The St. Louis Rams have the first pick over all, this is the reward for being a crappy team all of last year. In fact other than avoiding the Lions winless season the only points that made me happy cheering for the Rams last season was when they “won” the draft.
If you watched the team at all, I had Sunday Ticket so I watched almost every painful minute… ok I forwarded through a half or ten while watching on my PVR, you found yourself noticing two things.
1. The offence was awful and it did not matter who was the quarterback. How Stephen Jackson got over 1000 yards I will never know.
2. The defense was worn down by the half way mark of most games because of point 1.
I generally thought the defense looked ok for the most part. They were not ever going to win a majority of the game by themselves but they were a tolerable defense. The fault mostly lie with offensive side.
This is why I think Sam Bradford has become a no brainer for the Rams and I think the momentum is just too greatly slanted that way. I also think the Rams have finally clued in on a point I made last season on Bleacher Report.
Last year it was felt that the Rams had a good QB in Bulger, of which I was not one of them. So they had other needs that should be addressed. I suggested at the time Michael Crabtree. My reason was that impact players do not come from the offensive line.
A left-tackle is a critical player for your team but unless he can score he is not going to win games by himself. The good teams in the NFL have good, or at least passable (pardon the pun), Quarterbacks. The St. Louis Rams had not a single QB one would call adequet. In fact most of the time they were plain awful.
So Bradford is a no brainer as long as he is healthy. You have to take him because he offers you something that a defensive tackle cannot, hope. Hope is a big motivator for fans of a last place team. You cannot simply sit back and say, ah we do not care we can let the offense slide another year.
You passed on Matt Ryan and Mark Sanchez and right or wrong you cannot pass another QB especially at number one.
So the key to the draft for the Rams is what to do with the 33rd pick (second round first over all). As important as drafting Bradford might be I think this is the key pick. For me the focus of this draft is passing. Avery and Laurent may at some point be serviceable receivers but there is a need for a stud at wide reciever.
Using the Arizona model, you should have one slot receiver who can catch the ball anywhere and take the punishment, (Anquan Boldin or Jerry Rice) and one to make big catches (Larry Fitzgerald). Pat Shurmur the offensive coordinator wants to run a west coast offense then a good receiver is a must.
So this is where the team would be best served in taking a wide receiver. Preferably Golden Tate but Damaryius Thomas might be a reasonable faximile of that type of player. It gives the Rams a possible stud receiver and in the NFC West a good WR is going to take the team farther than the bunch they have now.
The other reason to go after a WR now is that Stephen Jackson will be 27 this season. If he falls into the same category as every other running back his shelf life is coming to an end soon. This means next year the Rams should be looking at a rookie runner to take the load off of Jackson who is injury prone in the past.
Tags: Bradford, Golden Tate, Jackson, Rams, Shurmur, St. Louis Rams
