2011 St Louis Rams – Where are they now?

Free agency is now a matter of a few days away. The St Louis Rams have relatively few picks available in the 2015 NFL draft, although there is potentially miles of salary cap room with Kendall Langford already cut, and possibly Jake Long, Scott Wells and others to follow.

Free agency therefore represents a huge opportunity for the St Louis Rams to address some of the bigger needs on the roster heading towards the new season. Despite the toughness of the NFC West division, many believe Jeff Fisher’s squad is not far from being genuine contenders.

When Fisher took over in St Louis after the 2011 season, it was a roster that saw the Rams finish with a dismal 2-14 record. It was clear from the outset that big changes would be needed. So what happened to the last squad of the Steve Spagnuolo tenure? Here is a selection of some of the key players from that year, and what has happened to them since:

Sam Bradford – Fell off in a big way from his 2010 performance which saw Bradford become the first Ram to win the Offensive Rookie of the Year award since Jerome Bettis in 1993. Despite playing a full season in 2012 and showing signs of his true potential in the early weeks of 2013, he famously suffered the first of two ACL tears against the Carolina Panthers. While Bradford remains with the team, he has yet to play a competitive down in regular season football since.

Steven Jackson – 2012 was the running back’s 8^th consecutive 1000-yard season, but it was to be his last in the blue and gold. Jackson left for Atlanta where he had limited success, amassing exactly 1250 yards across 2013 and 2014 combined – the lowest two-season total in his career. Where he will play in 2015 is currently unknown, with the long-time Ram cut by the Falcons at the end of February.

Craig Dahl – Grading at -6.9 on Pro Football Focus in 2011, defensive back Dahl averaged just one interception per year in the four seasons he spent in St Louis. Dahl did remain on the roster for 2012 where he allowed an average of 15.8 yards per catch against his coverage (78^th in the league) before amusingly moving onto divisional rivals San Francisco in 2013. In the last two season with the 49ers, Dahl’s tally of solo tackles is just 28.

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Brandon Lloyd – Finishing with 683 yards and 5 touchdowns in 2011, Lloyd was the Rams leading receiver for the single season he spent with the team. 2012 saw the former 4^th round draft selection follow offensive co-ordinator Josh McDaniels to the New England Patriots, where he would again spend just one season. 2014 signalled Lloyd’s return to the NFC West with the San Francisco 49ers, the team that originally drafted him back in 2003.

CJ Ah You – Despite playing a respectable 41% of defensive snaps across the 9 games he featured in 2011, defensive end Ah You managed just a single sack that year. The former 7^th round draft selection for the Buffalo Bills was one of the first roster casualties of the Jeff Fisher era, as Ah You left St Louis in free agency in the 2011-12 offseason. He failed to find another team, and has not played in the NFL since.

Danario Alexander – The former Mizzou receiver was another to leave the Rams after the 2011 season. He headed west to spend 2012 with the San Diego Chargers, where he posted career-high numbers with 658 yards and 7 touchdowns. In the run-up to the 2013 season however, Alexander tore an ACL and was placed on IR. He too has not played a down in the NFL since sustaining that injury.

Josh Brown – With St Louis’ 6^th round selection of Greg Zuerlein in the 2012 NFL draft, veteran kicker Brown left the Rams after the 2011 season with a 75% fieldgoal conversation rate, the third lowest of his then 9 seasons in the league. Brown spent 2012 in Cincinnati with the Bengals before moving to the New York Giants the following year. 2014 saw a career-high 92.3% of Brown’s fieldgoals going between the sticks.

Darian Stewart – Finishing 4^th on the defensive side of the roster with 920 snaps in 2011, Stewart’s contribution plummeted in 2012 as he was only the field for just 82 plays. Stewart remained in St Louis for one more year before moving to the Baltimore Ravens for the 2014 season where he featured in all 16 games, something he failed to do in four years with the Rams. Last campaign also saw by far the highest overall PFF grading of Stewart’s career, finishing the year +7.0.

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