How Rams’ addition of Roger McCreary could unlock even more in Quentin Lake

By Nate Atkins

https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/6765301/2025/10/31/rams-secondary-quentin-lake-roger-mccreary/?source=emp_shared_article

WOODLAND HILLS, Calif. — Roger McCreary ran off the field from his first Los Angeles Rams practice drenched in a sweat he didn’t expect to feel this time of year.

The cold had just arrived in Nashville, Tenn., the only home he’d known in the NFL with the Tennessee Titans. Here he was suiting up in a different uniform in Week 9, pushing through the heat to try to figure out how he fits in a defensive puzzle that the Rams are only just putting together.

But what struck him, more than the heat or the traffic on the way to the facility, was an energy shift in going from a team that picked No. 1 overall in April to the one he’s on now.

“They were having fun beating us,” McCreary said, referencing the Rams’ 33-19 win over the Titans in Week 2. “I see it in person now. They’re still having fun. Guys joke, and then it’s time to get serious. You can tell that they trust in having fun with each other.”

He’s sensing a confidence in these early moments, oozing from a team that’s 5-2 and a defense that has given up the third-fewest points per game despite featuring the lowest collection of defensive salaries in the NFL for 2025.

It’s quite an opportunity for a cornerback to step into in his contract year. And now, the question is all about how McCreary can fit in.

It was never a surprise that the Rams were after cornerback help ahead of the trade deadline. After all, they lost top outside option Ahkello Witherspoon to a broken clavicle in that game against the Titans. Although he’s expected to return on a 12-week timetable from the injury, what disappeared in the interim was his length against physical receivers and the ball skills that let him intercept four passes and break up 23 more over the previous two seasons.

But the replacement for Witherspoon in this trade is not the same player. Whereas Witherspoon measures 6-foot-2, McCreary is 5-foot-11. And though he played outside cornerback a good amount his first two seasons, he’s since been relegated to a slot role for all but one coverage snap this season, according to TruMedia.

After two stout seasons of allowing fewer than 7.0 yards per coverage snap, according to Sports Info Solutions, McCreary is allowing 8.8 this season and has only gotten his hands on one football in eight games. But the Rams are betting on a change of scenery bringing something more out of a 25-year-old in a contract year.

The Rams acquired McCreary for all of a Day 3 pick swap, moving from the fifth to the sixth round. But the trade also said something about what Los Angeles really covets at the moment.

“There’s a lot of different stuff (we) can do now that (we) have a lot of versatile guys,” defensive back Quentin Lake said. “It gives (us) a lot of flexibility with what (we) want to do.”

Giving defensive coordinator Chris Shula one more outlet to get creative mattered more than finding a true replacement for Witherspoon. After all, Witherspoon is expected back in about six weeks. Darious Williams has regained his outside role and has become a similar playmaker, with six pass breakups over the past two games. Cobie Durant and Emmanuel Forbes Jr. have shown growth at the other outside spot.

Rather, this move was about accentuating one of the budding talents already on the roster.

Why the McCreary trade is really about Lake

Sean McVay didn’t know too much about his newest cornerback before he arrived at the facility this week. The Rams coach knew his pass game coordinator, Aubrey Pleasant, held strong impressions from coaching McCreary at the Senior Bowl. And he knew he needed more depth in a secondary that had lost Witherspoon.

But when asked about McCreary moments after the trade went down, McVay twice brought up another player on his defense.

“He could play inside or outside,” McVay said of McCreary, “but feel really good about obviously what Quentin Lake does and the many hats that he wears for us.”

The Rams had a growing trust in Lake entering this season, following his first year as a full-time starter in 2024. But what has emerged over the past two games is that, on top of being a key run defender and versatile communicator on the back end, Lake can also make plays. He secured his first career interception against the Baltimore Ravens, in addition to a fumble recovery. Then, against the Jacksonville Jaguars, he scored a sack and added two pass breakups.

For a player who has spent this season rotating from the slot to strong safety to free safety to dime linebacker, the past two games have created a validation of the prime spot he’s entering in a contract year. He now ranks third among all safeties in Field Vision’s “Havoc” rating, which scores when players record an interception, forced fumble, sack, pass breakup and reception allowed.

“It plays to my advantage because (offenses are) like, ‘Oh, this guy might move a lot. We might try to pick on him because he is moving a lot,’ but I feel like I mask it,” Lake said. “If they do try to try me, I hope so, because it’s going to be a bad day for the offense. I’ve been getting a lot of action, and I love it. Being in the slot, you get so much action and opportunity: You can blitz, you can man, you can zone, all that stuff.”

In a way, it can look like adding a player such as McCreary, whose foundational position is in the slot, could stunt the growth Lake has shown in that role. But the Rams are viewing this through the opposite lens.

“Strong safety and slot are the same, if you think about it,” Lake said. “Usually, if you’re in any type of rotating coverage, whether that’s man or zone, you’re coming down on a slot receiver. Some teams will go formation into the boundary to get that mismatch with the safety, but if you’re playing strong safety with the nickel on the other side, it’s really the same thing as you playing slot. When I really understood that, and then I’m playing strong safety, it’s like, ‘I’m just playing nickel now, but I’m just going against some faster guys and some guys who have a little more quick twitch.’”

To create these different roles for Lake to rotate between before the snap, the Rams run dime packages with six defensive backs at a higher rate than any team in the league. Dime is their way to spare linebackers from coverage and to avoid what the San Francisco 49ers exploited in a Week 5 loss. It’s something they can feel confident running, thanks to a remade run defense with linebacker Nate Landman and defensive tackle Poona Ford creating obvious passing situations on second and third downs.

It allows the Rams to play in a “cheetah” look, with those six coverage players flanking a pass rush with Jared Verse, Byron Young, Kobie Turner and Braden Fiske on the field at the same time.

But it’s only going to work if they have six defensive backs they can trust.

Enter McCreary and his 38 career starts.

“I feel like I can play inside and outside,” McCreary said. “They told me they’ll need me in those spots. They’ve given me the main role that I’m going to be at, but they want me to help right away.”

McCreary needed one meeting with his new position group to get a quick sense of how this puzzle begins — with Lake at the center.

“That’s a leader right there,” McCreary said. “That’s a guy I see that they have a lot of faith in to lead that back end. I see him making plays, just from watching outside and watching film. Seeing on the field and how he plays, you can see he’s the leader. That’s the guy I’m going to learn a lot from.”

This is, ultimately, a bet on Lake and Shula and their growing synergy in carrying designs to the field in a passing league where their job is to react to what offenses are throwing at them.

“Anytime you have smart players that can move around, it allows you to get your best 11 on the field,” Shula said.

The overall investment hasn’t flipped by sending out a conditional Day 3 pick. But the options have.

Now, it’s on Lake to make those puzzle pieces fit on the fly and to see if he can build on the playmaking that could soon make him a player offenses try to avoid. For a kid who grew up in Los Angeles, played at UCLA and was drafted in the sixth round by the hometown Rams, the long-term payoff is something he dreams about.

“This is a place I’d love to play for, for the rest of my career,” Lake said.

KyTheRamsGuy@kytheramsguy
Warren McClendon @PFF grades so far this season:
Run Blocking: 82.4 (5th)
Pass Blocking: 58.2 (54th)
Overall: 70.0 (29th)

Rob Havenstein PFF grades so far this season:
Run Blocking: 58.1 (52nd)
Pass Blocking: 47.2 (67th)
Overall: 55.0 (58th)

PFF isn’t the Bible, but it’s a solid metric — especially for offensive linemen. At this point, should McVay and company just ride it out with McClendon?

Los Angeles Rams PR@TheLARamsPR
Byron Young has shown up in the sack column in 9 consecutive regular season games dating back to last season, the longest active streak in the NFL. He currently ranks 3rd in the NFL in sacks (9.0), 3rd in quarterback hits (17) and 4th in tackles for loss (9) for the 2025 season.

roberto clemente@rclemente2121
the rams have won 6 of their first 8 games just 11 times in their 88 year history, and each time they did they made the postseason, including reaching the title game 4 times and winning it twice, as was the in 1999:

Nate Atkins@NateAtkins_
Puka Nacua looked sharp in the limited time we were out there to watch, with no present issues making cuts on the ankle he hurt a couple weeks ago.

He’ll be listed as limited today, but he was pretty full-go in individuals.

Ian Hartitz@Ihartitz
Average distance needed for a 1st down on 3rd down this season:

Rams (5.8 yards)
Packers (6.1)
Falcons (6.2)
49ers (6.2)
Chiefs (6.5)
Lions (6.5)
Bills (6.6)
Cowboys (6.6)
Panthers (6.8)
Chargers (6.8)
Saints (6.9)
Jets (7.1)
Colts (7.1)
Vikings (7.1)
Patriots (7.2)
Commanders (7.2)
Texans (7.3)
Dolphins (7.3)
Browns (7.3)
Buccaneers (7.3)
Raiders (7.3)
Giants (7.4)
Ravens (7.4)
Broncos (7.5)
Bengals (7.5)
Cardinals (7.5)
Steelers (7.5)
Titans (7.6)
Seahawks (7.7)
Jaguars (7.8)
Eagles (7.9)
Bears (8.1)

from https://www.militarytimes.com/off-duty/military-culture/2024/03/26/the-time-british-sailors-sang-monty-python-as-their-ship-was-sinking/

On May 4, 1982, a month after forces from Argentina invaded the British overseas dominion of the Falkland Islands and two days after a British task force traversed nearly 8,000 miles to join the fight, an Argentine Exocet missile slammed into the destroyer as it patrolled off Port Stanley in the South Atlantic.

According to the warship’s board of inquiry report released in 2012, “the missile’s impact left a 15 feet by 4 feet hole in the ship’s side and caused widespread minor shock damage.” Fire spread almost immediately throughout the lower decks of the ship.

“My boots were actually melting because the superstructure was getting that hot,” John Miller, a Royal Navy weapons engineer, recalled in an interview with the York Press. “We couldn’t put the fire out. All we could do was close the steel bulkheads down and contain it.”

Of the 300 sailors that manned the 4,100-tonne destroyer, 20 were killed and 26 wounded.

“After some 4 hours firefighting the situation was deteriorating,” the report continued. “Internally the ship was burning fiercely. … Sheffield’s fighting capability was totally and probably irremediably destroyed.”

It was then, while watching their ship burn, that Sub-Lieutenant Clive Carrington-Wood struck up a tune, bringing the sardonic British sense of humor into full display as he and his fellow sailors sang “Always Look on the Bright Side of Life” — a classic from Monty Python’s “Life of Brian.”

The news of Carrington-Wood’s cheekiness reached the British press and injected some pride back into the British spirit in the aftermath of the attack.

Three weeks later, as the HMS Coventry sank after coming under waves of attacks from Argentine Douglas A-4 Skyhawks, the survivors took a leaf out of Carrington-Wood’s book and hummed, sang and whistled the track as they sat precariously perched in life rafts.

A little more than a month later, British forces prevailed to force Argentina’s surrender, giving new meaning to the notion that “when you’re chewing on life’s gristle, don’t grumble, give a whistle, and this’ll help things turn out for the best.”

roberto clemente@rclemente2121
headed into wk 9:

no team is allowing fewer offensive tds per game than the rams, 19 teams are allowing fewer offensive tds per game than the saints.

7 teams are scoring more offensive tds per game than the rams, 30 teams are scoring more offensive tds per game than the saint

Rams Wire@TheRamsWire
Davante Adams admitted Matthew Stafford’s absence in camp caused their chemistry to develop more slowly, but he likes where they’re at now

Never forget when Roger McCreary made one of the smartest plays in NFL history 🧠

Good luck in LA Roger 🫡#Titans #TitanUp pic.twitter.com/ffEfkpHqVm

— SharmSports (@SharmSports) October 27, 2025

With the Saints coming to Los Angeles on Sunday, the Rams could be facing Tyler Shough, which would be his first career NFL start. https://t.co/9ufysBWEO8 pic.twitter.com/joeUGMHtQ5

— Rams Wire (@TheRamsWire) October 28, 2025