Wide Receiver

With Brandon Lloyd gone, their leading receivers from last season are Brandon Gibson and Danario Alexander with 36 catches and 26 catches respectively. Poor Sam Bradford. They’ll have to hope that Justin Blackmon falls to them at 6, and that Danny Amendola returns healthy, and that either 2011 3^rd round pick Austin Pettis or 2011 4^th round pick Greg Sales step up in their 2^nd season, to even have a decent receiving corps in 2012. More likely, this is a 2+ year rebuilding project in the receiving corps. They haven’t had good receivers in forever.

Offensive Tackle

The Rams allowed 55 sacks last season, more than any team in the league. Sam Bradford missed significant time with injury and was under heavy pressure even when he did play. Left tackle Rodger Saffold played just 9 games last season, but still allowed 11 sacks, 17 pressures, and committed 10 penalties. Right tackle Jason Smith missed a lot of time with injury last season. He’s been disappointing to this point in his career and might end up being cut if he doesn’t restructure his contract, which counts for 10 million dollars on the cap next season. Either one could also move to left guard, where they also need help.

Outside Linebacker

James Laurinaitis is a great player at middle linebacker, but they don’t have long term starters at either of the outside linebacker positions. Neither Brady Poppinga and Chris Chamberlain are great and Chamberlain has already signed a 3 year deal in St. Louis. They need at least one new starter outside.

 

Guard

Jacob Bell was their left guard last season. He was pretty bad and the free agent guard is not expected to be brought back. Either Rodger Saffold or Jason Smith could play this position, assuming both are back, if they add a 3^rd tackle this offseason.

Defensive Tackle

Justin Bannan and Fred Robbins was the starters at defensive tackle last season, but at 33 and 35 years old respectively, their abilities became lesser than their contracts and they were cut. They signed Kendall Langford and top reserve Dorell Scott is expected to see more playing time, but they like to rotate defensive lineman so expect them to add one more defensive tackle in the mix.

Safety

Darian Stewart was their free safety last season in his first season as a starter. He could be better in his 2^nd season as a starter and the Rams might have to move forward with him because of how weak this safety class is, but there’s a reason why the Rams were linked to Michael Griffin before Tennessee franchised him. Stewart isn’t very good. Only 2 players missed more tackles than he did last season, whiffing on 20 tackles with 64 total tackles. That means he whiffed on almost 25% of his tackles.

Running Back

Steven Jackson is nearing the 2200 carry mark where running back’s abilities tend to fall off a cliff. They signed Cadillac Williams last offseason to take some of the load off his shoulders, but Williams sucked so Jackson still had to carry most of the load again. They should look for a young running back to pair with him and potentially be his long term successor.

Cornerback

The Rams lack of cornerback depth was exposed last season with Bradley Fletcher and Ron Bartell injured. It was so bad that Al Harris had to play a significant amount of snaps. Justin King was their #1 cornerback and he was ProFootballFocus’ worst rated cornerback last season. Josh Gordy wasn’t much better. Fletcher is back and they’ve added Cortland Finnegan, but Fletcher is so sure thing so they could use some more cornerback depth in the mix.