[phoenixrising]

I just heard Dan Orslavsky back a guarantee by shaving his eyebrows, lol, surely that is within Jake’s means?

I’ll defend Jake though, yeah he’s overly ambitious and gets out over his skis, but he’s come a long ways over two years and has carved out a niche from nothing. I have to give him some credit.

[phoenixrising]

Is anyone else tired of hearing “He’s not a replacement for Aaron Donald, but no one is”? Yeah, I get it, Captain Obvious.

[rams74]

I anyone else tired of hearing “He’s not a replacement for Aaron Donald, but no one is”? Yeah, I get it, Captain Obvious.

Sure, yes. However, I've accepted that we're just going to have to deal with that for a while. If our new D-line doesn't produce any pressure on QBs, it will be a long while. If, on the other hand, the D-line is great, it will be a short while.

Go Rams!

[Elvis]

I’d like to do a spread sheet. Wonder if there’s anyway to insert one so it keeps the format. Elvis feel free to educate me on this.

Never too soon for a 53 man roster/depth chart thread.

As far as embedding a spreadsheet, not sure we can make that work but i'll dig around some.

You can always post a screenshot but i realize that's kind of sucky...

[Dare]

What I've always found weird is why are people grading the draft now? Who won who lost....now? We won't know who won and who lost this draft until January. Then we will know who improved and who didn't. Who took steps forward and who are still treading water.

The following January is when you grade a team's draft. Last year's Rams draft was a perfect example of that. All these know nothings saying the Rams would be lucky to win 5 games. They almost went the distance. They needed a few pieces. They seem to have those pieces.

Yeah the loss of Donald is huge, but it's all about production. Instead of a 3 man D front they look like they have a good 5 man front. But it remains to be seen exactly who blossoms and who doesn't. Whittington could be another breakout player like Nacua. If he is, this offense will score on anyone.

Yeah now we wait and see how all the pieces fit together.

[ramsman34]

I listen to Jake’s podcasts all the time. Informative. I agreed with his take on going up to get offense, as you all know. I clearly underestimated how the Rams felt about their skill players. I figured there weren’t any complete star, game changing defenders in the draft worth a first round pick so they would make certain the offense was this side of unstoppable and help the D that way. I also thought they would double dip at edge and DL and play D by rotational committee - just picking from the 2nd round down. I figured they would use future picks to trade up in the first thus keeping most/all of this draft in hand. In retrospect, I am glad they went the way they did. Jake does a show with a girl named Alexis. She was actually more accurate than Jake. lol. They do interview players and Jake isn’t wrong about everything. As far as the AD thing goes. It seems he taped his podcast before the news was announced. So he might have known something. Anyway. A lot of haters out there but anyone who brings Rams content and isn’t clueless is alright by me. The Rams Brothers aren’t bad either.

I have an idea Elvis. I will hit you up about it in the near future.

[ramsman34]

As far as this draft goes, we should be excited. I agree with Dare in that “grading” is plain stupid. We all believe the team has picked great players who will elevate the team to SB contention. They might. But, they might all not be great or even good players. The team could even take a step backwards - we do have a tougher schedule based on last years records. We have to see some real football activity to gauge that. I went to camp last year and thought Puka, Cobie D, Higs, and D Rob looked fantastic. As did Stafford. Tuta look a lot better and was featured more. The OL worried me a bit. I thought they could win 9-11 games. Some of that played out, some didn’t. I will hopefully be at camp this year and report what I see. Maybe I will be right, maybe not. But it will be fun nonetheless.

[Elvis]

I think grading is fine. You just have to take it for what it is, a snapshot, what people think the day after the draft.

I mean teams grade players, they put their board together. If you couldn't tell one player from another, value one higher than another, then you might as well just draw names out of a hat instead of having a draft.

What i find humorous is if a team's draft is off from someone's mock, they say the team had a bad draft. But really they should use the actual draft to grade their mock. (And some people do just that, grade mocks by which are the most accurate.)

Sure it often takes a long time for things to play out but that doesn't mean you can't talk about and evaluate a draft before, during and after.

Teams have to do it. How else could they operate and make decisions?

[PARAM]

I think grading is fine. You just have to take it for what it is, a snapshot, what people think the day after the draft.

I mean teams grade players, they put their board together. If you couldn't tell one player from another, value one higher than another, then you might as well just draw names out of a hat instead of having a draft.

What i find humorous is if a team's draft is off from someone's mock, they say the team had a bad draft. But really they should use the actual draft to grade their mock. (And some people do just that, grade mocks by which are the most accurate.)

Sure it often takes a long time for things to play out but that doesn't mean you can't talk about and evaluate a draft before, during and after.

Teams have to do it. How else could they operate and make decisions?

They were talking about that on the radio. How mocksters (the professional ones) downgrade drafts that don't fit their mock. It's the same with fans.

Nobody had us trading up for Fiske. I suggested staying put in round 1 trading up in the second for another stud because it would have required less draft capital. But WTF do I know? That was a lucky guess. And obviously it required more than I thought. Of course I didn't know Verse would last to #19 and Fiske was their guy. After round 1 I suggested trading up for Newton but he wasn't their man.

Which brings us to fans who 'know' what the pick should be. Among Ram fans, Latu and Verse were the hot Edge players, Murphy and Newton were the hot DTs. And Dallas Turner wasn't going to last past #9. Some suggested going LT or WR. I enjoy the pre-draft discussion and debate. I love the post-draft discussion and debate. I just wish some fans (the fans who claim they screwed up) would realize they don't know nearly as much as the NFL guys. Hell the media experts don't know as much as the NFL guys and that's their job.

Who had us taking Kinchens in the third? A safety? WTF? We had Lake, Yeast, Curl and Taylor! Plus JJ was still available. Did we really need a S? Clearly, they had him pretty high on their board and couldn't resist. But he's a playmaker. A turnover machine. This guy could end up being the jewel of our draft but we'll have to wait and see.

It's fine to talk about a draft before, during and after and finally after a year or two or three, give it it's final grade. And even then there may be some debate. What's the final grade on 2021? I give it a solid C. Jones is a stud. Skowronek is a ST stud. Atwell has contributed and showed what he could do during the first 4 weeks of 2023 as the #2 WR. Brown is a starting DL.

2022? Kyren and Lake look solid. Durant and Kendrick? We'll see what they provide in 2024.

[Haden]

I was expecting to see CB in the draft too, but there are plenty of good FA corners out there if White can't get healthy or we need others. Witherspoon is still out there. Stephon Gilmore, Steven Nelson or Adoree Jackson could all be plug and play too if needed. I think the rams are okay there.