I think the biggest thing needed is McVay working on a counter to what the Patriots and Bears defenses did against our ZBS this year to make sure that can't happen again. Every team that faces us next year is going to watch replays of those two games to try to figure out how to stop us.
Second - get the TE's more involved, particularly the athletic Everett. Not just to diversify the offense, but to give us more options in case the unthinkable happens and we lose one of our top 3 WR's.
Related to the previous paragraph, I think McVay needs to add some dink and dunk to the offense. It doesn't sound exciting, and it's not how I would want to run the offense all the time, but sometimes when the chunk plays aren't there, that's what you have to do. Plus, it helps establish some offensive rhythm, and if you do it long enough, the opposing D is going to have to react and then some chunk plays will be there.
On OL, I think we need to keep Saffold and get younger at C. Other than that, I wouldn't change anything. Blythe had a bad game, yes, but so did the other OLinemen, but they individually and as a unit had a great season.
it's funny, I totally called it before the SB that the Pats were going to run the same defense that the Lions and Bears did against us. I'm surprised he didn't have a better gameplan in lieu of probably knowing that in the back of his mind. And you're correct, teams will hone in on that and study us in the offseason. Right now we're the team to beat, along with the Saints, KC, and NE. Teams are going to study film on these 3 or 4 high powered offenses and figure out ways to slow them/us down. Getting back to us, think about it like this. the Vikings did the same thing to us last year, gave our offense lots of problems presnap, well Mcvay learned from it and handled them this year with authority, and you might say so did a lot of other teams. But I am almost certain those other teams studied the hell out of Minnesota in their offseasons and came up with ways to beat them, and for the most part it worked! The Rams have to be very careful this offseason to make sure the same thing doesn't happen to us. I believe McVay is too smart to let that happen but he's also young and naive, so hopefully he doesn't fall into that trap.
I do agree wholeheartedly with your assessment of our TE usage. It's a headscratcher, I thought for sure we would have utilized our TE's more in the SB than what we did. I don't even think we targeted one the entire game. I mean it is a possibility that they were never open or maybe Jared had a better target in mind but those guys are supposed to be your outlet when no one else is open. And I just don't see that out of our offense. Occasionally I do but not often enough, and we have to fix that. Furthermore, I know McVay likes to use the TE he had a great one in Washington which he obviously doesn't have here. I think next year Everett will be healthy in the offseason which will be huge. The guy missed all of the beginning of last year and didn't play in a handful of games and he still impressed when given the chance. Hopefully he takes the next big step.
As far as game-planning, McVay does deploy the dink and dunk at times. Rewatch the Seattles games this year. We had a ton of 3 to 5 yard quick passes. That's how we attacked them, and it worked beautifully. I do agree that he does get carried away with the deepball or the 15+ yarders. I think this year you'll see some maturing from our offense and scheme and it will be more fine tuned. I don't really want to see our team give up on a game plan too quickly but I think he does need to adjust faster when things aren't going our way, or when the opposing team is exploiting us.
Oline, we need to get younger. I don't know if Whitworth will be back. That man looked destroyed after the NE game. He even said himself he has to think about it. He's 37 years old, and when it he goes, he's going to go very quickly and I dunno about you, but I don't want to have to rely on a guy midseason that hasn't at least shown the coaching staff his tendencies on film or in a live game.
I would love Whitworth to remain on the rams staff as a coach if he decides to retire. The man can teach, and everyone listens to him in the room. I just wish he was 10 years younger and a ram for life. He's a true icon.
One last thing i want to add. Everyone wants to keep CJ on our team. But i think you guys are forgetting how good Malcom Brown was when he was healthy. We didn't miss a beat. I'm not saying to not make CJ an offer but if we lose him to FA don't fret, we have some capable backups.
