new thread: Rams draft after AD retired

[zn]

My take.

They have  a top priority now, then a 2nd priority.

Top priority: a dominant front 7 player. Or 2, since it will take 2 to replace AD.

A running back. KW got dinged up twice last year and they went 1/3 with him out. They won’t find another KW but they can find a solid 1000 yard back to share carries.

[InvaderRam]

darius robinson is my choice.

 

he’s no aaron donald. but that would be impossible to find anyway.

[canadaram]

Depressing. What a ride though. So glad that I got to witness the Aaron Donald era. The Super Bowl win does not happen without him.

The draft needs to front 4 centric for sure. Hopefully last year’s guys progress as well. Not just Young and Turner, but Hampton, Johnson and Mathis too.

[InvaderRam]

also bobby brown iii.

[Billy_T]

Sad to see him go, but I understand it. The game takes an incredible toll on these players, and he left it all on the field, as they say. Ten years! He planned this well, stayed with the same franchise, and won the Super Bowl, along with pretty much every award a defender can get.

Rams can’t “replace” him, but if they scheme and coach and draft and develop well . . . they can find ways to match his production via two or more players. It’s too much to expect to do that with just one guy.

 

Deacon, AD, Merlin, Jack Youngblood. There’s my all-time Front Four.

[zn]

According to Rodrigue, Rams knew about AD before free agency started. I think it explains their FA strategy. Bulk up the offense and particularly the running game with vets. The draft will be for the defense, making for a young defense which the run-heavy offense will strive to keep off the field.

Since they are revamping the secondary with veterans, it looks like the main energy in the draft will be LB/edge and DL. (Which I already said, I know.)

AndI figure RB, which goes along with the “run at em a lot” strategy. As we know, they have no legit 1000-yarder type 1B back behind Wms, and Wms got dinged twice last year, so it’s not smart to count on him taking the load mostly himself for 17 games.

They will also (IMO) draft at least one each of the following: DB, OL, WR, and if one is there, a QB.

I see them trading down rather than up.

[Zooey]

Conspiracy theory on the net: AD will come back for the stretch drive like Eric Weddle.

Me: Nah. That isn’t the way the man operates. He never took a shortcut in his life.

[InvaderRam]

Zooey wrote:

Conspiracy theory on the net: AD will come back for the stretch drive like Eric Weddle. Me: Nah. That isn’t the way the man operates. He never took a shortcut in his life.

 

i do hope he changes his mind before the season starts. i won’t fully believe it until maybe 2 years post-retirement. haha. call it denial i guess.

[Zooey]

Okay.

Just don’t draft Bill Hawkins, Adam Carriker, or Sean Gilbert.

[wv]

Zooey wrote:

Okay. Just don’t draft Bill Hawkins, Adam Carriker, or Sean Gilbert.

 

3/4s of Some sort of Mt. Rushmore, there.

 

w

v

[nittany ram]

wv wrote:

Zooey wrote:

Okay. Just don’t draft Bill Hawkins, Adam Carriker, or Sean Gilbert.

3/4s of Some sort of Mt. Rushmore, there. w v

Plus Mike Shad, Jimmy Kennedy, Lawrence Phillips, Trung Candidate, et. al…

You would need an entire mountain range to hold all the visages of shame.

 

[InvaderRam]

who’s the worst clunker in rams’ history under the  les snead regime?

[zn]

InvaderRam wrote:

who’s the worst clunker in rams’ history under the les snead regime?

Greg Robinson. Though, same draft as AD.

But you want to see bad drafting? The Rams had 5 picks in the top 50 in 1988. They hit on Flipper Anderson at 42. To show what they missed, I’m going to post a Pro Football Reference draft history with their overall career grade for the player. These are guys the Rams could have drafted between pick 14 and pick 35. The PFR grade is a number. I will put them in order of highest grade numbers. The list continues until you see a Ram with a high grade on it. Remember, the list includes only guys they could have taken. Instead of Cox, Green, and Newman, they could have had 3 of these guys:

Rnd Pick Team Name Pos. Grade
2 40 BUF Thurman Thomas RB 110
2 30 PHI Eric Allen DB 96
2 44 PIT Dermontti Dawson C 96
2 50 CLE Michael Dean Perry DT 83
3 80 SFO Bill Romanowski LB 83
2 41 DAL Ken Norton Jr. LB 81
3 74 NYJ James Hasty DB 81
5 125 HOU Cris Dishman DB 23 78
3 76 IND Chris Chandler QB 77
1 15 SDG Anthony Miller WR 74
2 29 DET Chris Spielman LB 74
2 36 NYG Jumbo Elliott T 62
8 212 MIA Harry Galbreath G 60
2 52 NOR Brett Perriman WR 59
10 252 PIT John Jackson T 58
9 239 MIA Jeff Cross DE 50
4 98 SDG David Richards G 49
7 166 ATL Michael Haynes WR 49
11 299 SEA Dwayne Harper DB 49
4 87 NWE Tim Goad NT 48
2 47 RAM Fred Strickland LB 46

…

I have the benefit of hindsight, obviously, but if it were me and I were given a magic do-over, I would take  Eric Allen, Thurman Thomas, and Michael Dean Perry.

 

[Zooey]

Zooey wrote:

Conspiracy theory on the net: AD will come back for the stretch drive like Eric Weddle. Me: Nah. That isn’t the way the man operates. He never took a shortcut in his life.

How does Aaron Donald’s retirement impact salary cap? Rams leave door open for return
OverTheCap broke down how Aaron Donald’s retirement impacts the Rams salary cap

By Blaine Grisak

https://www.turfshowtimes.com/2024/3/16/24103004/rams-cap-space-aaron-donald-retirement-free-agency

 

The outlook for the Los Angeles Rams offseason took a completely different turn on Friday when Aaron Donald announced his retirement from the NFL. With Donald retiring, one of the biggest questions has been how it will impact the Rams salary cap. Prior to Donald’s announcement, it was reported that the team restructured his deal, opening up $9.2M in cap space. With that said, the restructure and retirement also has other implications.

Jason Fitzgerald from OverTheCap did a fantastic job breaking down Donald’s contract and how his retirement impacts the Rams salary cap. Here is what Fitzgerald had to say,

“Per a source with knowledge of the contract this was not a typical restructure where salary was just converted to a signing bonus. In this case the Rams converted his $5 million roster bonus, which was already guaranteed, to a signing bonus. They took $8.79 million of his salary, which was going to become guaranteed in a few days, and added it to his $20 million option bonus…The restructured contract, in light of Donald’s retirement, reads a bit more like salary cap maneuvering by the Rams to keep the door open to Donald possibly coming back to the team. If both sides were 100% on the retirement they would have simply bought his salary this year down to $1.21 million and taken out the option and roster bonuse. My guess is they want to leave the door wide open for him to come back. By doing the restructure, the Rams brought Donald’s salary cap number down to $24.97 million. Placing Donald on the retirement list would have caused the Rams to take on a $28.5 million cap charge at a minimum so this gives the Rams a little more room to work with.”

Even though Donald is retired, that doesn’t put the Rams off the hook from paying him, opening up $30M in cap space. His contract is still on the books and the Rams still have to pay Donald what he is owed. However, they can structure things in a way that works for both sides and maximizes their available cap space.

With how Fitzgerald describes it, the Rams are leaving the option for Donald to return in the case that he does end up changing his mind. While unexpected, it is possible and not totally out of the realm of possibility. We’ve seen the play out recently with players like Tom Brady who retired and then un-retired. There are also things that the Rams can do with some of the bonuses and options in the contract that they can restructure.

Said Fitzgerald,

“By deferring his salary into the option it also gives the Rams a chance to keep Donald on the roster through June, if they want, and place him on the retired list at that point. It also gives Donald months to consider if he wants to return since the contract is simply waiting for him if he returns to the NFL this year or any year in the future. If the team waits until June they should be able to split the salary cap charges across two years, though the cap charges are contingent on the way his signing bonus works. If the signing bonus is a legit bonus then the money should count towards dead money in 2024 and 2025. If it is earned but no money ever changes hands prior to the retirement the NFL will likely just disregard the bonus. If there is money paid and the team is later paid back the Rams will take a charge in 2024 with an offsetting credit coming in 2025.”

Reading Fitzgerald’s full explanation of Donald’s contract and the retirement implications is certainly worth checking out as there are several dead money scenarios depending on what the Rams decide to do. There’s a scenario in which the Rams could also restructure the contract once again to remove some of the option bonuses, lowering his cap-hit to $14.2M.

Again, Donald’s retirement doesn’t necessarily help the Rams from a salary cap perspective as they still have to pay out his contract. They can do minor things with some of the bonuses and options that will give them a little more room to work with. As it stands, the Rams opened up $9.2M with Friday’s restructure which could help bring in another low-value free agent.

[wv]

Daniel Jeremiah’s mock.

Rams take someone named: Lalatu Latu

https://www.nfl.com/news/daniel-jeremiah-2024-nfl-mock-draft-3-0

[wv]

Mina Kimes mock draft.    She picks two possible guys for the Rams:

Johnny Newton or Brock Bowers.   (she says Bowers would score a million TD’s in McVay’s system)

 

At about the 33 minute mark.

[zn]

wv wrote:

she says Bowers would score a million TD’s in McVay’s system

Can he play defense?

[wv]

Mina Kimes, 2nd mock. == Rams get Johnny Newton of Illinois.   Whoever that is.

[zn]

from: https://www.therams.com/news/top-takeaways-sean-mcvay-press-conference-nfl-annual-meeting-tyler-higbee-update-free-agency-offensive-line-jonah-jackson-steve-avila

What’s next for pass rush following Aaron Donald’s retirement

There’s no question that, between the way teams slid protections his direction and the double- and triple-teams he commanded, Aaron Donald was a focal point of the Rams’ pass rush.

Now that he’s retired, where does L.A. go from here when it comes to building that plan?

McVay said they would have a better idea after the draft.

“I think I’ll have a better clarity once we get through the draft, because you don’t want to just say, okay, we lost Aaron Donald, so now we’ve got to go address this position,” McVay said. “You want to be able to still continue to find the right kinds of people that it can influence and affect positive change for us. And the rush, whether that’s from the edge, from the interior parts, there’s a bunch of different ways to influence and affect the quarterback. There’s a bunch of quality players in this draft, and exactly who we come away with and how many we come away with that can do that, is something that we’re still working through.”

[zn]

Rodrigue, from: https://theathletic.com/5370135/2024/03/26/sean-mcvay-aaron-donald-retirement/

A common phrase around the Rams’ buildings right now: There is no replacing Donald. But the team is now in a position where they’ll have to at least build a new world for a defensive line that features two up-and-coming second-year players who started in 2023 — Turner, and outside linebacker Byron Young — and a lot of unknowns.

As things currently stand — and pending the draft at the end of April — Turner will move full-time to the three-technique. That means more pass-rushing opportunities. Turner finished 2023 with nine sacks and was a candidate for Defensive Rookie of the Year. Young had nine sacks.

The Rams also tendered Michael Hoecht, who started the entirety of 2023 — he signed the tender on Tuesday, according to VP of football administration Tony Pastoors — but there is a strong indication from the team that they are far from done with adding to the position room. All last season, a lack of consistent complementary pressure was evident.

“From a stability standpoint, we have two players who have played a lot of snaps for us at OLB, but we’ve always said we want to add partners for them to have a more disruptive arsenal compared to last year,” Snead said on Monday.

How aggressive will McVay and Snead be at finding more players who can improve their pass-rush?

“That is such an important part — you get better on the second and third levels of your defense by being able to affect and influence the pass game with the guys that are rushing,” said McVay.

“There’s different ways to apply pressure. It might be through (a) four-man rush. It might be through simulated pressure. Bringing five (rushers). Those are the things that we are in the midst of really figuring out. I think I’ll have better clarity once we get through the draft. You don’t want to just say, ‘OK, we lost Aaron Donald. So now, we’ve got to go address this position.’ You want to be able to still continue to find the right kinds of people that can influence and affect positive change for us in the rush, whether that’s from the edge, from the interior. … There’s a bunch of quality players in this draft. Exactly who we come away with and how many we come away with that can do that is something we’re still working through.”

[InvaderRam]

even with the rams signing white, i might still draft defensive back in the first round if i were the rams.  i could see cooper dejean fitting into this secondary.  maybe at first as a safety and then moving to cornerback in a year when white is a free agent again?

[InvaderRam]

curious to see how he does on his pro day which will be in mid april sometime.

• This reply was modified 1 month ago by InvaderRam.

[zn]

12 players have recorded a 91.0+ PFF pass-rushing grade over a full season of work as a college edge rusher since 2014.

8 of the 12 are NFL Pro-Bowlers.

One of the ones that isn't is UCLA's Laiatu Latu, and he's done it twice.

— Sam Monson (@PFF_Sam) March 28, 2024

[InvaderRam]

wow. that makes me feel a little bit better about latu. i’m just worried about his neck injury he suffered,  but if he checks out medically why not?

[joemad]

InvaderRam wrote:

who’s the worst clunker in rams’ history under the les snead regime?

 

Can’t complain too much about Lester’s draft picks…..

Tavon and Tutu….

Tiny Tavon over DeAndre Hopkins, Robert Woods, Keenan Allen, and Goodwin….

 

[zn]

InvaderRam wrote:

wow. that makes me feel a little bit better about latu. i’m just worried about his neck injury he suffered, but if he checks out medically why not?

I’ve been doing more reading around on him. I am not so sure he checks out medically (?)

[zn]

joemad wrote:

InvaderRam wrote:

who’s the worst clunker in rams’ history under the les snead regime?

Can’t complain too much about Lester’s draft picks….. Tavon and Tutu…. Tiny Tavon over DeAndre Hopkins, Robert Woods, Keenan Allen, and Goodwin….

Greg Robinson. But from what I read apparently even Holmes was behind that pick and still defends it. They saw it as swinging at the fences for greatness. But…they could have traded that pick. If the trade Buffalo did make that draft is any indication, the Rams would have gotten their 1st that year (9th) and their 1st in 2015 (19th). That would be with Lewan still available.

[zn]

Blaine Grisak @bgrisakTST

Haason Reddick to the Jets for a conditional 2026 3rd round pick. Really wanted him to go the Rams. Seems clear that they’re going to be patient and see how their pieces shake out. With Reddick no longer available, feels like it’s definite EDGE at 19 for the Rams.

[InvaderRam]

zn wrote:

I’ve been doing more reading around on him. I am not so sure he checks out medically (?)

 

well reports are that he cleared medical exams at the combine. but who knows? he lost a year to the neck injury. they thought his career was over. he transferred to ucla and had two great years. otherwise he’s a surefire first rounder looks like.

 

it freaks me out a little bit but it also depends on what the doctors say. i could see him slipping. sounds like the most pro-ready edge rusher though.

[InvaderRam]

this is from the following espn article.

 

https://africa.espn.com/nfl/story/_/id/39615406/ucla-lb-laiatu-latu-hearing-no-concerns-neck-history

 

“[Watkins] just looked at my scans and cleared me,” Latu said. “Because he’s had guys with the same, similar stuff, like Danielle Hunter and Peyton Manning, and he really just told me I would be able to play football.”

 

that does ease my concern. if there’s no issue with the neck draft him.

[Author]

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