Memo to LA Rams: Jadeveon Clowney is still lurking out there

From: Nervous LA Rams fans
To: Resident, Castle Franken-Snead, et al
re: DE Jadeveon Clowney

Must we take up pitchforks and lit torches to storm your front office castle to convince you to pair the NFL’s Defensive Player of the Year in Aaron Donald with free-agent defensive end, Jadeveon Clowney? Why fight the urge to shock the NFL with the news that you know you want to author. The LA Rams just built a monster-of-a-defense, and it came to life as soon as the lightning bolt known as Jadeveon Clowney struck a deal with the Rams.

This is about much more than just spit-balling some off-the-wall unlikeliest of scenarios or Monday morning quarterbacking. This is about seizing the moment, truly committing to going all-in on a Super Bowl ring. It’s about facing a defining moment and taking that leap of faith to become something greater.  Dare to dream? Why not? Dare to be bold? Now we’re talking.

It’s a very real, very do-able opportunity that exists in this year’s 2021 free agency market to put together a defense that is the stuff of every opposing quarterback’s nightmares. And it’s that opportunity that might never present itself again.

It’s a chance to put together a defense so unstoppable that it will rival the 2000 Baltimore Ravens’ or the 1985 “Super Bowl Shuffle”  Chicago Bears’ defenses.

Defense wins titles

Defense still can wins titles, even in today’s offense-happy, pass-friendly NFL. Defense always travels well. Offense, not necessarily. And this, this is an opportunity, an open door that might never present itself again.

Un-stoppable bookends, with a shut-down corner playing behind them in Jalen Ramsey.

You can’t double-team both Jadaveon Clowney and Aaron Donald. One man or the other is gonna’ come free and deliver a face-full of Reidell to some poor QB’s ribs. Oh, and a quick side note to our NFC West division rival Arizona Cardinals, too: We see your JJ Watt acquisition. . . and we’ll raise you one.

Clowney is still out there and available, so what are you waiting for? What’s the holdup? What exactly gives you pause? Is it the money?

Show me the money

Because if it’s just about the money required to snag a player of Clowney’s ability, here’s a way we think you can make this happen. And we have to look no further than the strategy you employed to bring OLB Leonard Floyd back into the Rams fold from the precipice of free agency.  You can go multi-year and commit 2021 compensation to a signing bonus. If you want a one-year deal, set it up like a multi-year deal with voidable years after year one.

By our rudimentary calculations, the Rams still have $5.9 million salary-cap space available. Spend it! If ever there was a year, a time, a moment in time to seize the bull by the horns and throw caution to the winds, this is it.

Besides, haven’t you already embarked on this path when you made the blockbuster trade for QB Matthew Stafford and unloaded your Super Bowl QB Jared Goff, plus one third-round and two future first-round draft picks?

Be bold. Finish the job. Carpe diem, seize the day.

What has it gots in its pocketses?

And speaking of Stafford, now that he’s officially a Ram, how about approaching him to re-structure or re-negotiate his deal, thereby saving over $15 million in cap space you can spend on Clowney? You know, ask him to “Be Like, Tom” (Brady) and forego a few million Benjamins now, in exchange for a few million Benjamins down the road.

As we have written before, such a duo would not only be dynamic, it would be dominating. Not just division-dominant, but across the entire league, take-on-all-comers dominating. Come to think of it, this has been on our TO-DO list for a year now.

It’s not as if the need for defensive help doesn’t exist after the team has just lost the services of DE Morgan Fox AND Michael Brockers to free agency. It’s unlikely you will find their replacements in the draft, especially when almost all of the pundits see 2021 as a down year for defensive players coming out of the college ranks.

Bam!

After all, a good chef, like Emeril Lagasse, is only truly limited by the quality of his food ingredients. So why not give your new defensive coordinator chef Raheem Morris the missing ingredient he needs to unleash such a dynamo upon the rest of the league? BAM.

Is it because Clowney had a down year last year with the Tennessee Titans? Actually, this works in the Rams favor! It’s part of what makes this deal all the more possible and all the more intriguing.

You don’t think that’s lit a fire under Clowney to come back fiercer and more determined than ever to prove to the league he’s still a wrecking ball force to be reckoned with, to prove he’s still relevant? An unspectacular stat line last year makes him even more affordable than perhaps ever before.

Clowney no longer has the leverage to demand a top-dollar contract, as before. Maybe even dangle a one-year, prove-to-us-you-can-still-dominate contract in front of his agent, land that Big Fish lunker of an edge rusher for cheap.

The Rams like that kind of one-year, salary-cap-friendly deals. It’s time to flip one over to Clowney’s agent. Time to sign the monster, and terrorize the NFL.