6 Mistakes the St. Louis Rams Can't Afford to Make This Offseason

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http://bleacherreport.com/articles/...louis-rams-cant-afford-to-make-this-offseason

6 Mistakes the St. Louis Rams Can't Afford to Make This Offseason
By Travis Wakeman, Featured Columnist

After a 6-10 season and a last-place finish in the NFC West, it may seem that the St. Louis Rams need to change things in a big way going forward.

But that may not necessarily be the case.

The Rams were a competitive team in 2014, and the difference between last place in the division and a playoff spot probably came down to a few plays being made.

Jeff Fisher and his staff are onto something with this team, and St. Louis could be one to keep an eye on in 2015.

With that said, there are certain mistakes the team could make this offseason that would set it back in the wrong direction.

However, if it can avoid falling into these traps, the playoffs are not out of the question next season.

Assume That Sam Bradford Is the QB of the Future

Matt Rourke/Associated Press

Sam Bradford has had his chance to be the quarterback of the St. Louis Rams, and he has never grabbed it by the horns. That is mostly due to injuries.

But when he has been healthy, he hasn't exactly been amazing either.

The Rams shouldn't turn their backs on Bradford, but they need a much more suitable backup plan than they have had in the past.

In 2014, the Rams had a competitive team, beating opponents such as the Seattle Seahawks and Denver Broncos. But the fact that Bradford missed the entire season and they only got marginal play out of Austin Davis and Shaun Hill hindered their chances to make the playoffs.

Bradford will be entering his sixth season in the league. He's played in 49 career games and has 58 career turnovers. That's not a good ratio.

He's also never played in a single postseason game.

Bradford may be a former No. 1 overall pick, but he needs to be kept on a short leash this season. That means the Rams will need to explore all of their options.

Would the Philadelphia Eagles be interested in trading Nick Foles? Could the team work a deal with unrestricted free agent Mark Sanchez?

There's always the draft as well. While St. Louis may not be able to get a quarterback in the first round, guys like Bryce Petty and Garrett Grayson are players the team should consider.

Trade Up in the Draft

Elaine Thompson/Associated Press

With the thought of creating a contingency plan for Bradford in mind, the Rams must not take drastic measures. That includes trading up into one of the top spots in the draft.

Marcus Mariota and Jameis Winston are clearly the top two quarterback prospects in the upcoming draft, but neither would be worth the cost of the Rams moving up to the No. 1 or No. 2 slot to select one of them.

Instead, the Rams should stay at No. 10 in the first round and draft the best player on their board. If they really want to get a quarterback in the first round, UCLA's Brett Hundley might be an option.

The Rams saw firsthand the mistake the Washington Redskins made when they traded away multiple draft picks to move up and select Robert Griffin III with the No. 2 pick in the 2012 draft.

Trading up for Winston or Mariota would be a bad choice, and it shouldn't even be considered.

Keep Jake Long

Rich Schultz/Getty Images

Once upon a time, Jake Long was the No. 1 overall pick in the NFLdraft. Once upon a time he was a pretty good left tackle too.

But that doesn't seem to be the case anymore, and the fact that he has a $10.5 million cap number in 2015 is making matters worse.

The Rams can't even consider keeping him with that being the case.

Long has suffered two torn ACLs, and he just isn't the player he once was. He played in just seven games last season but gave up three sacks and 13 hurries, according to Pro Football Focus.

If the Rams choose to re-sign Joseph Barksdale, it will allow them to keep Greg Robinson at the left tackle position and anchor their offensive line for years to come.

Long shouldn't fit into the team's plans any longer, and St. Louis should part ways with him as soon as it can.

Allow Joseph Barksdale to Get Away

Jeff Haynes/Associated Press

The Rams have 16 players scheduled to be free agents this offseason, as shown on Spotrac.com. Eight of them will be unrestricted free agents.

If the Rams were only going to re-sign one of these players, which one would be the most important to keep in St. Louis? If you said Joseph Barksdale, you win.

Barksdale played well for the Rams in 2014 and should have earned a role as their right tackle of the future. Pro Football Focus ranked him at No. 11 among all tackles as a run-blocker.

Barksdale's play makes the decision to release Jake Long even easier, as the team can feel confident in having Barksdale and Greg Robinson as its offensive tackles.

Barksdale made just $645,000 in 2014, so while the Rams would have to give him an increase in pay, it wouldn't break the bank. Releasing Long and clearing his salary would help give the team the money to pay Barksdale.

Get Too Excited About Kenny Britt

Tom Gannam/Associated Press

Kenny Britt has always been a player with immense talent. But his off-field decisions have always overshadowed that talent.

While it isn't fair to punish a player for his choices forever, one decent season shouldn't erase things for Britt.

In 2014, he had 48 receptions for 748 yards and three touchdowns. It was as good a season as he ever had while a member of the Tennessee Titans.

The Rams signed him to a one-year deal in which he earned about $1.375 million. As an unrestricted free agent, Britt likely won't receive a lot of attention from around the league due to his troubled past. If the Rams want him back, he'll be back.

Kenny Britt is an interesting free agent option. 9 arrests since 2009 are obvious issues, but he had his best pro season with #Rams in '14
— Matt Miller (@nfldraftscout) January 9, 2015

And the Rams should bring him back but under similar terms. Make Britt prove it again with another one-year contract. If he has another productive season, he'll have a little more leverage when it comes to a long-term deal.

Right now, he doesn't have that. And he shouldn't get it.

Don't Get Away from What Works

L.G. Patterson/Associated Press

From top to bottom, the Rams have one of the best young defenses in the league. They shouldn't get away from that.

Yes, they need a steady quarterback, and they have also begun to develop a strong rushing attack behind last year's rookie sensation, Tre Mason.

But defense is what this team needs to be built on.

It has one of the league's best pass-rushers in Robert Quinn, a very good middle linebacker in James Laurinaitis and an emerging young secondary that features Janoris Jenkins, E.J. Biggers and T.J. McDonald.

St. Louis is a team that could easily pattern itself off the Seattle Seahawks, its NFC West rival.

The Seahawks win with intelligent play at the quarterback position and a solid running game, but mostly with excellent defense. St. Louis has the pieces to do the same thing.

In other words, sticking to this model when the team looks for players through free agency and the draft is the right move.

The Rams don't need a drastic overhaul. Defensively, they can compete with most teams. They just need a couple of pieces in the right place to become a serious contender.

 

[jrry32]

No surprise this is from bleacherreport.

 

[ChrisW]

E.J. Biggers

Who the F?

 

[Mojo Ram]

Only read the bolded points but I agree with all of the reasons except Kenny Britt. He can still get better and help this team immensely with better QB play.

 

[Boffo97]

Could the team work a deal with unrestricted free agent Mark Sanchez?

While that went from not ever happening to slim possibility with Schotty's departure (remember, Schotty has been scapegoated for Sanchez before), I honestly hope there's better to be had than Sanchez out there.

 

[Ram_Rally]

What's the consensus on barksdale?

 

[Boffo97]

What's the consensus on barksdale?

Most seem to think he's a must keep. Some don't think he's good.

 

[Fatbot]

This time of the offseason sucks, no new content out there except from the former 49er fan site that's now sold nationally -- a/k/a bleacher report -- that gives us a precious level of news quality somewhere between pro football focus and TMZ.

 

[jrry32]

Who the F?

I think he meant that rookie CB of ours...what was his name...E.J. Manuel?

 

[Ram_Rally]

Most seem to think he's a must keep. Some don't think he's good.

So this draft is gonna be really ambiguous

 

[JonRam99]

Actually, not a bad article, except for absolutely positively indisputably BUTCHERING the name of our future pro-bowl CB.... what's-his-name.

 

[LosAngelesRams]

Hmm, actually not a bad article. 1st BR I've read without the dumb ass remarks about our team. Besides the EJ fuck up, not bad. I agree with alot of it.

 

[Ballhawk]

What's the consensus on barksdale?

Keep him! He played well with Saffold next to him and should come at a good price. If we can get a good center and left guard we can have a good line.

 

[Ram_Rally]

Keep him! He played well with Saffold next to him and should come at a good price. If we can get a good center and left guard we can have a good line.

Is this offseason exhausting to you akready as well? Lol

 

[Mackeyser]

Pretty sure he meant EJ Gaines.

And, you didn't ask me, @Ram_Rally but, yes, yes it is...

 

[Dagonet]

If Barks commands big $$$$ I say let him walk.. Not worth it.

 

[Dodgersrf]

Certainly don't agree with staying at 10 and taking Hundley.

Good read though.

 

[RaminExile]

Yeah its right on some points but you can tell its a bleacher report job. Two points;

Assume he's the QB of the future? No - that mistake has been made. But he's a better option than a lot of others I see thrown around. There's always a chance his bad luck is behind him now, but we need to make sure we have a backup plan in place either this year or next.

So that said, whats with them trying to do a hatchet job on Sam Braford's on field production? Calling him a turnover machine?? WTF? Yes the guys been hurt too much, but he doesn't turn it over.

At the risk of sounding like a "Bradford mom" - Sam Bradford has played 49 career games. Hes only thrown 38 interceptions. That's pretty good in my book. In fact I think that if you do some research (which I cant be bothered to do) that figure will be above average. He's also thrown 59 Td's in those games. So they can shut up about him turning it over a lot.

You want to know why he's had 58 career "turnovers" (note they didn't say INT's which most media types do with QB's as that's generally regarded as being the QB's fault and thus a fair yardstick of performance whereas fumbles are in large part down to bad blocking and receivers not getting open (and yes slow hesitant decision making/bad recognition by the QB) look no further than the number of times he's been sacked in his career - a whopping 120 times. Now is that his fault? Yes, partly. Does it explain why he's been injured so much as well? Partly - along with some bad luck. But would any fair observer who looked at those stats and then at the names of the offensive linemen, the sheer number of different mediocre offensive linemen, the lack of weapons he had until last year (and he would have had some weapons this year if he'd played so Im not making excuses for him there) and the different systems and co-ordinators he had as a young player would surely look at that and go - too many turnovers. I submit they would not.

I also agree with keeping Joe Barksdale. He played poorly in 2014 but he's been solid up until then. I realize I sound like I'm making excuses for guys here, but I believe that a large part of analysis of performance is looking at WHY something is happening, rather than just saying "well shucks, that aint working - rip it up and start again" and then two years down the line having the same problem. Imagine if that was how you ran your business. Wouldn't be any surprise when you failed. So why was Barksdale's production down? A lot of more knowledgeable posters than me made the point that you're only as good as the guy next to you on the line - and the guy next to him was Davin Joseph. The guy next to him was Scott Wells, who had arguably his worst year as a pro after overcoming a serious health scare pre-season which meant he'd lost 40lbs or thereabouts if I remember right (a worthy winner of the Ed Block Courage award btw). Add into that the argument that Barksdale struggles historically against talented 3-4 edge-rushers (hey, who wouldn't) in a season when the quirk of the schedule meant we played against more of those teams than usual (Kansas City for example) and its easy to see why an average right tackle in this league looked a little overmatched at times. What I'd say is that at the moment we need numbers on that o-line. It looks possible, if not probable that Jake Long is done, Scott Wells maybe too. So Greg Robinson is our LT. Saffold LG (I'd personally like to see him at RG where he's a beast of a run blocker) coming off surgery, an untried C in Tim Barnes and a hole at RG. We don't need a hole at RT as well!

We need to run the ball, and we need to protect Sam Bradford now more than ever (or indeed whatever QB we do decide to go forwards with for the next 10 years!). Our offensive line has been the teams big weakness for years and years and to fix it we need to allocate resources continually until it is done - not just by spending a first round pick on it in the form of G Rob and saying "there you go - she's as good as new" like a mechanic fixing your carburettor by sticking some tape over it. I do think Coach Fisher and Les Snead are well aware of that.

Sorry for wall of text.

 

[shaunpinney]

Agree with all points apart from the Britt one, I think he's a WR that we NEED, and if he continues to play like he did then I'm happy.

With regards to Sam though, I'd like to see him get 100% match fit first before we play him again, I know freak accidents happen but I think (IMO) he was rushed last season. We need a backup with more to give that Hill & Davis - I like the idea of Foles, but it does depend on our OC moving forward - if it's Cignetti, he's worked with QBs for years, I'd like to see his input here.