St. Louis Rams Add Two; Tryout Four More

The St. Louis Rams moved quickly to fill the roster vacancies left by Al Harris and Michael Hoomanawanui. Both players landed on the injured reserve list after this week's 13-12 win against the Cleveland Browns. For now, linebacker Justin Cole and cornerback Nate Ness will replace both players on the roster. 

Ness was signed from the practice squad today. Cole was signed away from the Kansas City Chiefs practice squad yesterday. Ness fills an obvious, immediate need for the Rams, giving them a full complement of five cornerbacks on the 53-man roster. Cole figures to be a special teams guy, but adding another linebacker to the roster, especially with Bryan Kehl and Josh Hull likely to return this week, would seem to indicate another move. It could be that David Nixon is out, since he was kind of a hasty addition last week. He did make a key special teams play, forcing a Josh Cribbs fumble. Either way, the Rams are tweaking at the edges of the roster. 

A handful of players also visited Rams Park for tryouts today. Cornerbacks Chris Smith, Kendric Burney and Trumaine McBride. Tackle Thomas Welch was also in for a tryout according to Howard Balzer. 

A UNC product, Burney had a great outing at the Senior Bowl this year, but not good enough to get him drafted. Also hurting his draft stock was a 4.71 forty time, not exactly lending itself well to playing on the outside in the NFL. Where Burney could be useful is on the inside, working in a zone scheme. He's also small. Here's a fuller report from Mocking the Draft on Burney. 

Chris Smith was signed by the Rams as an undrafted rookie free agent this year. A Northern Illinois product, he was injured in the Rams August 7 scrimmage, and was waived thereafter.