Rams Fans United - Los Angeles Rams Fan Discussion Forum

I understand that NFL Roster Building is NOT only about smart Drafting.
You also have to make good trades, watch the waiver-wire intently. make shrewd cost-effective UFA pickups. etc etc.
I call the preceding NFL Roster moves (trades, waiver-wire & UFA pickups) "horse-trading acumen".

Some of (but not ALL) Les Snead's positive horse-trading scores IMO include:

Jalen Ramsey....big Rams Draft Treasure Output to be sure, but for a great player!
Troy Hill...shrewdly purloined from Bill Bellicheck's PS in December 2015.
Marquis Christian....shrewdly purloined from sloppy Bruce Arian Zona roster shuffle
Raymond Calais...shrewdly purloined from sloppy Bruce Arian Buc PS muff
JR Reed...weirdly undrafted 2020 stud Georgia S & shrewdly purloined from Jaguars
Jachai Polite...some baggage, but major upside ER wisely purloined from Seattle
Andrew Whitworth...AWESOME UFA SIGNING BY LES SNEAD!!
Getting A Second Rounder For Branden Cooks...AWESOME SNEAD CON OF O'BRIEN
Austin Blythe...solid waiver wire pickup of a OL Starter off a 2017 Indy cut
Austin Corbett...Snead gets #33 overall Browns pick for a 5th Rounder? Wow!
Justin Hollins: shrewdly purloined ER w/upside (& Staley-connect) from sloppy Vic Fangio 2020 PS muff
Leonard Floyd: STILL EARLY, BUT GOOD UFA PICKUP W/ZERO 2021 COMP.PICK RAMIFICATIONS
Robert Woods: GREAT UFA PICKUP FROM BUFFALO!!!
John Wolford...we got this Wake Forest standout QB for nuthin' @ AAF bankruptcy sale!

So Kudos to Les Snead on the above HorseTrading moves! Good work!


BUT....Let's look at Les Snead's 2018 Draft okay? GAMES means Games Appeared In, NOT Games Started per pro-football-reference.com:

2018 LOS ANGELES RAMS DRAFTEES
RD/#....RAMS PLAYER NAME.....GAMES....COMMENTS
3/89...JOE NOTEBOOM, OLINE...24...IMO, BOOM NEVER REPLACES LT WHIT
4/111...BRIAN ALLEN, INT.OL.....22...IMO, DUD/JAG CAREER BACKUP OC/OG
4/135...JOHN FRANKLIN-MYERS..16..CUT IN 2019, NOW A NY JET DL JAG
5/147...MICAH KISER, ILB.........21...ASSISTANT LIFEGUARD @ REGGIE POOL
5/160.. OBO OKORONKWO, ER/OLB..15...HEAD LIFEGUARD @ REGGIE POOL
6/176...JOHN KELLY, RB.....8...JAG CUT IN 2020 FOR UDFA SMU RB XAVIER JONES
6/192...JAMIL DEMBY, OL...6...A BONA FIDE JAG SO FAR. KROMER'S PET.
6/195...SEBASTIEN JOSEPH, NT..22..THE PICK-OF-THE-LITTER IN THIS POOR RAM DRAFT!
6/205...TREVON YOUNG...2 GAMES ...GONZO FROM NFL NOW SELLING USED SATURNS
7/231...TRAVIN HOWARD...16...ILB WITH SOME UPSIDE, BUT ALSO A REGGIE POOL RESIDENT
7/244...JUSTIN LAWLER...16...OLB/DE WITH SOME EARLY PROMISE, CUT IN 2020 (OR was Lawler IR'd by Rams quietly??)

So, Les Snead's 2018 Draft was not as bad as the Scotty Flounder Linehan 2006 Tye Hill/Joe Flopenstein/Claude Wroten, Dominque Jail-Byrd Draft...

er, maybe

...because for total Rams games actually appeared in ....um, Linehan's group of Rams 2006 Rams Draft JAGs might actually have the upper hand!!

So....I'm not saying that Les Snead is a bad drafter (cough, Brian Quick, Isaiah Pead....cough-cough Bobby Wagner miss).....BUT...

logically, just looking at Snead's 2018 Draft, other than a Rotational NT in Sebastien Joseph-Day.....um, WHAT exactly have Los Ramos gained from that 2018 Draft haul huh?
ME: Not too much!!!

Okay now.....discuss amongst yourselves!!!

what jumps out in your post is that the rams first pick in 2018 was a late (25th) 3rd rounder, whereas linny's 2006 group included 5 guys taken in rounds 1-3

There you go again!

Muddying the pure waters of my dynamic reasoning....

.....with facts!!!


Seriously though.....Snead's 2018 Draft haul is paltry!
I threw in Linehan's awful 2006 Draft as the Nadir Of Ram Drafting Incompetence as a red herring comparison, to be honest.
But back to Snead's 2018 mess, I do opine that we keep Joe Noteboom and Brian Allen around just to make that 2018 Ram Draft meagerness appear to look less obvious.

A Draft crop is a Draft crop is a Draft crop....
ie. All 32 Teams get alloted 7 picks per annum and they spend them as they see fit......and then you harvest your Draft crop for that year.

....and 2018 was a lean harvest for Los Ramos!!!

But with respect to A1's reference to apples to apples....
let us see what other NFL Teams picked 3rd Rounders who logged less than 24 games so far okay?

There were 36 Third Round Picks in the 2018 NFL Draft. Here are the picks with less than 24 game appearances so far:
TEAM....#Pk..2018 Drafted Player..Pos..Gms...Commentary
PITTS...#76....MASON RUDOLF.....QB...11..PROBABLY UNFAIR COMPARISON AS BACKUP QB PICK TO BIG BEN
HOUS...#80...MARTINAS RANKIN...OT...22...PICKED BY UNEMPLOYED GM BILL O'BRIEN
ATL...#90....DEADRIN SENAT....DT.....20...PICKED BY UNEMPLOYED GM DIMITROFF
PITT...#92...CHUKWUMA OKORAFOR ..OT...19...DEPTH OL PICK BY STEELERS?

THIRD ROUND TALLY....OUT OF 36 THIRD ROUND PICKS IN 2018, ONLY 3 NON-QBs HAVE HAD LESS GAME APPEARANCES THAN OUR JOSEPH NOTEBOOM TO NOW! SO 32 OF 36 THIRD ROUNDERS HAVE YEILDED MORE GAME TIME THAN OUR NOTEBOOM? IE. A FULL 89% OF PICKS MADE OUT BETTER THAN WE DID WITH BOOM.

FOURTH ROUND TALLY....THERE WERE 37 FOURTH ROUND PICKS IN 2018 NFL DRAFT AND OUR TWO 4TH RD PICKS BRIAN ALLEN HAS APPEARED IN 22 GAMES FOR US AND JOHN FRANKLIN-MYERS IN 16 GAMES FOR AN AVERAGE OF 19 GAME APPEARANCES FOR LOS RAMOS . LET'S SEE WHICH 2018 FOURTH ROUNDERS HAD FEWER THAN 19 APPEARANCES FOR THEIR NFL TEAMS TILL NOW:

TOTAL OF NINE FROM MINNY'S DT JALYN HOLMES WITH 17 GAMES TO SAINTS OT RICK LEONARD WITH ZERO GAMES (NICE PICK BY FERRET-FACE PAYTON EH! )......SO 27 OF 37 PICKS HAD MORE GAMES REGISTERED THAN OUR TWO STUDS ALLEN AND JFM.....OR 73% HAD MORE PRODUCTIVE PICKS THAN SNEAD IN 2018's 4 ROUND.

We can perform this on 5th and 6th Round too.....results will be similar.

Suffice to say, not much to show from Snead's 2018 Draft save our NT Sebastien Joseph-Day sportsfans!

He's made mistakes. But I'm not going to write off the entire 2018 draft just yet. Of course in another year maybe that would be the best description. The Rams are 26-12 in the regular season since then so if that draft is a wash, they did a good job over coming it. Not too shabby.

yeah, hard to hold up the rams 2018 draft as anything but "oh well", but the rams pretty much had nothing but 4th round and later picks, the league average was 4.7 picks in rounds 4-7, the rams had 10, expecting much from nothing but the back end of a draft seems like a letdown waiting to happen.

i'm the opposite of a draftnik, don't really follow them at all, but looking at the 156 dudes taken in rounds 4-7 in 2018 only 1 has made the pro bowl, a 5th round punter, while 20 of the dudes never played a down.

so how do you gauge the backend of a draft class? i have no idea, starts? the guys the rams took in rounds 4 and later have started an average of 3.6 games, 12 teams have a lower average including the patriots, chiefs, saints, titans, steelers, and niners to name a few.

is it games played? only 4 teams have a lower average than the rams 14.9 games per draftee, the cards, steelers, saints, and giants.... anyway, it sure would have been nice if snead could have hit a home run on a few of those 10 dudes but, who knows, maybe a couple will pan out, sebastian is having a good year...

aeneas1 wrote:so how do you gauge the backend of a draft class?

You hope to get a surprise starter and some quality backups. 256 players are taken and the top 100 are off the board before the 4th round. Let's face it, on a 4-12 team a couple of those guys get a solid chance. On a good team, not so much. Every now and then there's a guy who's a stud from the get go like Fuller might be if he can stay healthy.

Hi aeneas!
Some Background
Like you, I was never a draftnik follower in my first decades as a Rams fan. Then, during WildernessDecade Part Deux (2005-2016) I needed something to give me hope AND PURPOSE for continuing on this love of The Horns.....
so I started following the Drafts every year, hoping to see some positives over&above the antics of Vitt, Linehan, Haslett, Spagnuolo and Fisher.

My 2018 Draft Diss
So, now....WOW!
Pro-Bowl status is now the standard for a successful Draft Pick??!!
High Standards in Northern California, I see. j/k

Here's some, what I would consider, successful Rams Draft Picks that never sniffed a ProBowl.
Michael Brockers
John Johnson III
Tyler Higbee
Rob Havenstein
Josh Reynolds
Cooper Kupp
Gerald Everett
Samson Ebukam

My point in the OP is that Snead's 2018 Draft has yielded paltry little fruit for the 2020 Ram Playoff Run active roster-wise. Like one NT semi-starter, Sebastien Joseph-Day, does NOT "a good Draft" make IMO. Furthermore, the Rams braintrust didn't go out and pay big bucks for A'Shawn Robinson last spring because SJD was such a compelling and dominant 2019 NFL NT, eh!

Look, just because I find fault (and point out same) does NOT mean I want Snead fired or McVay fired........but these guys (McSnead) occasionally fuck-up (just like all humans ) ...
...and it does not hurt, IMO, to let them know that the dedicated fandom of these Los Angeles Rams, actually take note.....and kvetch about it.

Why I kvetch.
Even as a kid, I was always a bit of a contrarian. When everybody loved The Beatles, I was a Dave Clark Five guy....after all, they were a Tottenham Soccer Team who only started up the band just to make money to fly to Europe to play other teams....plus the DC5 had a saxaphone, they never changed-up their drummer.....and when they got big & successful, they flew in their own aircraft....a DC-5!

Later, in 1977, whilst a Canadian Naval Officer, I suffered an injury that required a full-leg cast, so I was reassigned from Sea Duty to an office in MarPac HQ. During those months, I saw REAL professional spin-doctoring that sent total BS out as Daily Fleet Policy. All that moral corruption and feather-bedding, at that high level, shocked me! It was a real eye-opener for an idealistic young guy who actually thought all his superiors were as dedicated to killing Communists as he was. It was disgusting!!

After the Navy, when I was in the Private Sector (no truth-stretching there, right, folks?? ), I got involved in Political Campaigns, fund-raising, door-knocking, recruiting, etc etc
Suffice it to say, that a background like the above might lead a guy to being a fulltime skeptic, eh! Constantly jadedly asking
"So what's in it for this guy? What's HIS angle?"

The Angle On Our 2018 Bad Draft
For Snead's angle, IMO, keeping JAGs Joe Noteboom and Brian Allen around is not about how either one of those guys are key future players for Los Ramos. It's about maintaining the illusion that the 2018 Draft harvest is yet to be reaped by Los Ramos.
I mean, are there still guys out there who believe that injury-ridden former TCU Horned Frog LT Joe Noteboom, the ninth-rated OT in the 2008 Draft by most draftnik publications, is really and truly going to be Andrew Whitworth's longtime replacement???!!! I certainly don't!

Brian Allen is our next Rich Saul??? Sing me another song please!!

We might still see some dividends from Micah Kiser and Obo Okoronkwo....I know that I certainly hope so.....but the rest of that 11-body hodge-podge that Snead served up in the 2018 Draft was subpar IMO.

Guys around here (not you, of course A1 ) often say:
"Hey, don't be stupid and rate a Draft the day after it's over......you gotta wait a couple or three years to really see the impact of a Draft, you dummy!"

Well....here we are!!

As always, JMO.

TURFSHOWTIME.COM STOLE MY WORK ON SNEAD'S BAD 2018 DRAFT!!

Bastids!!!!!


Check out the article...

GRADING RAMS 2018 DRAFT CLASS
Nov 5, 2020 11:00 am CST
by Kenneth ThePlagiarismGuy Arthurs

Pretty much exact copying of my material and conclusions ....so, I am guessing
this Kenny Arthurs' mom must be one of those types who cheated to get him into an Ivy League School, eh!!
The poison-ivy berry never falls far from the bush, huh!!

FYI, Kenneth rates Snead's 2018 Draft Class a D+ Overall.
Kenny's Highest 2018 Ram draftee rating was Sebastien Joseph-Day C+
Kenny's Lowest 2018 Ram draftee rating was Jamil Demby with a F.

Tell me AGAIN how these media types, podcast guys....and even NFL team officials, etc etc NEVER READ OUR TALK FORUM POSTS!!!

Still and all, I cannot feel too badly....after all,
some wise wit once wrote that mimicry was the highest form of flattery!!!

"Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery that mediocrity can pay to greatness."
--Oscar Wilde

Not sure if this is the thread to drop this in to: but it is interesting.

St. Loser Fan wrote:Not sure if this is the thread to drop this in to: but it is interesting.

This is the correct thread. Some of those moves should have been corrected. How much Fisher was involved is an important consideration?