For three hours in Pittsburgh on Sunday, it was clear that Los Angeles Rams coach Sean McVay doesn’t have the same magic as his first couple seasons. We can drill it down to a baffling two-play sequence.

If Freddie Kitchens or Adam Gase had a similar decision-making process, we’d want them fired before they got on the team plane. In the third quarter, with the offense stalled, all of a sudden Blake Bortles was in the game at quarterback. He ran a really awkward read option and was stuffed for 1 yard on third-and-2. This was the plan. There was a plan to remove Jared Goff for Bortles in a key situation.

“We just had Blake come in. That was the play that we had designed for Blake,” McVay said, via Cameron DaSilva of The Rams Wire. “It wasn’t anything where Jared – you know, he was good. He was OK. That was a play that we were going to get Blake involved in and that was part of the game plan.”

Somehow, that wasn’t even the worst play in that sequence.

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On fourth down, punter Johnny Hekker came on. He lined up at shotgun depth and not his usual spot to kick. The Rams practically announced Hekker was going to throw it; it’s hard to even call it a fake. Hekker’s pass was intercepted by running back Trey Edmunds.

So on a key sequence McVay took Jared Goff off the field to run with Bortles, then pass with his punter. That’s ... something. Just to show he hadn’t gone temporarily insane, McVay didn’t give Todd Gurley one touch in the fourth quarter of a close game. Gurley averaged 6.1 yards per carry over the first three quarters.

McVay is a good coach but he’s having a bad season. His offense, with Goff regressing at a troubling rate, has looked awful a few weeks. They were steamrolled at home by the San Francisco 49ers, but the 49ers have maybe the best defense in the NFL. The Steelers don’t have a bad defense, but they shouldn’t nearly shut out Los Angeles’ offense. The Rams had 15 possessions on Sunday and didn’t score a touchdown. Going back to their last game, the streak of possessions without a touchdown is now 19.

“That’s the kind of game it was today — just bad,” Gurley said, according to the Los Angeles Times. “The defense played a hell of game. Just weren’t able to help those guys out.”

We spent a lot of time the past two seasons praising McVay. He was seen as something between a genius and the man who was reinventing offensive football. It’s only fair to give him some much-deserved blame when the Rams are sitting at 5-4 and in real danger of missing the playoffs.

It’s not like McVay can’t coach anymore. But defenses have caught up to his play-action heavy attack. The Rams didn’t have Brandin Cooks (concussion) on Sunday, their offensive line has taken an enormous step back, Gurley isn’t what he once was and there are some questions about Goff. Those are significant factors, and some are out of McVay’s control. It’s also true that the Rams’ offense hasn’t been the same since the end of last November.

This is where McVay really earns his reputation. He had a long offseason after Bill Belichick coached circles around him in the Super Bowl. That happens. But the Rams look mediocre and might find themselves trailing by four games in the NFC West by the end of Monday night. The competition for wild-card spots will be intense. And the Rams don’t look like they’re up to that challenge. We might find out a lot about McVay over the rest of the season.

Los Angeles Rams head coach Sean McVay is having his roughest NFL season. (Photo by Shelley Lipton/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images) More

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