Pro days have become increasingly important this year leading up to the draft due to the fact that the scouting combine was canceled. With no centralized location for all of the top prospects to work out, teams will be traveling across the country or attending pro days virtually this spring.
Just don’t expect to hear about the Rams being on the road very much during the circuit of workouts.
They skipped Texas’ pro day on Thursday, which featured an intriguing pass rusher, Joseph Ossai. Every other team was in attendance except for the Rams, which raised some questions as to why they didn’t go down to watch Ossai and other prospects showcase their physical skills.
The NFL is limiting pro day attendance to three members of each team due to the pandemic, but that isn’t the reason Los Angeles has been skipping pro days.
Les Snead explained during his media session Wednesday that the Rams only attend certain pro days they deem completely necessary, like to finish a prospect’s file ahead of the draft. “For every pro day attended, there should be a specific reason,” he said.
The Rams also don’t want to tip their hand ahead of the draft if they send a coordinator to watch a prospect work out, doing their best to keep their targets under wraps.
“Nothing different than in years past, because in most situations, we probably haven’t sent three to a pro day anyway,” Snead said. “But I do think because there’s no private workouts this year, there’s definitely a cap, but maybe allow three, because a lot of times with position coaches, coordinators, even head coaches, if they wanted to get out to a pro day, they could but a lot of times nowadays that is done somewhat privately to try to keep — what we try to do is keep people from going, ‘Oh the Rams had defense coordinator, offensive coordinator at this position’ and now teams will try to take note of that and try to use it against you maybe.”
With the combine being canceled, workout numbers aren’t something a team has to attend a pro day to gather. That data will be shared with teams, making it less imperative for each club to attend every workout.
He reiterated again that the Rams don’t want to show their cards before the draft, where a team could trade up and take a player they might’ve been interested in.
“The interesting thing this year, with no combine, all pro days we will share data, but that occurs every year in a system that’s referred to as the APT system where every club doesn’t have to attend a pro day,” he said. “But let’s call it a player, subset school, didn’t go to the combine, we can get the standard 40-yard dash standard short shuttles, and that data is shared. So, I think this year, unlike combine, some of those numbers, some of those measurables would just get to us later in the process. And then as a club, there is times where maybe you don’t want to attend the pro day just because you don’t want to show your cards or what have you, and things like that. So, there’s always some of that game theory going on.”
So when the lists of attendees come out for each pro day, don’t be alarmed about the Rams skipping one or another. They’ll attend as they see fit.