Sounds about right.

7-9 … 8-8 …

A Groundhog Day of mediocrity.

And we win too many games these days to even have much excitement over the draft.

Being a Ram, fan. How rewarding!

I’ll just say this.

Spanos strikes me as a So Cal guy, through and through. He is NOT going to like leaving the glamor of the So Cal coast for … St. Louis. Or, probably, San Antonio.

I think this is a to-the-death duel between SK and Spanos for the So Cal market. And SK is winning.

That helmet could drive me away from the NFL forever.

The horns we love are not just a channel for tradition for Ram fans. They are also one of the classiest images in sports branding. They blazed the trail for NFL helmet logos and are often mentioned as iconic examples of commercial graphic design.

Mess with the horns, and the consequences would, I think, be dire among the few deeply loyal fans the team has left.

zn wrote:

Ask Dolphins, Titans why splurging on free agents is a losing strategy

By Jason LaCanfora

Way too many generalizations here. And, ultimately, a pretty lame argument.

Basically, the argument boils down to this: overspending on bust FAs is bad.

Uh-huh.

The article does mention Manning. Well, I think Manning was worth the money to the Broncos. LaCanfora has to admit that a Miami move was motivated by a desire to match the success of that move.

Is that the norm? Probably not. And I guess one could argue that a franchise should be very slow to pull the trigger on a mega-deal. But then, it depends on who is involved. A player who is good enough is worth the money. Which means that the burden is on the FO to acutely assess the talent.

But my biggest problem is the big, sweeping generalization that you can’t accomplish much with FAs.

You certainly cannot make up for poor drafting and a lousy roster with FA signings.

But you CAN fill holes with FAs. And astute roster building can get great value out of modest signings. A great example is William Hayes. We’ve been bad for a decade. But there were years when we’d have been far WORSE without a solid vet like Hayes.

I don’t like any discussion that focuses on stars. Especially when talking about general roster building, which is the theme of this article. Yes, indeed, draft well and commit to 4-5 years of roster building. By all means.

But a competitive team needs solid play just about everywhere. Even with some stars, holes will sink the ship. And no one can build solid competence solely through a couple of drafts. As we know.

I fervently believe that one can get solid, competitive-level competence from astute FA signings. ZN has listed some of our better ones. The guys don’t have to be studs. They do have to be experienced, capable, and disciplined. If they are, they will help.

If they are busts, well, that just means the FO blew the assessment and signing process.

You’ve heard me say it over and over. THIS YEAR, we MUST fill holes on the OL and at QB. We must. And the Draft won’t fill all those holes.

Which leaves FA. I get so tired of people–for example JT–looking at the FA class at QB and saying no one looks to move the needle. OK. But then Carson Palmer was not seen as a needle mover when AZ got him. But Ariens did pretty well moving the needle making good use of a solid, experienced QB even though his body is aging and vulnerable. To me, Carson Palmer disproves the over negative thrust of the article. You can do a lot with a solid, non-star vet filling a hole.

Well chosen vet FAs can raise a team’s ceiling a couple of notches. They can limit the damage on bad teams. They can solidify teams looking to stabilize as winners. And they raise play-off teams to genuine contention. Sure, you can look at a bunch of busts, as you can look at draft busts. But the challenge is always the same: construct a team vision and select rookies and FAs that can play and fit that vision. Do it well, and you’re competing. Do it badly and you are a laughingstock.

So what else is new?

zn wrote:

Lance Kendricks 27 1 38 71.1% 2.6%

I will be really disappointed if we cut this guy.

I really don’t understand why he isn’t a fan favorite. Or trusted more by the coaches.

Winnbrad wrote:

Maybe I’m missing something obvious, it happens a lot, but why would Bradford take any pay cut at all?

If the Rams *won’t* cut Bradford, then it seems he has nothing to gain by taking a pay cut.

Well, an extension could give him an incentive. Suppose the Rams offer an extension. 3 or 4 years. Some amount of guaranteed money that adds up to MORE than the 16 M he gets for this year, but also frees up cap space. The short term pay cut COULD provide a long term raise.

And, he’d be getting paid longer and have reason to hope the team would be motivated to keep giving him opportunities. Despite the speculation about league interest, relying on other teams is a real crap shoot, especially with his injury history. Someone would sign him. But would they offer peanuts compared to what the Rams might offer in a re-negotiation?

Of course the real crux of the issue is the portion that is guaranteed. The man is very vulnerable to career-ending injury. I mean everyone is, but a 2-time ACL loser?

Now consider this question. Is Sam willing to bet on himself? The Rams could offer a deal for 4 years with top-half NFL starting QB money which is dependent on performance. Incentives, but more significant in his case merely non-guaranteed money. If he stays healthy and plays well, he earns much more than the 16 M. But if he flames out, not so much. Is Sam willing to bet on himself?

And remember that Kaepernik just signed a huge contract with a boatload of performance-based money. He’s younger and fitter, but, it’s not impossible.

There are creative ways to incentivize Sam to re-negotiate. The question is whether the Rams want to spread out their bet on Sam or compress it to 1 season.

wv wrote:

Well, they are not letting him go. They may not trust him
but they are not letting him walk.

I don’t think that’s in doubt at all. If he stays healthy, he is, probably in all of our opinions, the very best option the Rams have.

The issue of re-negotiating is trickier. I can see that going either way, actually. I guess I would predict that a new contract won’t happen until or unless A) the team developed a specific opportunity for a FA acquisition and B) Sam agreed it would really improve the team and his chances of success. For example, a major OL upgrade. But, I don’t know that it matters much in itself.

To me, the whole question, as I’ve said often, is whether they can get QB 1A through FA or the draft. I don’t know whether they can. But I believe it is crucial that they find a way to do it. Guys like Hill, Davis, and Clemens ain’t good enough.

The whole thing with Bradford is one of those frustrating situations Rams are unfortunately used to.

As all know, I think his health is seriously compromised and a team cannot responsibly entrust a season to it.

But.

He is a very solid, effective QB. A Top 5 stud? No. But, Lord. The league has a lot of starting QBs not in his league.

This article gives a flash of that reality. Underneath the hype and punditry, the league knows. Bradford is a solid QB.

His main question is whether you can trust his body to remain healthy.

General agreement on the thread. I think the OL personnel and the QB issue will determine what we can do.

My point about Tavon.

As I have said before, Tavon needs to play underneath a downfield passing attack that drives the DBs off the ball.

The absence of that condition has not, in my mind, been primarily a matter of the OC. It has been the absence of WRs until last year, at which point we lost our QB.

A healthy, starting-quality QB plus a solid OL will ALLOW an OC to use Tavon successfully. I don’t think it has previously been a genuine option.

‘Course, I do think Schotty used too many jet-style gimmicks with Tavon. But, again, at least some of that was because he had a lousy QB and OL.

sdram wrote:

Without further ado, here are Around The NFL’s top 25 NFL free agents for 2015:

Not one OL on the list.

Zowie! Gotta question the criteria for a list that has no OL.

I agree that this is a silly column.

There are some parallels, but what Bernie doesn’t refer to here is the vast gulf between the SEA FO and the Shaw/Zygmunt insanity. Our SB loss revealed the rotten foundations on which the GSOT was built.

Martz was a great OC. He was a questionable HC and a lousy talent evaluator. All of that could have been fine on a team grounded by a quality GM running a sound ship. We were being run by the Keystone Kops. And, actually, the folly of our “leadership” is revealed in Bernie’s assertion that they never forgave their HC for losing a close game. Who does that? People who don’t know the game. I dunno if Bernie is right or wrong. But the assertion sounds plausible because those morons didn’t get the first thing about football.

By contrast, SEA is run by one of the sharpest GMs in the game. I see no indication that that foundation is rotten enough to be shattered by one game.

Of course, it IS possible that Pete may have some problems with his players. We’ll see how much credibility he has built up with them. I would think that they’d settle down and it would all be fine. But, lingering effects are possible.

But let’s imagine the worst. Pete loses the locker room. They fire him. OK, the stream of talent won’t stop as long as the GM is running a capable ship. They’ll be an attractive gig for a really good coach. The organization has a great chance to keep chugging along as the Whiners did under Siefert.

In general, I think Carroll is taking a lot of unfair heat. I figure the call was fine. A pick was really unlikely. An Inc, for example, would have been fine. Trust your top 10 QB to run the play without losing the game, and it’s a good call. That is, it’s perfectly defensible.

And yet …

I loathe Pete Carroll. His arrogance and faux-boyish emotionalism are irritating. I understand that he has some program called “Win Forever.” That sort of arrogance calls for a correction. Glad to see it happen.

Sadly, I doubt it.

We lost to NE, but that wasn’t what doomed us to a decade of futility. That was due to FO ineptitude.

Tragically for Ram fans, SEA has a superb FO. That GM of theirs is a wizard. There is no reason to imagine that they won’t keep channeling talent for a long time.

• This reply was modified 9 years, 9 months ago by rfl.

In general, agreed.

The question with the SB pick is Caroll’s decision-making. And, the fact that he had the league’s best power running game which NE had had trouble stopping. AND a TO left.

The question with Hill was … Hill. We had no power on the goal line all year. Our chances throwing were better than running it. (I can’t remember if the play ran off an empty backfield. If so, that would be a problem.)

Wilson tried to make a play to a guy who seemed, if not open, available. And he’s a much better QB.

I’d put the difference this way. If Wilson chose to throw the ball away, I would trust him to do that successfully.

My problem with Hill is not that he threw a pick. It’s that he was throwing the ball away and he didn’t have the presence of mind to throw it straight down or OB. He threw it down into a pile of bodies. That ain’t good.

But the call was fine. You have to trust a QB to see an opening or successfully throw it away to kick the FG.