L.A. Rams: Puzzle Pieces...

An NFL team is an intricate jigsaw puzzle. You know the ones I’m talking about: The ones your Grandmother bought you when visiting to keep you from playing football in her house... I’m talking about those 5000 piece puzzles I rarely finished. I’d get the edge pieces put together, then realize I didn’t really want to spend hours trying to fill in all the blue sky over the serene lake scene depicted on the puzzle’s box. I mean, what’s with all the frickin’ BLUE SKY?

When Jeff Fisher took over as head coach of the Rams, he took on a monumental task few others were qualified to do. Team owner Stan Kroenke tasked him with rebuilding the Rams, while preparing for a re-location back to Los Angeles. The job seemed daunting, but do-able: create a team with a solid foundation of talent. Whether winning or losing was high on the agenda for Kroenke is anyone’s guess, but I can’t help but think Fisher wanted then - and now - to get his team to the Super Bowl...

Piecing together an NFL team - from the bare bones left behind by previous Rams coaches - hasn’t been easy. Limited money to spend on free agents, and the “hit or miss” nature of the NFL Draft made the job hard. Sub-.500 records for the St. Louis Rams and Jeff Fisher cast a cloud over the team when it finally arrived in the City of Angels. While fans have shown up in droves to welcome the Rams back after 20 years, the fact is this team has to prove itself to the NFL world.

Now, back to the puzzle thingy... Trying to suss out which players can meld with others on an NFL team seems to need a wizard-esk ability I can’t really fathom? I think there’s some kind of disconnect between “the player” chosen, and when he arrives to find out he’s just traveled to an alien world that’s so unlike the college he recently left behind it causes a kind of mind-meltdown? Coaches have to find a way to make every player puzzle piece fit, and some just never do...

The current edition of the Rams as a team has me excited for the season to come, but there’s something that has me scratching my head too? Is it just me that sees a team that appears to be approaching the coming season as one trying to incrementally improve? Increments are fine most of the time, but if true, Jeff Fisher is literally planing on his 2015 team - with a couple additions and subtractions along the way - being the one he’s decide to let everything ride on in 2016? If so, it’s a gutsy thing to do.

Added to the Los Angeles Rams puzzle are a few new wide receivers for 2016. Training camp and preseason performances aside, I honestly don’t see any of them making much noise in the season to come. There’s a couple of new tight ends, and that new quarterback everyone seems to be either a fan of, or calling him a bust before he’s even taken an NFL regular season snap? Outside of the aforementioned, I’m just not seeing much change? Yes, Todd Gurley, Todd Gurley, Todd Gurley... I get it! But how many times have we Rams fans pinned our hopes on a player (re: Sam Bradford) only to see them bizarrely quashed?

I bet you think I’m being too negative, right? Well, maybe that could be true except for one thing: I think the Rams will go 10-6 in the win loss column in 2016, and even make a wild card berth in the playoffs? You confused yet? Well, don’t be...

Remember all that Blue Sky in the puzzle I bemoaned earlier? How a yammered about how hard it is to piece together, not to mention exceedingly tedious? Well, welcome to the true life of an NFL fan. The Rams have the pieces to compete in the NFL. Bang on Case Keenum all you like, but I get the feeling Jeff Fisher really doesn’t think a Peyton Manning-esk starter is necessary to win in the NFL. I mean, the Denver Broncos won with Peyton Manning after he stopped being Peyton Manning, right? It’s just my opinion, but I think Fisher leans toward the fan-dreaded “game manager” quarterback. If you think back a couple years, all the Rams teams have had a single reason in common as to why they didn’t succeed, and the line can’t be drawn directly to the quarterback position...

The one and only thing holding the Los Angeles Rams back - from being among the top 10 teams in the NFL - has been avoidable mistakes. That’s it, and you know it. Penalties, dropped balls, poor blocking technique, ect... Plain and simple, most of the Rams’ losses over the past two or three years haven’t been won by their opponents, as much as lost by a team that can’t seem to resist the urge to beat itself... The hinge point for the 2016 Los Angels Rams will be just how much they’ve matured. Long the youngest team in the NFL, it’s time they grow up. Idiotic plays have to disappear for this team to show the world what they are truly capable of being in the NFL.

So what do I see for the 2016 Los Angeles Rams? Why, Blue Sky, of course...