Second-round tender on Cory Littleton easy decision for Los Angeles Rams

By exercising a second-round tender on Cory Littleton, the Los Angeles Rams can match any offer sheet from other teams if needed.

As the madness of free agency continues with the new league year officially getting underway on Wednesday afternoon, the Los Angeles Rams have already been keeping themselves busy over the last couple of days.

From deciding to bring Dante Fowler Jr. back for another year to weighing out options on players like Ndamukong Suh and C.J. Anderson, the Rams knew they would be busy once this time arrived in the offseason, but they’re nowhere even close to being done.

For example, one of the unexpected challenges Los Angeles may end up facing once the free agency period officially gets underway is making sure Cory Littleton continues to be part of the picture after elevating his game to a whole new level in 2018.

In what seemed an easy decision for the Rams, the team decided to use a second-round tender on Littleton before Wednesday’s deadline, meaning they’re eligible to match any offer sheet from other teams, that is if the offers were there.

Back in 2016, Los Angeles signed Littleton as an undrafted free agent to a three-year deal with the intention of having depth at the linebacker position, and while there were times in which he looked good over the first two years, 2018 was by far his best season.

Around this time last year, the Rams had some questions at the linebacker position since that appeared to be one of their weaker areas on the defensive side of the football, but it was amazing to see Littleton take advantage of the situation by putting together a career year.

By starting all 16 games while setting career highs across the board with 125 combined tackles, four sacks, and three interceptions, Littleton proved to be quite valuable on defense for Los Angeles during his third NFL season.

With all this in mind, the decision to use a second-round tender on Littleton just to be safe really shouldn’t seem all that surprising, and hopefully the Rams can reward him with a long-term deal at some point since he’s only going to get better with experience.

Over the next few days, the madness of free agency is going to hit new levels, and while Littleton isn’t a top priority compared to some of the other players the Rams will need to decide on, the linebacker is certainly high up on the list.