It’s not ideal that the Los Angeles Rams don’t have a first-round pick in this year’s (or next year’s) draft, but that doesn’t mean they can’t come away with a handful of impact players on Friday night and Saturday. With four picks in the top 105, including two in the top 60, the Rams are well-positioned to improve on both sides of the ball.
Even better, this draft class is deep at several positions of need for the Rams – including wide receiver, offensive line and running back. Sean McVay pointed out that very fact on the Rams’ pre-draft livestream Wednesday night when asked about weighing need vs. value in the draft.
“It’s always a balance. For us, fortunately at some of those positions that we do feel like we need to address, there’s a lot of depth in this draft class,” McVay said. “It’s something that you’re trying to put together the puzzle and trying to figure out what’s the best way to navigate this for our football team. … It’s always a combination of both [need and value], but to say there’s not an element of ‘best player available, you don’t take into consideration the depth on your team,’ that wouldn’t be accurate, so it is a little bit of both.”
The Rams have shown in the last few years that they do prioritize talent over positional need. They didn’t reach for offensive line help last year despite that being arguably their biggest hole, selecting safety Taylor Rapp in the second round. And in 2018, with the offensive line looking strong, the Rams went with lesser-known prospect Joseph Noteboom.
That doesn’t mean they’ll go with a quarterback or tight end at No. 52 overall, but don’t rule out a running back or wide receiver if the right prospect falls to them.