ATLANTA -- It's an old axiom, one that St. Louis coach Mike Martz had inexplicably forgotten in last Monday's loss to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and one that the Rams' offensive genius recalled in time for the crucial matchup against the Atlanta Falcons here six days later.

Speed kills.

In virtually every tete-a-tete matchup involving skill-position players during the Rams' 35-6 win on Sunday -- a victory that went a long way toward relegating the defeat to the Bucs to rear-view mirror status -- St. Louis enjoyed a notable speed advantage. And especially when the subject was tailback Marshall Faulk, the NFL's most versatile offensive performer, the matchup against various defenders in pass coverage was actually an "overmatchup."

	Marshall Faulk sprints past Ashley Ambrose for one of his three TD catches.

Electing to go out of character and blitz more than they normally do in an effort to pressure Rams quarterback Kurt Warner, the Falcons left themselves vulnerable to Faulk's big-play skills in the passing game. Martz entered the game a little wary -- uncertain of how the Atlanta defense was designed for this game. He intended to feel his way through the early stages and then make adjustments.

But early on, it was apparent the Falcons wanted to attack the pocket. It was just as obvious their game plan mandated single coverage against Faulk in most situations. And so the reigning NFL Most Valuable Player became more wide receiver than tailback. He ended up aligned in the slot or flanked out on nearly half of the 40 snaps in which he participated, and most of the time he was covered by either a linebacker or the strong safety.

If speed kills, linebackers Chris Draft and Mark Simoneau and safety Johndale Carty are looking for their obituaries in the newspaper this week. The three played the role of human smudge spots as Faulk torched Atlanta for three touchdown catches, doubling his season output and beating coverages short, long and in between.

"You put the ball in his hands and he's going to make something happen," Warner said of Faulk. "We got away from that a little bit last week. This game, it wasn't so much that we predetermined that we would get him the ball, but things certainly worked out that way. You just cannot try to 'single' (cover) him and expect to get away with it. He's too explosive a playmaker. He's way too fast for most cornerbacks even, so when you get him isolated on a linebacker or a safety, school's out."

Indeed, the versatile Faulk took the young Falcons defenders out behind the woodshed, and the lesson learned was a painful one.

On his first touchdown, a 19-yard catch in the first quarter that catapulted the tentative Rams into a 14-3 lead, Faulk lined up at tailback but offset slightly to the right. He ran a simple circle route out of the backfield but instead of curling to the middle, as he characteristically does, Faulk sprinted up the right sideline. By the time Draft turned his hips to run with Faulk, the tailback was already on top of him and sprinting by. Draft hadn't even gotten his head turned completely as Warner feathered a touch pass for the score.

The second score, a nine-yard catch in the third quarter, came with Faulk aligned far right as a wide receiver. He ran a precise I-cut route, knifing between Simoneau and Carty and catching the ball five yards deep in the end zone.

On his final touchdown, Faulk began the play aligned in the short slot and finished it in the end zone 65 yards later. This time, he clearly victimized Carty, who was making just the second start of his three-year career. On the snap, Faulk deked to the outside but, instead of going to the flat, turned the route up the right seam. He caught the slant and, when Carty took a poor angle, broke past the young safety and ran down the right side behind a Torry Holt block.

	“	With Faulk, it's like having another wide receiver on the field. They can move him all over the place and kind of (dictate) the matchup. I mean, here's a guy who is a running back, and he probably could start at receiver for just about any team in the league. ”
		— Johndale Carty, Falcons safety

"There's no doubt they took advantage of me," Carty said. "But with Faulk, it's like having another wide receiver on the field. They can move him all over the place and kind of (dictate) the matchup. I mean, here's a guy who is a running back, and he probably could start at receiver for just about any team in the league."

In fact, Faulk's six touchdown receptions are more than the aggregate total this year for wide receivers Terry Glenn, Wayne Chrebet, Keyshawn Johnson, Keenan McCardell, Joey Galloway and Muhsin Muhammad. By using him so much on Sunday as a receiver, Martz maximized the 18 "touches" Faulk got. In the loss to the Bucs, he had just 14 touches from scrimmage and had only two receptions.

Like most big-play performers, Faulk wants the ball in his hands as often as Martz will put it there, but Sunday's game demonstrated that sometimes quality touches can count as much as quantity. Clearly the Falcons, having seen Tampa Bay significantly disrupt Warner's throwing rhythm with a strong inside rush, opted to pressure the quarterback and take their chances with Faulk hooked up in man-to-man coverages.

The strategy may have looked good on paper, but it became unhooked on the field.

"I always want the ball," Faulk said. "Anyone who says differently is lying. But in this offense, if you're greedy, it takes away from what some of the other guys can do. You can't ignore some of the other players we have. Sometimes you just have to be patient because the plays will come. We will eventually find some matchup to (exploit) and we'll take advantage of it. Let's face it, we're going to be faster than most everyone we play."

For sure, it was almost as if the Atlanta offense was playing in slow motion compared to the lightning attack the Rams unleashed. Of its 45 snaps, for instance, St. Louis aligned with three or more wideouts on 36 of them. Conversely, the Falcons often played with three tight ends, trying to prove that muscle could overcome the mercurial Rams defense. And when Michael Vick was forced into the game because of an injury to starting quarterback Chris Chandler, the offensive sets for Atlanta became markedly more conservative.

As long as Chandler was perpendicular, the Falcons actually did some nice things with their tight ends, often aligning them in dual slots and flipping both to the same side of the field opposite the wide receivers. Enter Vick and exit imagination, as the Falcons almost always aligned in standard two-back/two-wideout sets in the second half.

Of course, it didn't much matter, since Atlanta didn't have a player on either offense or defense who could match up with Faulk and his wondrously diverse abilities. Offensively, the Falcons could not take advantage of a second quarter in which they controlled the ball for 13:14 and ran off 22 snaps compared to St. Louis' seven. Defensively, they sagged after intermission, with the Rams coming out in the third quarter and blowing the game open on a three-play sequence that netted 77 yards and a touchdown.

But mostly, it was a matter of having no answers for defending Faulk as a receiver.

"He's definitely the 'X-factor,' that's for sure," said Atlanta cornerback Ray Buchanan, beaten badly on the Rams' other big scoring play, a 45-yard touchdown catch by Holt that culminated the drive on the first series of the second half. "He's like a wind-up toy, and they put him out there in about 10 different spots, and he makes plays at all of them."

Len Pasquarelli is a senior NFL writer for ESPN.com.