate a hamstring issue he’s been dealing with for the past several days and miss the entire fourth quarter.

Coach Steve Wilks had to know the questions about Rosen would be coming. Bradford hasn’t been able to move the offense a lick through eight quarters of football. Rosen, at least, would provide some excitement and a belief that he can do what Bradford hasn’t tried or been able to do, which is throw the ball downfield in hopes of making some big plays.

“We have to evaluate everything, and when you look at the situation in all three phases, that’s what we’re going to do,” coach Steve Wilks said. “I’m not going to sit here and jump to conclusions right now, right after the game. We’re going to go back and evaluate the film, look at personnel … and come up with the best game plan.”

So is that a “maybe” regarding Rosen possibly taking over this coming Sunday when the Cardinals host the Chicago Bears?

“Again, I’m not going to sit here and say right after the game what we’re going to do from a personnel standpoint,” Wilks said. “But I will say this: Everybody will be evaluated.”

While the Cardinals begin to further undergo some intense psychotherapy among themselves, the Rams look like they’re ready to laugh all the way to a second straight NFC West division title. On 10 occasions, Goff hit five different receivers for gains of 15 yards or longer, including Brandin Cooks four times. One of those hookups went for 57 yards.

Cooks caught seven passes for 159 yards, Robert Woods caught six for 81 and Cooper Kupp hauled in six for 63. The Cardinals’ leading receiver was Fitzgerald, who caught three balls for 28 yards.

“There are always going to be things that you can improve on, even in a good game,” Fitzgerald said. “But the inability to sustain drives, not being able to do the basic things that we work on is frustrating. We played a damn good football team today. The Rams, they’ll be deep in the playoffs like they were last year. They’re just a good ball club.

“When you don’t execute, things like this happen at times. You play against good teams, or you play against anybody, you’ve just got to do a much better job of executing, completing, catching, getting open, blocking, the whole gamut.”

That’s how bad it was on Sunday. There wasn’t just one thing on offense that kept derailing the Cardinals. It was everything.

“I wish that there was one thing that I could tell you that if we got that fixed, that it would be instantly better,” Bradford said. “There’s a lot of things that need to improve for us and it’s got to start happening now. This is two weeks in a row where we’ve let the defense down, and I think we all understand that we have to play better.”

Arizona’s running game, which totaled just 54 yards (48 of it by David Johnson), clearly has to get better.

So does the defense, which allowed 432 total yards and four touchdowns, and the special teams’ coverage units, which allowed JoJo Natson to return six punts for 133 yards and one kickoff for 22 yards. Natson’s 60-yard punt return in the second quarter sparked the Rams to their second touchdown and third scoring drive of the first half and a 19-0 lead.

“The thing about us, it’s not just one guy, it’s 10 guys,” said Gurley, who finished with 73 yards from scrimmage. “… Credit to JoJo just for coming in and balling out the way he did.”

While Rams defensive tackle Aaron Donald gloated about the Rams’ “scary” defense getting even better moving forward, Cardinals cornerback Patrick Peterson wonders where Arizona’s defense will go from here.

“It’s definitely a tough pill to swallow,” he said. “But we have to find a way to not only win your one-on-one matchups, but find a way to win down after down. We’re obviously not getting off the field on third downs. We’re giving up too many big plays. … We can’t give up that many points.

“Regardless of where special teams may put us or the offense may put us, our job is to keep teams out of the end zone.”

It was nothing short of a disaster across the board for the Cardinals on Sunday.

Reach McManaman at bob.mcmanaman@arizonarepublic.com. Follow him on Twitter @azbobbymac and listen to him live every Tuesday afternoon between 3-6 on 1580-AM The Fanatic with Roc and Manuch and every Wednesday afternoon between 1-3 on Fox Sports 910-AM on The Freaks with Kenny and Crash.