LA Rams 2020 free agency strategy likely 2021 comp picks

The LA Rams face losing a number of free agents in 2021. The long term strategy may be to add four compensatory picks for the 2021 NFL Draft.

As the LA Rams fans scramble and cling to the hope that the team finds a way to free up 2020 salary cap dollars to re-sign key players, another strategy may be at work among the team’s personnel department. The LA Rams face losing up to 18 players who were on the 53-man roster in 2019.  That equates to a third of the team’s overall roster.

Several players stand to become very rich in the NFL Free Agency market, whether remaining with the LA Rams or playing for a new NFL team.  Players like OLB Dante Fowler Jr., ILB Cory Littleton, DE Michael Brockers are all in the $10+ million price range per season. Of course, that could go higher if the NFL Players vote to accept the new NFL Collective Bargaining Agreement.

Even one such player returning to the LA Rams would effectively break the team’s bank of available contract dollars.  In the hopes of the team being open to signing 2020 free agents, we had compiled a plan for the team to free up salary dollars. So far, the team has not committed to restructuring contracts today and paying for those dollars in future years.

General manager Les Snead did commit to adding additional faces onto the roster in the LA Rams running game during the LA Rams weekly podcast on March 4, 2020. The podcast, in fact, was incredibly informative – both in what Snead did say and what he did not say.