3 Rams revelations from GM Les Snead that Rams fans will love to hear

I love to take any and every opportunity to follow LA Rams General Manager Les Snead, because even when he doesn't 'spill the beans,' over the team's future strategy, he seems to drop nuggets of wisdom and the bread crumbs for what might be in the future. If you view his video press conferences, and pay attention to what Snead says and doesn't say, you can get a lot of information from him by reading between the lines.

Les Snead is one of the savviest and shrewdest NFL strategists in the industry today. But while some NFL GMs have been known to sprinkle misinformation to mislead analysts and other teams, Snead does not sully himself with that nonsense. He simply knows where to draw the line of what can and cannot be shared safely. Still, he does have a way of confirming what the team may do by what he is and is not willing to discuss directly.

And so when the opportunity to get more direct feedback from Les Snead on the Rich Eisen Show video podcast arrived, I made sure that I was perched in my chair and able to take copious notes. While those notes cover a lot of ground, the Rich Eisen Show did me a grand favor by clipping and sharing a number key talking points that I had wanted to make in a future article (or articles) and saved me the work of detailed transcription.

In short, why tell you what Les Snead said when I can embed the video snippets and show you what he said instead? With that in mind, here are three revelations about the LA Rams' strategy for the draft and the 2024 NFL season that Les Snead made a point of sharing that are definitely worthwhile to take note of:

III: Rams drafted RB Blake Corum over trading back for more picks

When we size up any draft, invariably there is the debate over if or when the team may be open to trading back. In many cases, that debate often tries to acknowledge that the team is reluctant to accept huge gaps in the draft, as that prevents the team from appearing on the board at regular intervals to catch the falling stars who may be valued by the front office.

In the case of the 2024 NFL Draft, the Rams optimal picks to trade back from were Round 1 with the 19th overall pick and Round 3 with the 83rd overall pick. Round 1 made sense because it was the pick with the most value, and trading back in Round 1 to later in the round would net the team the most valued return.

The Round 3 pick made sense because the team had two picks in that round, and if the team traded back with the first pick in that round, the team could net a pick to fill in over the gap in Rounds 4 and or 5. Per Rams GM Les Snead, the team was prepared to trade back if Michigan RB Blake Corum was not on the board at 83. But he was on the board, and the rest was history:

Snead explained what we guessed all along. Choosing RB Blake Corum in Round 3 was too high to view him as a backup for the team. Rather, he should be viewed as part two of a 1-2 punch from the team's backfield in the 2024 offense. With Corum having so much success at scoring, does that make him the primary weapon with short-yardage and goal to go scenarios?

Stay tuned.

II: Snead shared that door to Aaron Donald still open

Another area that was skillfully addressed was the matter of All-Pro defensive lineman Aaron Donald's retirement. To the question of when did Donald tip-off the team about his plans to retire, Snead shared that it happened fairly early in the 2023 NFL season. Was it due to the 3-6 start to the season? While that point was skirted, Snead did state that Aaron Donald had a lot of fun playing when the team got hot and nearly ran the table with a 7-1 finish to the season.

Had the Rams won their Wild Card game in the 2024 NFL Playoffs against the Detroit lions, perhaps Aaron Donald's decision may have turned out differently. But following that loss, Donald told Rams Head Coach Sean McVay that his cup was full, and that he wanted to retire from the NFL:

But no bridges were burned.

In his ever-optimistic approach, Les Snead described how the LA Rams got hot in 2021, and convinced then retired DB Eric Weddle to return to the team despite a two-year retirement from the NFL to compete for the team in post-season. Weddle agreed to do so, and earned a Super Bowl ring from playing in just four post-season games.

Pivoting to the Aaron Donald retirement, Snead teased that if the Rams lock up a spot in the 2025 NFL Playoffs, he would circle back around to see if the team could lure DT Aaron Donald out of retirement to play for the team once again. While Snead admitted that he did not believe that Donald would be willing to do so, I am less certain of that fact. Stay tuned.

I: Les Snead loves pairing Jared Verse/Braden Fiske in this defense

The third and perhaps most intriguing revelation is the discussion that centered on the team's selection of two of the most prominent Florida State Seminoles defenders, first adding edge rusher Jared Verse followed by defensive tackle Braden Fiske. Host Rich Eisen set up Les Snead by detailing the scenario. Jared Verse participated in the call to inform his teammate Braden Fiske that he was just selected by the LA Rams with the 39th overall pick of the 2024 NFL Draft.

It was a moment that was one of the coolest draft moments in Les Snead's career.

Where the revelation appears is the admission by Snead that the Rams regrouped on Day 2 and worked out the plan to trade up to select Braden Fiske throughout the morning hours. The conversation then morphed into the direction of how the team managed to pull off the logistics of getting Verse on the phone with Fiske for the Round 2 selection.

But Rich Eisen shrewdly turns the topic back to the advantages of selecting two players from the same defense to the roster. Snead shared that the Rams vetting process uncovered just how close the friendship of Jared Verse and Braden Fiske had grown. Snead described their bond that helped each to improve one another through friendly rivalry and pushing one another throughout the season.

Snead admitted that the front office knew that in the void left by Aaron Donald's retirement, the defense needed help. As such, the word shared by the personnel department was that Aaron Donald could not be replaced by one player, but perhaps the team could get close by adding two. Snead then admitted that in the Rams front five on defense, maybe four players could help replace Aaron Donald in 2024.

As always, that you for reading.