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jacobarch
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First and foremost I think it is of the utmost importance to re-sign Rodger Saffold. The guy can virtually play any spot on the Oline and play them all well too very well. IMO I think Saffold belongs at RG as he seems to play better in a tighter space. Of course our biggest concern with him is, can he stay healthy and will he want to play RG for the remainder of his career? Personally I don't think he'll get top LT money, he might get 6 mil (tops) a year to play LT for a team just solely based on his injury history.
Second, with Jake Long going down with an ACL injury and the timetable being 9-12 months depending on the severity of the tear (if there even is one) we will be forced to at least pick someone up in FA this offseason as a backup in case J Long isn't ready or we draft someone in later rounds. This really puts us in a bind because there are other glaring holes @ center, RG, and LG. Sure we have serviceable backups but are they starting material? No, and we'll be right back at square one rebuilding our line rather than just retooling it.
Question is do we draft an OT in the first round? We all know Fisher doesn’t like to take chances on Olinemen early in the draft so I think depending on the severity of J Longs injury will give us a hint on where we’ll go in the draft.
WRs, can you believe it’s been 10 and counting since having a #1 WR? Yes, 10 years!!! That’s how bad our drafting and FA signings have been for the Rams organization and it doesn’t seem to be getting any better under Sneed and Fisher. With big playmakers coming out in Watkins and Lee we could be in the running for one of these two in the draft. But who do we pick? Who fits our ‘system’? I think this has been the Rams main problem picking skill position players in the past. Even under Fish and Co. have continued the long tradition of picking offensive (offensively bad) players in the draft. While I won’t call Quick or Givens a bust just yet, they are however approaching that line rather quickly. We all know and agree that year 3 generally tells you what type of WR they are going to be.
Givens had a great rookie season and looked to be a solid #2 burner with good hands that could get deep in a flash. His second season has been riddled with drops and misreads. Yes he’s trying to do more but sometimes you have to go out there and just PLAY! Quick on the other hand has been very disappointing in all aspects of the game. While he’ll flash here and there he has no consistency and has proven to be a very slow learner. Yes he’ll be on the Rams roster next season but he’ll be on a tight leash. He’ll need to prove that he can be the playmaker in the redzone that we drafted him to be or he’ll ride the bench and eventually be on another squad.
Bailey and Austin have been good to great so far. Austin has proven he can be that pivotal playmaker we’ve been missing for such a long time. And Bailey looks like the guy that we can depend on to make the needed catch. He gets open and runs great routes, no he’s not a burner which tells me he relies on technique which is one of the most important things when playing WR.
On a side note, Pettis is a guy I would hang on to. I think he’s going to be a good WR and he’s getting smarter at reading defenses which has shown up in the last couple of weeks. He could turn into our Ricky Proehl on 3rd down
TE,s have been a little disappointing, but Kendricks and Harkley have been very impressive run blockers and Hark has been coming on lately in the passing game which is always a great sign for a undrafted rookie. Personally I wish they could get Kendricks more involved in the passing game because I think if used correctly he could be one of the better ones in the league. The real disappointment has been Jared Cook…The guy has so much talent but he seems to take plays off and doesn’t play with much enthusiasm. He almost coughed up another fumble last weekend the same exact way he did against AZ in week one, ‘being careless with the football’. Hopefully he’ll find his stride next year with our new running game and Bradford.
Secondary is something we should all be concerned with. We have had so many bad-to-horrible plays in the backfield this year. Jenkins and Johnson have obviously regressed, and I’m not sure if it’s due to Finnegan being out or the lack of depth but 90% of us thought our Secondary would be a thing of pure bliss this season and we all had to take a step back and reanalyze these guys. I’m not really sure where we go from here with these guys but it’s obvious we need help at CB and Safety. I feel we obviously release Finnegan because he hasn’t even come close to earning his inflated contract and McLeod is nothing more than a serviceable backup, but I will say he’s good in run support.
That is all for now.
Second, with Jake Long going down with an ACL injury and the timetable being 9-12 months depending on the severity of the tear (if there even is one) we will be forced to at least pick someone up in FA this offseason as a backup in case J Long isn't ready or we draft someone in later rounds. This really puts us in a bind because there are other glaring holes @ center, RG, and LG. Sure we have serviceable backups but are they starting material? No, and we'll be right back at square one rebuilding our line rather than just retooling it.
Question is do we draft an OT in the first round? We all know Fisher doesn’t like to take chances on Olinemen early in the draft so I think depending on the severity of J Longs injury will give us a hint on where we’ll go in the draft.
WRs, can you believe it’s been 10 and counting since having a #1 WR? Yes, 10 years!!! That’s how bad our drafting and FA signings have been for the Rams organization and it doesn’t seem to be getting any better under Sneed and Fisher. With big playmakers coming out in Watkins and Lee we could be in the running for one of these two in the draft. But who do we pick? Who fits our ‘system’? I think this has been the Rams main problem picking skill position players in the past. Even under Fish and Co. have continued the long tradition of picking offensive (offensively bad) players in the draft. While I won’t call Quick or Givens a bust just yet, they are however approaching that line rather quickly. We all know and agree that year 3 generally tells you what type of WR they are going to be.
Givens had a great rookie season and looked to be a solid #2 burner with good hands that could get deep in a flash. His second season has been riddled with drops and misreads. Yes he’s trying to do more but sometimes you have to go out there and just PLAY! Quick on the other hand has been very disappointing in all aspects of the game. While he’ll flash here and there he has no consistency and has proven to be a very slow learner. Yes he’ll be on the Rams roster next season but he’ll be on a tight leash. He’ll need to prove that he can be the playmaker in the redzone that we drafted him to be or he’ll ride the bench and eventually be on another squad.
Bailey and Austin have been good to great so far. Austin has proven he can be that pivotal playmaker we’ve been missing for such a long time. And Bailey looks like the guy that we can depend on to make the needed catch. He gets open and runs great routes, no he’s not a burner which tells me he relies on technique which is one of the most important things when playing WR.
On a side note, Pettis is a guy I would hang on to. I think he’s going to be a good WR and he’s getting smarter at reading defenses which has shown up in the last couple of weeks. He could turn into our Ricky Proehl on 3rd down
TE,s have been a little disappointing, but Kendricks and Harkley have been very impressive run blockers and Hark has been coming on lately in the passing game which is always a great sign for a undrafted rookie. Personally I wish they could get Kendricks more involved in the passing game because I think if used correctly he could be one of the better ones in the league. The real disappointment has been Jared Cook…The guy has so much talent but he seems to take plays off and doesn’t play with much enthusiasm. He almost coughed up another fumble last weekend the same exact way he did against AZ in week one, ‘being careless with the football’. Hopefully he’ll find his stride next year with our new running game and Bradford.
Secondary is something we should all be concerned with. We have had so many bad-to-horrible plays in the backfield this year. Jenkins and Johnson have obviously regressed, and I’m not sure if it’s due to Finnegan being out or the lack of depth but 90% of us thought our Secondary would be a thing of pure bliss this season and we all had to take a step back and reanalyze these guys. I’m not really sure where we go from here with these guys but it’s obvious we need help at CB and Safety. I feel we obviously release Finnegan because he hasn’t even come close to earning his inflated contract and McLeod is nothing more than a serviceable backup, but I will say he’s good in run support.
That is all for now.
