The St. Louis Rams are at the precipice of making some changes after a disastrous season. What exactly those changes are remain to be seen. There are credible reports that say Stan Kroenke is prepared to find a new general manager and head coach for the Rams. Offensive coordinator Josh McDaniels has done nothing to endear himself to fans with an offense scoring 11.8 points and a franchise quarterback looking lost after a promising start to his career. However, McDaniels' time in St. Louis may not be over after this season, according to ESPN's Adam Schefter.
Stop. Let that sink for a moment. Josh McDaniels, the man who took seven plays at the one-yard line before finally deciding to use the 240 lbs Steven Jackson, may be back with the St. Louis Rams next season.
In his online knowledge dump yesterday, Schefter spent some time discussing the McDaniels issue, mostly as the man who drafted Tim Tebow. Despite the coach's failures in Denver in St. Louis, his Broncos draft class is now giving him some credibility, per Schefter.
No one around the league would be surprised if Kansas City and its general manager Scott Pioli, who worked with McDaniels in New England, made a hard run at him as the successor to Todd Haley. New England would always have a spot for McDaniels. And St. Louis wants to keep him even when change is likely to shake up the organization.
Clearly the Rams are an organization fraught with problems, mostly from the top down. The front office track record on middle to late round picks is not a good one. The head coach shows a disturbing lack of command of the overall flow of the game on the field, despite almost three years of head coaching experience. The assistant coaches, for the most part, look to be in over their head. The personnel team hasn't brought in the kind of playmakers this offense needs, and the coaches have done a poor job developing middle and later round picks.
And Josh McDaniels, well, the results speak for themselves. It's hard to say what the players think about McDaniels. I know of one former player that called him an "asshole." Of course, some 80 percent of Americans think the same about their former bosses, so there's nothing really salacious or telling about that.
McDaniels' place in the hierarchy of organizational politics is the wild card here. There are people who say Kroenke is the one who pressured the team to hire him, but there are also those who say Spagnuolo wanted him to punch up the offense. Fissures between Spags and the brash young offensive coordinator seem to be well concealed, if there are any.
McDaniels' survival all depends on whose corner he's in when changes start happening. If he really was Kroenke's hire, that ups his likelihood of survival. And while fans may be distraught to begin with, the team could assuage those feelings if the Rams made some upgrades among the offensive players. The kid coordinator will be a tough sell for whoever brings him in, at least if they hire him into a high profile role, like head coach or coordinator.
For all the weeks of bad football Rams fans have had to suffer through, at least the offseason promises to be mighty interesting.