Rams tweets 6/13 thru 6/17

The Rams have a trio of options behind Tyler Higbee, but who will step up as TE2? https://t.co/jkZiisavQE

— Rams Wire (@TheRamsWire) June 14, 2021

from https://theramswire.usatoday.com/2021/06/14/rams-cooper-kupp-brad-holmes-senior-bowl/

Lions GM Brad Holmes, who was formerly the Rams’ director of college scouting from 2013-2020, shared a story of how Kupp stood out at the Senior Bowl in 2017, which really caught the Rams’ eye. His testing numbers weren’t the best, but he was uncoverable at the Senior Bowl and his GPS time was the fastest in Mobile.

“I’ve told the Cooper Kupp story — that’s more of cognitive bias, in terms of just every time you saw him play football, the guy was good, you liked him. But I remember we saw him at the Senior Bowl, he was the best player on the field. Nobody can cover this dude. He looked explosive. And his shuttle and all that kind of reflected that, but his 40 time was in the 4.6s. He did it at the combine and at the pro day, so the last thing in your head was that 4.6,” Holmes told Chris Burke of The Athletic.

“But, I’ll never forget, it came out that his GPS time at the Senior Bowl was the fastest. So, it’s like, “OK, now that makes sense.” But it was because he was playing football. He looked fast, he looked explosive on the football field. In tights, on that Eastern Washington track, it didn’t look fast.”

Jourdan Rodrigue@JourdanRodrigue
On Bobby Brown III and Robert Rochell (I’ll start here with Brown linked), it was interesting to get a feel for the team-building model. One of the Rams’ greatest assets is that they have elite players in Aaron Donald and Jalen Ramsey (duh), but beyond the on-field, fronting

the draft capital (Ramsey) and drafting/paying Donald did force the team-build strategy into turning middle-round picks into necessary contributors – but, because you have a Donald and a Ramsey, you only have to draft certain complementary traits to them.

In Brown, the Rams see a player whose ceiling is as a starter, yet whose floor can still be as a key role-player based on athleticism alone.

The likelihood of “successfully” hitting on a middle-round player increases if you’re specifically and accurately identifying just a few traits, and less-so looking for a “complete” player or a dart-throw who might be a luxury pick (I’m just talking about these specific 3 guys as

we know Rams certainly have a history with luxury picks). It seems obvious, sure, but it also removes certain inefficiencies in the process itself, from the scouting/draft portions of the year to the actual player-development part. I use the word “ecosystem” because of how each

piece interconnects. For Brown, they followed a similar pattern/sought similar traits as SJD, because of how well he and Donald complement each other schematically. Because Donald is on the roster, Brown won’t ultimately be asked to play outside of those maximized traits, which

could hinder or even ruin long-term development. Instead, he may be asked to do the things that complement Donald, where the traits that got him drafted are maximized. That speeds up his window to getting on the field, which best-case means he’s a cheaper starter, for longer, and

that means they can continue to afford the big Donald contract. If players get more starting experience earlier, may improve terms of second contract (in Rams case, comp picks). Similarly, Ramsey kept coming up in the process of evaluating Rochell.

Now, I’m not saying this works every time or with every pick, and perhaps I’m overthinking the methodology here (though I don’t think I am). These guys could be great players all on their own. But specifically with these mid-to-later round guys, the Rams HAVE to make it less of

the dart-throw that it usually is because, well, their ecosystem depends on it (and on winning, but that’s a whole other conversation). Have they found the formula to do that? We’ll see in 2-4 years. But to count on star players as assets in draft process is fascinating.

When it came to the Jacob Harris interviews, was interesting to feel how outdated some of my own reporting for previous pieces already was – or at least, that there is a much better way to specify the language of certain facets of the evaluation process.

“The Rams don’t care about the 40” is a sexy tagline but in both Rochell and Harris’ evaluation, of course it was a relevant metric. They haven’t thrown it out as a piece of the evaluation – but they have re-assessed its value as a variable in cooperation w/other variables, and

that is an important differentiation. Ex.: Temme pulls speed WITH weight and six separately-gathered times. GPS data is the more relevant “speed” measurable in most cases. Bailey, in compiling Harris’ report, of course found the 40-times relevant – but as a pairing WITH other

variables such as explosiveness metrics. And certainly that’s not unique to the Rams, but in the larger scope of their team-building strategy especially with later-day picks, I think it’s fascinating. Thanks for indulging me – another reminder that there’s always stuff to learn.

(I’ll add – I picked just these three guys for a reason, in part because holy sh*t there is so much more to it than this, so many things can screw it all up and luxury picks/bad picks do happen all the time. but specifically, this was the study. thanks for coming to my ted talk.)

merlin

They drafted 4 of the biggest freaks in the class

Tutu, Harris, Rochell, and B Brown were all workout freaks tbh. There was a clear desire to bring in speed.

But they can also play. This is no Jeff Fisher focus on athleticism. Tutu plays big and can run routes unlike Tavon when we took him. Harris is a freak of a gunner and also represents a non-diva elite receiving talent. Rochell has been roasted it seems so far but that’s ok he’s a seriously gifted DB who is in a good coaching pipeline now. And B Brown is a 20 year old powerhouse who can really move for his size and will help vs the zone run games as well as team tackling and getting to the ball.

We know that statistically not all these guys are gonna work out. But it’s still exciting to see a group that might be special if they all work hard and succeed.

Jacob Harris: Playing inline tight end is 'a whole different world' https://t.co/wYOBRnzFpC via @theramswire

— RamsNewsNow (@RamsNewsNow) June 15, 2021

==

link above.

Harris admitted playing inline tight end is a different animal than lining up outside as a receiver.

“It’s going good. I’m learning a lot. A lot of football – more football than I could’ve imagined I could learn,” Harris said. “So it’s pretty cool being in that room, getting comfortable in a three-point stance and whatnot. Being comfortable next to the O-line in that world. It’s a whole different world in there, but I’m taking it day by day and I’m learning a lot and I feel like I’m picking it up pretty quickly.”

Jourdan Rodrigue selected as PFWA 2021 Terez A. Paylor Emerging Writer Award winner https://t.co/byHy7dMFnd

— Pro Football Writers (@PFWAwriters) June 15, 2021

from https://theramswire.usatoday.com/2021/06/16/rams-darious-williams-best-cornerbacks-nfl-rankings/

Mark Schofield of Touchdown Wire knows all about [Darious] Williams and ranked him among the NFL’s best outside cornerbacks. He put Williams 10th, nine spots behind the top-ranked Ramsey.

We turn now to the start of our second tandem of cornerbacks, with Darious Williams of the Los Angeles Rams. In his third season in the league Williams took a huge step forward in 2020, playing over 900 snaps and locking down one of the cornerback spots for Brandon Staley’s defense. He was impressive in coverage, allowing a completion of just 48.7% when targeted, and an opposing passer rating of a mere 55.4 when quarterbacks threw in his direction. His 11 pass breakups were a career-high mark.

Sources: Two teams have crossed the much-talked about 85% threshold for player vaccinations (fully vaccinated or in the process). Those two are the Dolphins and Saints.

Nothing's agreed upon yet, but NFL and NFLPA have discussed relaxed protocols for teams over that threshold.

— Albert Breer (@AlbertBreer) June 17, 2021