Deadline Decisions Lack Foresight

Anthony Bafaro

Thanks to being protected by the St. Louis Cardinals from the local media, and being protected by their own utter irrelevance from the national media, very few questions were raised by any weighted member of the press as to why an 0-5 team would trade anything at all for a 30 year old receiver in a walk year.  It’s clear that this team is several years away from contending for a championship.  Once you’ve accepted that, you have to start shedding valuable players that aren’t part of the long term picture instead of adding them.      

The minute the Rams passed on interior offensive lineman Mike Pouncey to take Robert Quinn in this year’s draft, James Hall should have been on the block.  How else do you justify drafting a defensive end there.  This is not some elite team that has the luxury of drafting depth players in the first round.  This team needed to upgrade ten or eleven starters with a focus on Bradford and the passing game.  If Robert Quinn was so good that he just had to be taken there, then he should’ve been good enough start over Hall.  Instead, Quinn is still only getting half as many snaps as Hall, because he isn’t good against the run.  That makes sense; I mean we wouldn’t want to disrupt the great string of Spartan shields that is the Rams run defense (They’re allowing 185 yards rushing a game.  It’s perfectly legitimate to pick up third string running backs in a fantasy league as long as they’re going against the Rams; how embarrassing is that?).  If Quinn isn’t good enough against the run to be part of this run defense, then he didn’t deserve to be drafted in the first round.  Let him learn to play against the run by playing him against the run; that’s the only option right now if you have any self respect as a GM or coach.  Run him out there until he can’t move, then give Hall a snap.  Hall is 34 years old. He's in the second to last year of his deal that hits the cap for $3.4 million per year; that’s a movable number.  Trading him probably would have drawn a fifth or sixth round pick at the deadline and would have opened up some cap space.  Whoever is in charge of personnel this off season needs to unload James’ salary and put it towards the signing of a young starter.

Steven Jackson turned twenty-eight in July of this year.  Most backs of his caliber find themselves falling back to the curve, or further, when they reach the fatal age of thirty.  Unless you think the Rams are going to make a Super Bowl run next season, it’s disrespectful to both the fan base and to Steven Jackson to have to watch his abilities waste away on a hopeless team.  The move should’ve been made coming into the year, it should have been made again at the deadline, and it must be made this off-season.  Hopefully he’d garner a 2^nd or 3^rd round pick and possibly an additional late pick.  Trading him would also relieve the cap of $9.7 million per year which he is set to make through the 2013 season.  That daunting cap hit may make it difficult to trade him, but having just under $4 million left in guaranteed money, maybe he’d be willing to restructure in order to play for a contender.  He’s putting up 4.9 yards per carry behind a below average run blocking line and a passing attack that frightens no one.  You can’t tell me that the Lions, Cowboys, or Jets, wouldn’t have at least been willing to talk.  Steven is still an elite back if he’s on good team.  He’s the type of player that can turn a top ten team into a Super Bowl favorite, but that’s not what the Rams are.  On this team, his inflated salary, deserving demand for touches, and short shelf life are all road blocks on the way to an sound rebuilding process.  Trading him is what is best for all parties involved.

I know that moving two of the better players on this team seems counter-intuitive.  I know that the term “rebuild” is not something that Rams fans want to hear again, but that’s not the way to look at it.  Last season was a façade that made a lot of people, including the Rams front office, think that the process was almost over.  The truth is, with Bradford in his second year, it’s just beginning.  Peyton Manning was good out of the gate, but he didn't win a playoff game until year six (all six years in the same system).  Prior to Peyton's second season the Colts traded 26 year old Marshall Faulk for 2nd and 5th round draft picks.  They replaced Faulk with 21 year old running back Edgerrin James in the first round.  They used the 2^nd round pick from the trade to draft current Falcon linebacker Mike Peterson, and the 5th round pick to draft defensive end Brad Scioli, who played six years with the team as both a starter and a backup. They knew they needed to put a young team in place that could grow with Peyton, so they traded some prime, expensive talent for some young, potential talent.  It’s time for the Rams to show that kind of foresight; sacrifice a short term chance at mediocrity for a long term chance at dominance.