Mike Thomas and Nelson Spruce

[UKram]

dont count out spruce just yet ,,, he caught everything thrown at him ... there's a long way to go till preseason week 4 when the cuts begin

 

[Soul Surfer]

What exactly is this love affair for Mike Thomas based on?

Well, his YouTube highlight tape looks as good as anybody's.
( of course his lowlights might be incredibly bad )

He has 4.4 speed legit.
( of course that doesn't mean much if you can't catch the ball consistently )

He's a very good route runner.
( again.... catching the ball is very important )

I'm pulling for the kid personally, but of course I pull for all of the guys wearing the horns.

 

[Soul Surfer]

Thomas will at least make it as a Ram through his suspension.
There's also a lot of Camp to go and someone may get nicked up short-term.

You guys got to really slow down cutting these guys.

Let's not make too many knee-jerk reactions around here.

Remember that they only have one final cut this year going from 90 players to 53 after the final preseason game.

The coaches are going to take advantage of this and allow themselves to get a longer look at the bottom of the roster players.

 

[rams56]

It is a really nice problem to have.... I think we keep 7. Watkins is no 1 on depth chart. No way are we moving Woods.... he was brought in to fisilitate the development of Goff.... not to mention he is towards the top of the depth chart. Does Kupp overtake him? Maybe... but he is still a fantastic no 3.....as a matter of fact...between those 2.... who ever is no 3 is a mismatch. The rest is projection based on non injury.......There is the possibility of moving Austin..... which we cannot do until he is healthy enough to pass another teams physical. Not to mention he can do things that no other person on this roster can do. We won't practice squad Reynolds unless he proves he is just too raw these next 3 games. So that leaves Cooper, Thomas, and Spruce. I think we keep Cooper because he is explosive enough (and has good hands) to fill in with the ones. Now to Thomas and Spruce. Thomas has 3 preseason games to prove he belongs. He has speed and must prove he has quality hands ...along with his outstanding coverage skills on special teams...then off to serve his 4 game suspension. Spruce in my mind can get open and catch everything thrown his way... I think he just needs to prove that he has enough wiggle to get first downs when he catches short of the marker on 3rd down....he also has potential on coverage in ST.......but he has to prove that.....in the next 3 preseason and 4 regular season games.... and I believe we will try to franchise the loser. Either way the Rams and Goff are the winners because of all this talent.May the best man win........

Go Rams..........

 

[UKram]

View: http://www.therams.com/videos/videos/WIRED_Nelson_Spruce_During_the_RamsCowboys_Opener/ecc1237b-5900-4957-9e7c-c3e921cb1df6

 

[JackDRams]

As a Spruce fan, I have to disagree. I think Spruce has more talent than Cooper, and gives us more potential. And i also believe P. Cooper was a Fisher's pick, and Spruce a choice of Snead, maybe this is something to think about .. who knows..
... JMHO
But i trust in McSnead and GO RAMS!ball:

So because you like Spruce, Snead chose him? But because you don't prefer Cooper, he was Fishers? Come on now, that's rediculous.

 

[shovelpass]

Spruce's biggest thing going for him is he has good hands. I think the best hands on the team, but Kupp, Woods, Watkins, and Cooper have good hands too. I think those guys offer man than Spruce can, really 2 are only a question mark. Kupp because he's a rookie, but he's shown it against #1s and everyone is raving about him. And Cooper, he looked good in limited action last saturday, if he continues to play like that I don't see how he doesn't make the team.
Another thing would be his route running, crisp and gets separation, but he's played in 2 preseason games against 3rd/4th stringers. In the most recent game he looked slow, 6 catches for 30, 1 first down, I wasn't seeing/feeling the "Spruce Magic" after that game. Can he separate and get yards against starters?
Like Thomas, and every other player who isn't a "lock", Spruce has 3 games to show he belongs.

 

[fanotodd]

As the president of the mike Thomas fan club I might be a little biased, but I don't see him getting cut. Most people seem to look at his suspension as a bad thing but if anything it only helps him. Not counting against the 53 man roster for 4 weeks makes it pointless to cut him before he's unsuspended and injuries are inevitably going to happen. Whether any happen to a wr and for an extended enough time to justify adding Thomas to the 6 other WRs remains to be seen but he'll be around past preseason for sure

I think you're right about the suspension being a benefit to Thomas. The Rams have all that extra time to evaluate the other WRs and ST gunners (which is actually the thing he did best last year); and as you say, injuries happen.

To me, the biggest strike against him is that he is unproven and there is no way of knowing if he'll ever develop or if he is gonna be a star, certainly not based on his performance last season.
...enter Sammy Watkins. Now we have a proven, legit, outside/deep threat. The Rams don't have to cross their fingers and hope Thomas gets it this year. Throw in rookie Reynolds, and Thomas would be in serious trouble if the Rams had to make a decision on him before week 1.

 

[LACHAMP46]

As the president of the mike Thomas fan club

I thought I was the president??? Ok, I'll take CEO

maybe a trade....these guys can play.

Spruce needs to make something happen(and stay healthy after a game)...after the catch tho....I bet Mike Thomas does something this weekend...Cooper too...Pharoh Cooper.

 

[Zero]

What exactly is this love affair for Mike Thomas based on?

 

[rams56]

It is a really nice problem to have.... I think we keep 7. Watkins is no 1 on depth chart. No way are we moving Woods.... he was brought in to fisilitate the development of Goff.... not to mention he is towards the top of the depth chart. Does Kupp overtake him? Maybe... but he is still a fantastic no 3.....as a matter of fact...between those 2.... who ever is no 3 is a mismatch. The rest is projection based on non injury.......There is the possibility of moving Austin..... which we cannot do until he is healthy enough to pass another teams physical. Not to mention he can do things that no other person on this roster can do. We won't practice squad Reynolds unless he proves he is just too raw these next 3 games. So that leaves Cooper, Thomas, and Spruce. I think we keep Cooper because he is explosive enough (and has good hands) to fill in with the ones. Now to Thomas and Spruce. Thomas has 3 preseason games to prove he belongs. He has speed and must prove he has quality hands ...along with his outstanding coverage skills on special teams...then off to serve his 4 game suspension. Spruce in my mind can get open and catch everything thrown his way... I think he just needs to prove that he has enough wiggle to get first downs when he catches short of the marker on 3rd down....he also has potential on coverage in ST.......but he has to prove that.....in the next 3 preseason and 4 regular season games.... and I believe we will try to franchise the loser. Either way the Rams and Goff are the winners because of all this talent.May the best man win........

Go Rams..........

Oops I meant the loser is added to the practice squad ( not franchised ). Sorry.... my bad

Go Rams......

 

[Rams43]

I think that maybe we're overlooking the obvious as we try to predict our final WR corps.

Question: Why must we count Tavon as a WR? Why not count him as a versatile weapon that can be used in multiple positions? I mean, that's what he really is, isn't he? Why try to fit him as a square peg into a round hole, position wise?

By so doing, we can simply focus on our true WR corps.

Here's mine...

Watkins
Woods
Kupp
Reynolds
Cooper
Thomas or Spruce. TBD after the final PS games.

That's a helluva WR group and it features all types of WR threats for McVay to play around with. Should be able to keep opposing DC's awake at night before they play us. Lol.

Does this work for y'all?

 

[VeteranRamFan]

It is a really nice problem to have.... I think we keep 7. Watkins is no 1 on depth chart. No way are we moving Woods.... he was brought in to fisilitate the development of Goff.... not to mention he is towards the top of the depth chart. Does Kupp overtake him? Maybe... but he is still a fantastic no 3.....as a matter of fact...between those 2.... who ever is no 3 is a mismatch. The rest is projection based on non injury.......There is the possibility of moving Austin..... which we cannot do until he is healthy enough to pass another teams physical. Not to mention he can do things that no other person on this roster can do. We won't practice squad Reynolds unless he proves he is just too raw these next 3 games. So that leaves Cooper, Thomas, and Spruce. I think we keep Cooper because he is explosive enough (and has good hands) to fill in with the ones. Now to Thomas and Spruce. Thomas has 3 preseason games to prove he belongs. He has speed and must prove he has quality hands ...along with his outstanding coverage skills on special teams...then off to serve his 4 game suspension. Spruce in my mind can get open and catch everything thrown his way... I think he just needs to prove that he has enough wiggle to get first downs when he catches short of the marker on 3rd down....he also has potential on coverage in ST.......but he has to prove that.....in the next 3 preseason and 4 regular season games.... and I believe we will try to franchise the loser. Either way the Rams and Goff are the winners because of all this talent.May the best man win........

Go Rams..........

^^^THIS^^^

Let me add a little something to the mix, #12 Ryan. Not as good as those mentioned but he does bring something to the dinner table. Cooper I like. Thomas hasn't shown much to me and with Reynolds and Watkins, how can we justify keeping him on the active roster? I will say that if we think we can stash these guys on the PS, they won't clear waivers.

What a wonderful problem like you said.

 

[UKram]

I think that maybe we're overlooking the obvious as we try to predict our final WR corps.

Question: Why must we count Tavon as a WR? Why not count him as a versatile weapon that can be used in multiple positions? I mean, that's what he really is, isn't he? Why try to fit him as a square peg into a round hole, position wise?

By so doing, we can simply focus on our true WR corps.

Here's mine...

Watkins
Woods
Kupp
Reynolds
Cooper
Thomas or Spruce. TBD after the final PS games.

That's a helluva WR group and it features all types of WR threats for McVay to play around with. Should be able to keep opposing DC's awake at night before they play us. Lol.

Does this work for y'all?

so where do you group Austin ? at RB ?

 

[dieterbrock]

I think the Rams will give Spruce plenty of PT in these PS games and a team will throw us a late draft pick prior to cuts

 

[FrantikRam]

so where do you group Austin ? at RB ?

I think rather than grouping it that way, I would look at it like this:

Gurley/Brown/Rogers
Tavon
Watkins/Woods/Kupp/Cooper/Reynolds
Everett/Higbee/Hemmingway

I think these guys all make the team - although Rogers and Hemmingway would be the low hanging fruit of the group IMO.

That's a combination of 12 RB/WR/TE - and I believe a lot of teams keep a combination of 13-15 of those positions. We kept 14 under Fisher IIRC - 4/6/4

So we have potentially two spots for:

Harkey/Thomas/Spruce/Justin Davis/Aaron Green

If Rogers makes it, I doubt Harkey does. The preference would be a RB over a WR I imagine - and Davis looked so good I give him a spot. Tavon being able to play RB helps with roster flexibility. Before Davis looked so damn impressive I would have kept Spruce until Thomas' suspension and then make a choice between the two.

 

[Rambitious1]

Man our WR is loaded now and two of the WR's I see a lot of support for are Spruce and Thomas, and you know what? We have no more room for them anymore. This has really giving me a revelation that in just one off season past Fishers we are going to be cutting some pretty damn decent WR's which we have not had in the last 10 seasons.


Guaranteed Roster WR's:

1. Watkins
2. Woods
3. Kupp
4. Tavon
5. Cooper
6. Reynolds

That's a hell of a WR lineup.
I guess you could make an argument if we keep 7 WR's it would be either Spruce or Thomas.

If we torch some teams the first 4-6 games hopefully that will bring some safeties up high again and then Gurley can be let loose!

At this point, I'm not too worried about us 'torching' teams.
I'm more concerned about just scoring enough points to win a game.