Interesting nuggets from Michael Silvers' Draft Weekend With The Rams

Every year as fans we want to get a deeper look inside of our teams "war room" during the NFL Draft, we want to see if what we think, matches what the team thinks. Luckily for the St. Louis Rams every year that head coach Jeff Fisher has been with the Rams, they have some type of big national draft article that comes out after the draft. This year's reporter was Michael Silver, who wrote about the Rams "war room" in 2012.

The article that Silver wrote was shorter than I expected it to be honestly, but he delivers some good information and helps us see the vision that the team had in building their roster during the draft.

First let's look at the team's thought process during the first round.

Fisher: "I’ve got three hellacious defensive fronts in my division, and I want some big, strong maulers who go right at Seattle and San Francisco's linebackers and let us pound the ball," Fisher explained. "To survive in the NFC West, we have to win in the trenches. That's what this draft is about."

As you can tell, the Rams thoughts early on were to build through the trenches and play fire with fire. Offensive tackle Greg Robinson was the most gifted and physical offensive lineman in the draft, and he will be the strong mauler that the Rams need to hit the Seahawks and 49ers in the mouth.

Oh, what would happen if the Houston Texans decided not to draft Jadeveon Clowney?

If the Houston Texans somehow decided not to select defensive end Jadeveon Clowney (and didn't trade the pick to a team targeting Clowney, the Rams would pounce…

Now let's take a look at some interesting what if's, that could have occurred in the draft.

If Martin, Donald, or Mosley weren’t there at 13: "St. Louis would have tried to trade down into the 20s, where they'd be able to land an offensive lineman a bit lower on their board." The parameters of a deal were discussed with the Ravens, who held the 17th pick; the Rams threw out the possibility of surrendering second- and third-round picks, along with next year's second-rounder, should Martin continue to fall.

So even with Greg Robinson already drafted, the team was interested in Zack Martin. If Aaron Donald wasn't there we could have had two offensive linemen in the first.  For a coach who has never drafted an offensive linemen in the first, he didn't seem to mind getting two. Maybe something to watch for next season.

Also, C.J. Mosley could have been the pick at 13 if Donald and Martin was gone. The linebacker was an interesting talent, but another 1st round linebacker. At least we know the Rams do value BPA, Mosley probably would have taken Jo-Lonn Dunbar's place. It's an interesting note to remember.

Everything and everybody in the national media made it sound like the Rams would draft Johnny Manziel. Was there any fire in that smokescreen?

Over the next half hour, several staffers pitched the idea of trading up

for Manziel. Taking him with a third first-round selection, they reasoned, would be less threatening to Bradford, who'd remain the incumbent quarterback for at least 2014. Also, as one person put it to Fisher: "This isn't the Johnny Manziel of two hours ago. It's a guy who's mad at the world because he keeps getting passed over, and wants

I don't know how much interest the Rams had in Manziel. The team did more than enough legwork on Manziel, I don't think it was a smokescreen like the above passage proves. I don't know how much Fisher liked Manziel, but it appears as though other members in the staff wanted Manziel. We will never know how much Fisher wanted Manziel, but we do know that some people on the staff wanted Manziel. It doesn't matter anymore because the Rams quarterback is Sam Bradford.

Let's look towards controversial topics

"I know exactly what we're getting into, and I'm not worried at all," Fisher said Saturday night as he sipped a glass of sublime red wine while reclining in his large, brown office chair. "Michael Sam will help us, and we'll give him every chance to succeed, and you know what? It's gonna be pretty cool."

Hey if Fisher can be all chill and calm drafting Michael Sam, why can't we? Hopefully he ends up making the team and making the Rams better.
Lastly, let's see what they said about the most surprising pick of the night, Maurice Alexander.

"If I don't get (Alexander)," he told Demoff and Snead on Friday night, "I'm gonna be mad.""How mad?" Demoff asked. "Like, Bobby Wagner mad."

Wow, Bobby Wagner mad, Fisher really wanted Wagner and he wasn't happy that the Seahawks got him over the Rams. Hey, if Fisher likes Alexander that much, I'm happy that the Rams got him. It's going to be interesting to watch Alexander develop now that we know that the team valued him highly enough to draft early, and that they basically love him.

So those are the key nuggets that were found while reading Michael Silver's article. Honestly, the article is worth a read,  there's plenty of interesting tidbits that i just decided not to add, just to keep the word total low.

So anyway, that's the key information that I got from the article, what are your thoughts?