Does the outcome of SB LVI change the LA Rams off season strategy?

One of the curious matters that confront the LA Rams one week from today, the day after Super Bowl LVI, is the same question that confronts 30 NFL teams right now. Now what? But that question has a certain bit of ambiguity when it applies to the LA Rams. After all, the team is just one game away from claiming the NFL Championship Game, and all the honors that distinction bestows upon the organization.

But it seems in recent years that it is more likely to attain a Super Bowl victory than to maintain a Super Bowl victory. Already, forces are prying coaches off the staff. The LA Rams will lose offensive coordinator Kevin O’Connell as he will become the head coach of the Minnesota Vikings. The team will also lose secondary coach Ejiro Evero as he will become the defensive coordinator of the Denver Broncos. And they may just be the tip of the iceberg.

The Tampa Bay Buccaneers tried to bring everyone back for a sequel after winning the Super Bowl last year, but that did not go according to plan. WR Chris Godwin suffered an ACL injury and was out for the season. The Bucs lost WR Antonio Brown after he took himself out of the game against the New York Jets by removing his equipment at halftime. And a wave of injuries impacted their season.

But in the end, it comes down to the difficulty of winning consecutive games in the NFL is much harder to do than many realize.

A fork in the road

If the LA Rams do not win, the goal will likely be to bring as many key contributors back for 2022 as possible and try again. Whether or not that means that the Rams will find the funds to re-sign a significant number of their 2022 projected free agents, they will likely have more incentive to do so.

If the Rams do win, will the team be as aggressive in extending the handful of one-year veterans added to augment the roster in 2021? Perhaps. But the price to re-sign players after a Super Bowl victory goes up considerably, and the Rams do not seem like the type of team to chase players by throwing handfuls of cash at them. In many cases, it’s likely that the Rams have already established ‘their price’ for players.

In 2021, the Rams extended their ERFAs, brought back one RFA in DB Darious Williams, and re-signed OLB Leonard Floyd. That was it. Despite the hope that the Rams will bring a lot of their players back, that has not been their track record, and that’s worth keeping in mind.

Super Bowl LVI is on everyone’s mind this week, and rightfully so. But turning the corner, the LA Rams front office is already deeply invested in restocking the roster for the 2022 NFL season. And very likely, what the team will do depends a great deal on how well they do in the last game of the season.