Planet Rams

By Jim Rodenbush Wednesday, May 5, 2010 The St. Louis Rams’ draft class of 2010 made its debut this past weekend on the practice fields at Rams Park. The 11 players were among the nearly 70 who participated in the team’s three-day rookie minicamp, which concluded Sunday morning. For the draft group, the minicamp was about making a good first impression, with their coaches and teammates. “I’m really looking to see if guys can think, if the same guy is making the same mistakes, so that’s one thing,” Rams coach Steve Spagnuolo said. “When they are doing things physically, I’m trying to get skills, how they interact with the coaches, what they’re doing. After they catch the ball, are they walking back or jogging back?” As expected, a great deal of the attention during the weekend was focused on No. 1 overall pick Sam Bradford. “He handled the workload well,” offensive coordinator Pat Shurmur said. “Really, we tried to mentally stress him a little bit to see how he’d handle things. He handled that well and he was able to bring the stuff from the meeting to the practice field. That’s the most important thing.” But, as the Rams’ newest quarterback saw it, other stood out as well. Those players included some of his newest targets – wide receiver Mardy Gilyard, a fourth-round pick and tight ends Michael Hoomanawanui and Fendi Onobun, fifth- and sixth-round choices. Bradford, on Gilyard: “Oh, it was definitely fun working with him. Obviously, he can do a lot of different things. He can play outside. He can play inside. He’s just very versatile as a wide receiver. He got by people on the deep ball, but then he had some really nice short routes where he was breaking it off, so it was really fun to get to work with him and just get some chemistry going.” Bradford, on the tight ends: “Both of those guys did a great job. ‘Big Mike’ (Hoomanawanui) made a catch with one hand (during practice Saturday), and I mean literally just snagged it. It was very impressive. And then Fendi, I feel like I can put the ball anywhere around him, and he’s just going to catch it because he’s so long and athletic.” On the defensive side, coordinator Ken Flajole said it was difficult to get a read on players because they practiced without pads. “It’s tough,” he said. “Here in a non-padded camp there’s some things from an athletic standpoint you can kind of gauge. Then really you’re trying to get an idea on their ability to learn the scheme because we throw a few at them here in a short amount of time and how fast they can process it. You know, do they have the mental capacity to learn the scheme at the speed that it runs? So you’re always in the evaluation process, that’s for sure.” As Flajole sees it, the learning curve is high for each of the team’s defensive draft picks: cornerbacks Jerome Murphy (third round) and Marquis Johnson (seventh round), defensive ends Hall Davis (fifth round), Eugene Sims (sixth round), and George Selvie (seventh round) and linebacker Josh Hull (seventh round). “They’re all coming from college schemes they’ve been in for three or four years, so you’ve got to break some old habits about maybe how they did things,” he said. “But I was pleased. I thought I really liked our guys and now we just have to build on it.” Still, there were some picks that stood out on the defensive side, like Johnson and Murphy. “The two corners, I thought, adapted to our style of defense,” Spagnuolo said. In addition, the Rams coach had praise for Hull. “I thought he displayed good command in the huddle,” he said. “You look for that in a Mike linebacker, just like the quarterback. Will he blurt it out with some enthusiasm, so it sounds like he knows what he’s talking about?” Per NFL rules, the draft class and the Rams’ rookie free agents will not return to Rams Park until May 18, when the team starts its organized team activities. In the meantime, the players will have the opportunity to continue to study the team’s playbook and build on what they learned at the minicamp. “This is the first time I’ve ever been involved in the rookie camp, so what will be nice now is they get it by themselves," Shurmur said. "Now they’ll get to restudy it and that’s really the process: learn something, relearn it, relearn it, relearn it, so they’ve had a chance to get a head start on it.”

I surely hope we are on our way. Devaney and Spags are cutting alot of the ties to the 'former regime' and that so needed to be done. I feel like the Rams have a plan and know what they are doing, which other than the few years Charlie Armey had authority, hasnt been the case for a long time.

Yes it does seem like they have a true plan and I hop that for their sake it begins to start taking some sort of shape to appease the angry crowds in St. Louis!

I wouldnt waste my time worrying about angry crowds if I were them. I feel St Louis fans need to grow up and have some patience - DeVaney and Spags didnt make this mess and the so called experts among the fans there need to give them time to fix it right. I think we are due for another long year, though improved from last year. More noticeable improvement in 2011, I think.