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Trade of Greg Robinson illustrates a new way of thinking by the Rams
Guard Jamon Brown is a prime beneficiary of a new way of thinking on the part of the new Rams coaching staff. (Photo by David Crane/Southern California News Group)
By VINCENT BONSIGNORE
The writing was on the wall well before the Rams traded Greg Robinson to the Detroit Lions early Thursday morning for a sixth-round draft pick.
So we won’t give them too much credit for acting decisively and wisely in completing the trade, which puts to rest the inglorious three-year Rams career of a player of whom so much was expected after he was selected second overall in the 2014 draft and yet so little was delivered.
The former Auburn star was supposed to lock down the left tackle position for the Rams for the next decade and anchor a young, dominant offensive line.
But it didn’t take long to figure out Robinson simply wasn’t up to the task. And it took even less time for him to play his way out of the Rams’ present and future.
He was billed as a dominant run-blocker with the athletic ability and size to develop into a premier pass-rush protector. The former was never the case and the later never materialized. The fact the Rams could get a draft pick for him given all his underachieving is a coup, not that a sixth-round pick will ever make up for the major swing and miss they took drafting him.
All the more egregious given how current All-Pro linebacker Khalil Mack was there for the taking at the time.
But what’s done is done.
In the bigger scheme of things, the Robinson trade, the domino effect that preceded it and the thought process and imagination behind it bodes well for the club moving forward.
There is a different vibe with these Rams under new coach Sean McVay, one that reaches above him into the general manager’s office, below him to his assistants and around him with the players.
“Aggressive,” is how Jamon Brown explained it from the player’s side.
Brown is the main beneficiary of the Robinson trade given the wide open path it clears for him to win the starting right tackle job. But he’s also a prime example of the new, aggressive approach from the Rams.
Although Brown played tackle in college at Louisville, he’s strictly been a guard in his first two seasons with the Rams. And he fully expected to continue that role this year. That is, until new Rams offensive line coach Aaron Kromer decided to give Brown some reps at right tackle during an Organized Team Activity practice last month.
“It was like, literally right there on the practice field,” Brown remembers, laughing. “Like, hey, take some reps at right tackle.”
To call it a whim would be underestimating Kromer and McVay. They knew Brown’s history as a tackle and had a pretty good idea he could at least provide average play at the position if given a chance. But there was some method to the madness in how Kroemer approached Brown about the possibility.
As in, right in the middle of a practice without any heads up.
“It’s OK to make guys uncomfortable sometimes this time of year,” Kromer explained.
And even more beneficial to see how they respond.
Brown immediately took to the position and was a mainstay with the first team the rest of OTA’s and minicamp, which concluded Wednesday when McVay canceled the final practice as a reward for a job well done this offseason.
“My thought process was just to show them I could be versatile, that I could play any position,” Brown said, “I knew new players were being brought in. Guys were being shuffled around. So I just wanted to make as positive an impression as possible.”
That’s exactly what happened, apparently.
“I guess coach was pleased,” Brown said, smiling.
That doesn’t mean Brown is guaranteed to be the starting right tackle when the Rams open the season against the Indianapolis Colts the first week of September. Or that Kroemer and McVay won’t ultimately decide to flip Rob Havenstein back to right tackle from right guard after making the switch from tackle to guard to start OTAs.
But with the left side of the line now solidified with two-time All-Pro tackle Andrew Whitworth coming over in free agency and Rodger Saffold at left guard, the Rams can now focus on getting the right side figured out.
“We’re still trying to sort all that out,” Kroemer said.
But even that speaks well to the new Rams’ way of doing things under McVay, which seems much more progressive, imaginative and inclusive compared to previous coach Jeff Fisher.
The willingness to remain open-minded about positions and roles rather than locking themselves into one way of looking at things is a refreshing change.
Just moving Havenstein to guard illustrates that. One look at the 6-foot-6, 322-pound Havenstein and you immediately think tackle given the height and size.
From McVay and Kromer’s vantage point, though, they saw a better athlete than others may have seen — which enables him to get on defenders quicker than most would have suspected — plus a bright mind to handle the intricacies of the position.
“I think he’s kind of one of the rare exceptions where he’s such a sharp guy, things do happen a little bit faster inside and he’s got better athleticism,” McVay said.
And it didn’t hurt that Havenstein had to clean up a bit before taking a stroll to the altar a few months ago, resulting in a bit of a body transformation any groom would be envious of.
“We always joke with him because he lost a little bit of weight because he got married this offseason,” McVay said. “So, he had to look good for that.”
Point being, McVay and his staff saw something in Havenstein others may have closed their minds to, whether it was because he didn’t fit the prototype or look the part or out of sheer stubbornness.
More importantly, they had the guts to act on their instincts and at least give it a shot, making no promises in the process while reminding players this remains a fluid situation.
“You have to be ready for anything,” Brown said. “ Nothing’s set in stone right now, given how far out we are from the actual season.”
As for Robinson, his time with the club was being measured in months almost from the moment McVay was hired and he and the Rams locked in on and ultimately reeled in Whitworth in free agency.
Whitworth coming aboard immediately displaced Robinson and sent him over to right tackle on essentially a tryout basis.
But given the Rams’ decision to decline Robinson’s fifth-year option for 2018, he would have needed a breakthrough year to put himself back on their long-range radar. And even that would not have guaranteed any sort of future with the team beyond this season.
If, say, Robinson actually held onto the starting job he could have been looking at the kind of $8 million or $11 million dollar deals fellow top-two pick tackles — and disappointments — Matt Kalil and Luke Joeckel got from the Panthers and Seahawks after fizzling out with the Vikings and Jaguars.
There is little chance the Rams would have ever paid him that kind of money, especially given the direction their cap is headed and the big-time players currently up for new contracts and raises.
Brown has a cap-friendly $800,000 contract for 2018, so if he can lock down the job he becomes an asset on the field and on the payroll.
Meanwhile, the Rams get a draft pick and $3.2 million in cap relief this year.
It’s not much, but it’s something.
And in the grand scheme of things, it speaks to a new way of doing things under McVay.
[www.ocregister.com]
Guard Jamon Brown is a prime beneficiary of a new way of thinking on the part of the new Rams coaching staff. (Photo by David Crane/Southern California News Group)
By VINCENT BONSIGNORE
The writing was on the wall well before the Rams traded Greg Robinson to the Detroit Lions early Thursday morning for a sixth-round draft pick.
So we won’t give them too much credit for acting decisively and wisely in completing the trade, which puts to rest the inglorious three-year Rams career of a player of whom so much was expected after he was selected second overall in the 2014 draft and yet so little was delivered.
The former Auburn star was supposed to lock down the left tackle position for the Rams for the next decade and anchor a young, dominant offensive line.
But it didn’t take long to figure out Robinson simply wasn’t up to the task. And it took even less time for him to play his way out of the Rams’ present and future.
He was billed as a dominant run-blocker with the athletic ability and size to develop into a premier pass-rush protector. The former was never the case and the later never materialized. The fact the Rams could get a draft pick for him given all his underachieving is a coup, not that a sixth-round pick will ever make up for the major swing and miss they took drafting him.
All the more egregious given how current All-Pro linebacker Khalil Mack was there for the taking at the time.
But what’s done is done.
In the bigger scheme of things, the Robinson trade, the domino effect that preceded it and the thought process and imagination behind it bodes well for the club moving forward.
There is a different vibe with these Rams under new coach Sean McVay, one that reaches above him into the general manager’s office, below him to his assistants and around him with the players.
“Aggressive,” is how Jamon Brown explained it from the player’s side.
Brown is the main beneficiary of the Robinson trade given the wide open path it clears for him to win the starting right tackle job. But he’s also a prime example of the new, aggressive approach from the Rams.
Although Brown played tackle in college at Louisville, he’s strictly been a guard in his first two seasons with the Rams. And he fully expected to continue that role this year. That is, until new Rams offensive line coach Aaron Kromer decided to give Brown some reps at right tackle during an Organized Team Activity practice last month.
“It was like, literally right there on the practice field,” Brown remembers, laughing. “Like, hey, take some reps at right tackle.”
To call it a whim would be underestimating Kromer and McVay. They knew Brown’s history as a tackle and had a pretty good idea he could at least provide average play at the position if given a chance. But there was some method to the madness in how Kroemer approached Brown about the possibility.
As in, right in the middle of a practice without any heads up.
“It’s OK to make guys uncomfortable sometimes this time of year,” Kromer explained.
And even more beneficial to see how they respond.
Brown immediately took to the position and was a mainstay with the first team the rest of OTA’s and minicamp, which concluded Wednesday when McVay canceled the final practice as a reward for a job well done this offseason.
“My thought process was just to show them I could be versatile, that I could play any position,” Brown said, “I knew new players were being brought in. Guys were being shuffled around. So I just wanted to make as positive an impression as possible.”
That’s exactly what happened, apparently.
“I guess coach was pleased,” Brown said, smiling.
That doesn’t mean Brown is guaranteed to be the starting right tackle when the Rams open the season against the Indianapolis Colts the first week of September. Or that Kroemer and McVay won’t ultimately decide to flip Rob Havenstein back to right tackle from right guard after making the switch from tackle to guard to start OTAs.
But with the left side of the line now solidified with two-time All-Pro tackle Andrew Whitworth coming over in free agency and Rodger Saffold at left guard, the Rams can now focus on getting the right side figured out.
“We’re still trying to sort all that out,” Kroemer said.
But even that speaks well to the new Rams’ way of doing things under McVay, which seems much more progressive, imaginative and inclusive compared to previous coach Jeff Fisher.
The willingness to remain open-minded about positions and roles rather than locking themselves into one way of looking at things is a refreshing change.
Just moving Havenstein to guard illustrates that. One look at the 6-foot-6, 322-pound Havenstein and you immediately think tackle given the height and size.
From McVay and Kromer’s vantage point, though, they saw a better athlete than others may have seen — which enables him to get on defenders quicker than most would have suspected — plus a bright mind to handle the intricacies of the position.
“I think he’s kind of one of the rare exceptions where he’s such a sharp guy, things do happen a little bit faster inside and he’s got better athleticism,” McVay said.
And it didn’t hurt that Havenstein had to clean up a bit before taking a stroll to the altar a few months ago, resulting in a bit of a body transformation any groom would be envious of.
“We always joke with him because he lost a little bit of weight because he got married this offseason,” McVay said. “So, he had to look good for that.”
Point being, McVay and his staff saw something in Havenstein others may have closed their minds to, whether it was because he didn’t fit the prototype or look the part or out of sheer stubbornness.
More importantly, they had the guts to act on their instincts and at least give it a shot, making no promises in the process while reminding players this remains a fluid situation.
“You have to be ready for anything,” Brown said. “ Nothing’s set in stone right now, given how far out we are from the actual season.”
As for Robinson, his time with the club was being measured in months almost from the moment McVay was hired and he and the Rams locked in on and ultimately reeled in Whitworth in free agency.
Whitworth coming aboard immediately displaced Robinson and sent him over to right tackle on essentially a tryout basis.
But given the Rams’ decision to decline Robinson’s fifth-year option for 2018, he would have needed a breakthrough year to put himself back on their long-range radar. And even that would not have guaranteed any sort of future with the team beyond this season.
If, say, Robinson actually held onto the starting job he could have been looking at the kind of $8 million or $11 million dollar deals fellow top-two pick tackles — and disappointments — Matt Kalil and Luke Joeckel got from the Panthers and Seahawks after fizzling out with the Vikings and Jaguars.
There is little chance the Rams would have ever paid him that kind of money, especially given the direction their cap is headed and the big-time players currently up for new contracts and raises.
Brown has a cap-friendly $800,000 contract for 2018, so if he can lock down the job he becomes an asset on the field and on the payroll.
Meanwhile, the Rams get a draft pick and $3.2 million in cap relief this year.
It’s not much, but it’s something.
And in the grand scheme of things, it speaks to a new way of doing things under McVay.
[www.ocregister.com]
