ChatGPT then told me that I couldn’t get more than 3 images in one day unless I upgrade to the Pro version.

zn wrote:

To be honest, I just expect them to hit on all 3 top picks. Is that too optimistic?

If that was a betting prop, I would take the other side: missing on 1 or more.

But hitting on all 3 is certainly possible. They hit on their first 3 in 2023, nailing 3 quality starters. Maybe they did last year, although the jury is out on Corum, and I have doubts. Scroll back through preceding years, and they didn’t hit on all 3.

zn wrote:

BTW they have 8 picks. Add the 6th rounder for Jackson. ‘

I was just coming back to make that edit, but now the sole error of my life is part of the permanent internet record. {sigh}

Half of their picks are in the 6th round which is a bit of a bummer.

zn wrote:

Pro Football Focus writer Dalton Wasserman jumped out after the end of the 2024 NFL season to pen an article entitled 10 highest-graded UDFAs from the 2024 NFL regular season. Two items that jump off the page at anyone who checks out the article. Only three NFL teams that made the playoffs last season appear on the list. They are the Los Angeles Rams, Buffalo Bills, and Kansas City Chiefs. Only one postseason competitor made the list with two players: The Los Angeles Rams.

He means from the rookie class, in case that isn’t clear. The Rams had more than two highly-rated UDFAs playing last year.

zn wrote:

Alaric Jackson’s new contract, averaging $18.8 million per season, establishes him as the highest-paid undrafted free agent in NFL history, surpassing Tony Romo’s peak of $18.0 million.

Unbelievable. A undrafted FA as a solid starting LOT. It can’t be overstated how fortunate it was for the Rams to score Alaric Jackson for zero acquisition cost.

I never thought I’d see an adorable football player. But…

Who is Nate Landman?

Turns out, the information available for free.

zn wrote:

Meanwhile in the last 2 years, after they had a serious re-evaluation of their drafting, they have had 7 hits in rounds 1-3, which now includes 6 starters (Avilla, Turner, Young, Verse, Fiske, Kinchens), or an unbelievable 85.7% hit rate.

If they can keep this up, they will be getting a few more players. Or to be more specific, if the percentages stay the same or close to the same, they will be getting 4-5 starting and/or contributing players out of this draft.

Just to be absolutely clear, I am not complaining about the Rams’ drafting ability.

I think I read something here a year or so ago about the Rams’ ranking in draft success, and they were up there, but not really at the top. I don’t know how you can really do any better than the Rams have done. Of course, the past two drafts have been off the charts, it seems like. Not just guys who stuck, but guys who are substantially better than their draft positions.

Yeah. Another draft like the past two, please.

zn wrote:

They have a hole or 2 to fill but this is already a better team that the one that game just short against the Eagles on the road in the snow.’

Adams and Ford are good signings. They are set up to draft well. This will be a better team than the one that took the division last year.

Last year they got solid to great contributions from 6 draft picks: Verse, Fiske, Kinchens, Karty, Limmer, and Whittington (ie. with Whitt it was not just on offense, on different special teams units too). That includes the defensive rookie of the year.

In the last 3 drafts combined they had 9 6th round picks. Usually the hit rate on round 6 is anywhere from 2% to 8.84%, depending on your source. That means that 9 6th round picks should yield at best 1 player. But of out of those 9 Rams picks I would say so far that we know the Rams hit on 5: Lake (2022), Ethan Evans (2023), and 3 from 2024: Whittington, Karty, & Limmer. That’s a 55.6% hit rate. They have 4 more 6th round picks in 2025.

So IMO if they continue this good streak drafting, they ought to come up with 4-5 players, ie. counting
both immediate and depth/future contributors. As a result, the 2025 team could be even better than we already know it is.

And now that they’re set at P and K, they can focus on drafting a long-snapper.

Billy_T wrote:

I don’t get paying Tutu 10 mil while letting Kupp go. But what are ya gonna do? He’ll be missed.

Anyway, Nacua is the man now, and Adams should be a strong #2, if he stays healthy.

It will be interesting to see if the wideout room retains its emphasis on selfless play, blocking, etc. They lost a lot of “intangibles” with Kupp going, just as they did with Woods . . .

Woods inoculated me for Kupp. Both guys still had tread on the tires, and I deeply disliked trading Woods, but honestly, the Rams didn’t seem to miss him.

And it’s not the money. They did not ask to restructure. McVay wanted a different array at wideout, I think. It’s strictly football. Unless Kupp is physically cooked.

But Seattle – I don’t know the structure of the deal – but I believe they would have done due diligence before a 3-year deal. Run him through the machines to have a look etc.

And with how gd excited McVay was about Adams, I think he wanted diversity in his WR weapons. It’s wild how unique Kupp was… until Puka came in with the same skill set, but bigger and younger and cheaper. I’m just leaning into the belief that McVay wants the entire range of top shelf kitchen knives to cook up some offensive destruction.

I’m here for it.

How Sean McVay’s aggressive recruiting style brought Davante Adams to L.A.
By Jourdan Rodrigue
5

Mar. 13, 2025 1:42 pm PDT
LOS ANGELES — Despite a time difference of 16 hours between California and Japan, where star receiver Davante Adams was vacationing with friends after his March 4 release from the New York Jets, he still felt Sean McVay’s urgency to bring him to Los Angeles.

McVay sent Adams two highlight videos featuring several plays from when Adams was a member of the Packers, Raiders and Jets (particularly the latter two teams as they were Adams’ most recent). The head coach filmed his computer screen with his phone as he went through each play, which were organized into different categories that illustrated how Adams would fit in the offense, what McVay saw as his gifts and how McVay and Adams could schematically adjust depending on how defenders covered him. McVay narrated each play in detailed fashion, spanning about 10 total minutes between the two videos.

Adams had just woken up from a nap when he got the first video, he told The Athletic on Thursday afternoon.

“It wasn’t loaded, I’m like, ‘What is going on?’ I could kind of see what the cover was, but it wouldn’t load all the way. … I’m sitting here like, ‘Is it my Wi-Fi?’ But everything else (was) working fine. Then I looked down at my phone, it said (it was) loaded, and I tapped it and it said ‘seven minutes long‘,” he said. “I’m like, ‘oh my God, what is this?!’

“I hear how it starts, he’s got it blocked off clip by clip. He’s narrating. He’s talking about everything. I’m laughing at the beginning, and then I start watching it. Started to kind of feel it a little bit, I like this energy. I love that he’s unapologetically himself, doesn’t try to be anybody different. He’s all ball. It really aligned with everything I knew about him.”

Adams recognized the organization of the clips as typical for evaluators who put together cut-up reels for prospective players. But they’re not usually narrated by the head coach — nor are they sent to the player directly. That was when he knew how serious McVay was about signing him.

“It was kind of ‘Jon Gruden-esque’ a little bit, you know how he is with ball,” Adams said, smiling. He met local reporters for the first time Thursday morning at the Rams’ Woodland Hills, Calif., facility shortly after returning from Japan. “He’s breaking down every single clip. … He’s just going through everything, talking about it like he’s — I thought he took that job to be on TV for a minute, when I was watching it! Just shows how much ball means to him, how much of a priority I was for him and the rest of the guys here.”

Adams and McVay first met at the Kentucky Derby in 2019, during which McVay praised the receiver. Yet Adams, a three-time All-Pro who is coming off his fifth consecutive 1,000-yard season, wouldn’t become a free agent for the first time in his 11-year career until this spring.

“(For him) to have the opportunity to make sure it didn’t slip away — because he certainly made sure it did not slip away — that was something that drew me kind of even closer to the Rams, just knowing how much I was wanted,” he said. “Having different players reach out, too, that was another thing that meant a lot to me. It’s a good feeling just being wanted and knowing what you still can contribute and bring to the game. It’s always good when the other side, or the organization, views you the same way as you view yourself.”

Even on the day Adams’ agent agreed to the Rams’ terms for his two-year and $46 million contract, Adams got two initial phone calls while still in Japan: one from his agent, one from McVay.

“I thought he was out there, too,” Adams quipped, “I was talking to (McVay) more than I was talking to my wife.”

Adams, 32, is from East Palo Alto, Calif., and has family in California.

“Being from California, obviously coming back and being really close to home, having my family in my backyard (and) a lot of friends in the area … Having my support system,” he said. “Because I’m a real simple dude. My family and friends just mean a lot to me. Being able to have them have easy access to me out here (is a) good feeling for me just knowing I get to kind of have that support, keep it real tight and stay close to family.”

But, he added, it was the Rams’ attentiveness that stood out to him among other prospective teams that expressed interest in signing him.

“Definitely the most eager organization to reach out,” he said, “whether it was the understanding of contracts (or the) understanding of my game, and obviously having the opportunity to play with Matthew (Stafford) is a heck of an opportunity. And obviously the rest of the team, too. Being able to be with a contender at this point in my career is something I’ve been waiting for for a while now. Been putting the work in to make it happen. Now we’ve got it, so it’s exciting.”

McVay has a reputation as a dedicated recruiter if he has his mind set on a player. The Rams were aggressive in their pursuit of defensive tackle Poona Ford as the legal tampering period began, for example, after pro scouts and coaches identified Ford as a top priority to add to their ascending defensive line.

“Oh, man, he’s a character,” Ford said of McVay in his introductory news conference. “He’s a good coach, you know?”

McVay’s initial recruitment of Stafford is a well-known story by now. The coach and veteran quarterback encountered each other in Cabo San Lucas in 2021 while on separate trips as Stafford was seeking a trade from Detroit, and broke down film over drinks. McVay then convinced owner Stan Kroenke and other top executives to approve the trade, which began the Rams’ Super Bowl run that season.

In late February, an early-morning meeting with Stafford at the team facility set by McVay helped the quarterback and team reach an agreement during an ongoing contract dispute despite Stafford’s financial offers from the New York Giants and Las Vegas Raiders, should he have decided to play elsewhere.

Even the backup quarterbacks McVay has taken a shine to get an extensive pitch when free agency begins. Jimmy Garoppolo, who league sources said was considered as a possible replacement/bridge quarterback if the Rams couldn’t work things out with Stafford, has heard plenty from the head coach over the past two offseasons. Garoppolo re-signed with the Rams last week on a one-year deal.

“He is a good recruiter, man. He’s a smooth talker (and has) high energy, which I really enjoy,” Garoppolo said, smiling. “Every time I talk to him on the phone I say like 10 words. He’s talking so fast, in a good way though. It’s his high energy. He has a point to make and I love that about him. There’s no BS’ing around.”

nittany ram wrote:

I can’t watch any of these tribute/hi-lite videos yet. Too soon.

It must be painful for you to watch highlights of Kupp torching the Seahawks. It’s fine. Take your time.

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