Rams: Once Again The Youngest Team In The NFL

[RamBill]

Rams: Once Again The Youngest Team In The NFL
By Frank "Dubs" Dobozy

http://www.turfshowtimes.com/2015/9...-rams-once-again-the-youngest-team-in-the-nfl

Being the youngest team in the NFL is getting to be a habit for the St. Louis Rams. The Rams will field the youngest team in the NFL...for the 4th consecutive year.

All 32 NFL teams reduced their rosters to 53 players on Saturday. The Rams had some pretty difficult roster decisions to make this year. In Year 4 of a complete rebuild - under Les Snead and Jeff Fisher - the Rams continue to stockpile young talent. For the fourth consecutive year, the Rams will open the season as the youngest team in the NFL. At an average age of 24.94 years, this is the youngest Rams team since the arrival of Fisher and Snead in 2012.

St. Louis Rams Current 53-Man Roster & Depth Chart

C Tim Barnes Demetrius Rhaney
RG Rodger Saffold Garrett Reynolds
LG Jamon Brown Cody Wichmann
RT Rob Havenstein Andrew Donnal
LT Greg Robinson Darrell Williams
TE Lance Kendricks Cory Harkey
TE Jared Cook
WR Brian Quick Tavon Austin Bradley Marquez
WR Kenny Britt Stedman Bailey Chris Givens
RB Tre Mason Benny Cunningham Chase Reynolds
RB Todd Gurley Isaiah Pead
QB Nick Foles Case Keenum Sean Mannion
PK Greg Zuerlein
P John Hekker
LS Jake McQuaide
DT Aaron Donald Nick Fairley
DT Michael Brockers Ethan Westbrooks
DE Chris Long William Hayes
DE Robert Quinn Eugene Sims
MLB James Laurinaitis Bryce Hager
OLB Alec Ogletree Daren Bates
OLB Akeem Ayers Cameron Lynch
CB Janoris Jenkins Marcus Roberson
CB Trumaine Johnson Lamarcus Joyner
SS T.J. McDonald Mark Barron Maurice Alexander
FS Rodney McLeod Cody Davis

Practice Squad Reserve/Suspended Injured Reserve
DE Matt Longacre RB Trey Watts CB E.J. Gaines
DT Doug Worthington
DT Louis Trinca-Pasat
CB Trovon Reed
SS Jacob Hagen
FS Christian Bryant
RB Malcolm Brown
FB Zach Laskey
TE Justice Cunningham
OT Isaiah Battle

Every year - when rosters are reduced to 53 players - Jimmy Kempski (PhillyVoice.com) collects and analyzes age data for all 32 NFL teams. The accompanying chart presents his findings for the past four years:

Kempski explains the seemingly minor difference (2.23 years) between the leagues youngest team (the Rams) and the leagues oldest team (the Colts):

"While 2.23 years may not be a big difference between two individual players, keep in mind that these are the average ages of 53 players per team."

"2.23 years on average * 53 players = A difference of about 118 total years between the Rams and Colts."

"In other words, if you took the 23 oldest Colts and shaved 5 years off each of their ages, their roster still wouldn't be as young as the Rams."

The Rams remain the youngest team in the NFL for the following reasons:

They're committed to building the team through the draft, opting for talented young players over experienced older players.

Although the Rams signed a trio of older, experienced veterans during the offseason [Garrett Reynolds (28), Nick Fairley (27) and Akeem Ayers (26)] they also released/didn't re-sign a number of ageing veterans: Davin Joseph (31), Jake Long (30), Scott Wells (34), Jo-Lonn Dunbar (30) and Shaun Hill (35).

Virtually half of the Rams' current roster is comprised of players with two years (or less) of NFL experience. The Rams' roster consists of only two players who have reached the age of 30: both William Hayes and Chris Long are 30.

Eleven rookies made the Rams' final 53-man roster. Seven were 2015 draft selections. Demetrius Rhaney is a 7th Round 2014 draft selection. The remaining three are 2015 UDFA's.

The accompanying chart presents the 11 rookies who made the 53-man roster:

Position Player How Acquired
RB Todd Gurley 1st Round Draft
OT Rob Havenstein 2nd Round Draft
OG Jamon Brown 3rd Round Draft
QB Sean Mannion 3rd Round Draft
OT Andrew Donnal 4th Round Draft
OG Cody Wichmann 6th Round Draft
MLB Bryce Hager 7th Round Draft
C Demetrius Rhaney 7th Round (2014)
OT Darrell Williams UDFA
WR Bradley Marquez UDFA
OLB Cameron Lynch UDFA

The composition of this years roster once again displays the Rams' commitment to building the team through the draft and UDFA process. It's also a testament to the teams' ability to evaluate - and accumulate - exceptional, young talent.

 

[Rmfnlt]

Sorry, but no longer an excuse.

 

[rdw]

Sorry, but no longer an excuse.

may I ask who is using age as an excuse?

 

[HometownBoy]

may I ask who is using age as an excuse?

That word is slowly becoming one of the most over and misused words on this site.

 

[Rmfnlt]

may I ask who is using age as an excuse?

Maybe excuse is too strong a word... but it has been given many times as an "explanation" as to why the team is sloppy (bad execution, penalties, etc.).

It's time... regardless of the average age.

 

[MrMotes]

may I ask who is using age as an excuse?

Exactly. Our youth is a strength not a weakness...

 

[Rmfnlt]

Exactly. Our youth is a strength not a weakness...

Glad to hear you say that...

 

[rdw]

This post has me curious about some things. I would research it now but I'm at work.
1. Top ten youngest and oldest teams the last 10 years
2. Top ten most and least penalized teams the last 10 years
3. Most penalized teams by head coach the last 10 years

Is there a direct coloration between age and penalties?
Has JF consistently ranked at or near the top in penalties the last 10 years?

Finally, if there are no correlations between age and penalties and JF consistently ranks near the top in most penalties then maybe we should accept as fact that we're going to be near the top for penalties and just deal with it? Or maybe it's the opposite and JF coached teams are not traditionally near or at the top of most penalized teams and there's a direct correlation between age and penalties. In that case you could use age as an "excuse".

 

[MrMotes]

This post has me curious about some things. I would research it now but I'm at work.
1. Top ten youngest and oldest teams the last 10 years
2. Top ten most and least penalized teams the last 10 years
3. Most penalized teams by head coach the last 10 years

Is there a direct coloration between age and penalties?
Has JF consistently ranked at or near the top in penalties the last 10 years?

Finally, if there are no correlations between age and penalties and JF consistently ranks near the top in most penalties then maybe we should accept as fact that we're going to be near the top for penalties and just deal with it? Or maybe it's the opposite and JF coached teams are not traditionally near or at the top of most penalized teams and there's a direct correlation between age and penalties. In that case you could use age as an "excuse".

Fisher's teams do tend to commit a lot of penalties. That was true in Tennessee too.

But the last 3 SB winners were at or near the top of the league in penalties, so really, shouldn't be too hard to deal with...

 

[Fatbot]

Is there a direct coloration between age and penalties?

Not sure about the rest of the correlations, but this white paper is probably the definitive authority on penalties: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2095254615000022

"The analysis revealed that temperature positively predicted aggressive penalties in football"​

So you see it is not biased refs or Jeff Fisher, but clearly time to blame global warming for Rams penalties...

 

[Fatbot]

Is there a direct coloration between age and penalties?

Ok here's another more real source: http://footballstatblog.blogspot.com/2008/08/age-and-defensive-performance.html

"You often hear commentators calling penalties, "rookie mistakes." You also hear them mention how as a player matures, he will smarten up and stop making so many penalties. Well, according to statistics, this is nonsense. When it comes to committing a lot of penalties, it appears that players are who they are. There is zero statistical decline in a player's penalty rate as his career progresses. Furthermore, there is no relationship between years of NFL experience and the amount of penalties that a player gets."
​

Unfortunately the writer does not cite his source for those statistics...

 

[rdw]

Not sure about the rest of the correlations, but this white paper is probably the definitive authority on penalties: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2095254615000022

"The analysis revealed that temperature positively predicted aggressive penalties in football"​

So you see it is not biased refs or Jeff Fisher, but clearly time to blame global warming for Rams penalties...

TL;DR - Crank up the AC in the dome to lower penalties!

 

[MrMotes]

Ok here's another more real source: http://footballstatblog.blogspot.com/2008/08/age-and-defensive-performance.html

"You often hear commentators calling penalties, "rookie mistakes." You also hear them mention how as a player matures, he will smarten up and stop making so many penalties. Well, according to statistics, this is nonsense. When it comes to committing a lot of penalties, it appears that players are who they are. There is zero statistical decline in a player's penalty rate as his career progresses. Furthermore, there is no relationship between years of NFL experience and the amount of penalties that a player gets."
​

Unfortunately the writer does not cite his source for those statistics...

Also from said unsourced blog:

The truth: Well, for starters, defensive penalties are not a killer. There is no relationship between the amount of penalties a defense commits and its defensive ranking. Nor is there a relationship between defensive penalties and the amount of points a defense allows. While a penalty in any particular game can obviously change the course of a game, over the course of a season, a defense will not be harmed if it is prone to penalties. ​

 

[iced]

may I ask who is using age as an excuse?

 

[rdw]

 

[RamBall]

As Fisher has stated himself, the Rams are young, but not necessarily inexperienced. With the obvious exception of the rookies, the young Rams players have playing experience. How many rookies have started for the Rams in the Fisher era? I'm too lazy to look it up but I'm sure its quite a few.

 

[Rmfnlt]

But the last 3 SB winners were at or near the top of the league in penalties, so really, shouldn't be too hard to deal with...

Well then, super bowl here we come!!

Who says this football thing is difficult?

 

[CodeMonkey]

What jumps out at me is how YOUNG the Packers (3rd youngest) are and how OLD the Colts (the oldest) are. That's interesting and not what I think most would expect as we tend to think of the young gun Luck and the veteran Rodgers when it comes to those teams.

Age is clearly not an excuse. There's good and bad teams at both ends of the spectrum.

 

[MrMotes]

What jumps out at me is how YOUNG the Packers (3rd youngest) are and how OLD the Colts (the oldest) are. That's interesting and not what I think most would expect as we tend to think of the young gun Luck and the veteran Rodgers when it comes to those teams.

Age is clearly not an excuse. There's good and bad teams at both ends of the spectrum.

Exactly. True for age and penalties...