:format(webp)/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/13495815/168524311.0.jpg)
Power rankings. They fuel the soul on the football-less days.
We've seen them trickle out recently. SB Nation's community managers put together their rankings on the eve of the draft with the Rams coming in at 18. ESPN offered theirs just following the draft; St. Louis settled in at 15.
Yesterday, CBS Sports' Pete Prisco (never short with his words...) put his post-draft power rankings out, and it replicated the ESPN ranking slotting the Rams in at 15th.
Les Snead is building a heck of a roster. They have a talented front seven that they could ride to a playoff berth, even in a tough division.
The blurb isn't all that telling, but the ranking is.
The conventional wisdom is coalescing around this team - better than they have been, potential to be good, but everything yet to prove. Heck, you can apply that to Sam Bradford as much as you can the team.
Still, it's a different position to sit in at this point compared to a year ago when the Rams were thought of as one of the worst teams in the league going into the 2012 season. And with even more unknowns (key new additions and departures, rookies supporting one of the youngest rosters in the entire league), it's hard for anyone to really get a firm grasp on what this team will be, as opposed to say the Raiders or Falcons.
Of all people, it took Lavar Arrington to provide me some clarity on power rankings right now.
Listening to the Lavar & Dukes show on my way home yesterday, Lavar suggested something I completely agree with as they were discussing Prisco's power rankings: The top five or six teams are relatively clear. The bottom five or six are as well. Everyone else is interchangeable.
Put it like this. Prisco has the Lions, Vikings, Saints and Steelers all behind the Rams. I could understand why someone might rank any of those teams ahead of the Rams. Similarly, I could make a fair argument that the Rams should be ranked above the Cowboys, Redskins, Colts or Bears.
The Rams spent a painful amount of time sitting at the bottom level of power rankings in recent years. That's just not the case anymore.