LOS ANGELES (AP) — Les Snead says the Los Angeles Rams need to revamp their organizational depth, and he’s looking forward to doing so with a handful of draft picks in the next few years.
This isn’t a change of philosophy for the funny-shirt-wearing general manager at the Rams Super Bowl parade featuring the mundane meme claiming that he, well, couldn’t care less about recruiting choices.
Instead, it’s the next logical step in the evolution of a franchise that won a championship a year ago and then finished the current campaign at 5-12. The Rams’ worst injury luck since returning to Los Angeles revealed the depth lacking in a team that has added just six players in the first two innings since returning to California seven years ago.
The Rams’ next move in “Chapter 3 of the Sean McVay era,” as Snead called Thursday, is to put better depth behind Matthew Stafford, Cooper Cobb, Aaron Donald, Bobby Wagner, and Galen Ramsey.
“When you’re faced with a situation where you’re now relying more on players on their rookie contracts to really be key contributors, key starters, (then) going back to having some guys in the first rounds, going back to getting second and third round is going to help,” Snead said. .
Snead admitted that the 2022 Rams simply weren’t as deep as his previous teams, and he’s eager to add depth as much as he can — starting with the upcoming draft in which he expects to have 10 draft picks, though most will be third-day picks.
That’s the price of trading high-level picks to veteran players frequently in a strategy that has produced five winning seasons, four playoff berths, three NFC West titles, and two Super Bowl appearances over the course of half a decade.
“Maybe we should not hit the gas as much, and pay up a little bit of the debt we’ve accumulated,” Snead said. “As you do some of the things we’ve done, you’ll pay some of it forward. But we’ve been able to compete in paying some of that debt as well. … There are ways — not necessarily easy, but this league isn’t easy — and it’s up to us to be creative and innovative and try Find out.”
The Rams made seven of their eight picks last year in the third, and didn’t make much of the pack: Only fourth-round defensive back Kobe Durant made a sustained impact on the field.
The Rams haven’t made a first-round selection since 2016, and they don’t have another option until 2024, with their sixth overall pick coming in April from the Detroit Lions.
Snead admits that the Rams need a modest rebuild, though he calls it a “rebuild”.
The foreman for this redesign job is already in place: Sean McVay decided last week to return for a seventh season in charge, though the Rams will have another year of heavy shake-up in their coaching staff with the departure of offensive coordinator Liam Quinn and the firing of several assistants.
Snead confirmed that McVay was seriously considering leaving the team to deal with burnout, and the Rams devised a contingency plan in case the youngest coach in NFL history to win a Super Bowl quits. The Rams have also been in talks about how they can “make this outfit more sustainable,” Snead said, though McVay has almost complete autonomy in his job.
“When he (McVay) got the job at the age of 30, the guy had basically run an 800m every week since he got our job,” said Snead. “Over time, at some point, your hamstrings will get pulled, and you won’t be able to do that. I don’t know how to tell if you should delegate more, but somehow it took his weekly rhythm and made it more sustainable.”
The Rams’ top roster heavyweight should return next season. The Rams haven’t officially confirmed Stafford and Donald’s return in 2023, Snead said, but he has implied that the Rams will get both stars.
Stafford has already said he’s back after missing eight of his last nine games in Los Angeles due to injury. Donald tweeted Tuesday that he will play in 2023 — three days after someone sent Rams fans into a panic by briefly including “ex-NFL players” in Donald’s Twitter bio.
“I guess you could follow Aaron Donald on Twitter, maybe,” Sinead said, laughing. “My kids told me he retired a little bit on Saturday.”
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