Rams GM Les Snead Gives Puka Nakua Intriguing NFL Draft Comparison
Through three games, Los Angeles Rams rookie receiver Puka Nacua looks to be one of the biggest steals in the draft.
The fifth-round pick out of BYU hasn't just been one of the best rookies in the league, but one of the best receivers as well. In three weeks, Nacua has the most targets in the league with 39, the second-most receptions with 30 and the fourth-most yards with 338. He's also had one of the best starts to his career of any receiver, with his 25 catches through two games and 15 receptions in a single game both being rookie records.
With Nacua's hot start, many are wondering how he even fell to the fifth round in the first place. The answer to that question lies largely in injuries, as he only played nine games in 2022, and a relatively subpar showing at the Combine when he ran a 4.57-second 40-yard dash.
That turned out to be the Rams' gain, though, as they were always high on him. During a recent interview, Rams general manager Les Snead even shared an interesting comparison the team's draft room had for Nacua.
“It’s interesting, what we’ve seen come to fruition, and I think one of our scouts termed him – his nickname a little bit from our draft room was, hey, ‘the Deebo Samuel of the Mountain West’ in that, at BYU, what they did do was throw a lot of bubble routes to Puka and just let him become Larry Csonka after that,” Snead said on The Coach McVay Show.
Los Angeles Rams receiver Puka Nacua celebrates a touchdown during his college days at BYU.
Aside from the fact that BYU hasn't played in the Mountain West since 2010 (being an independent until this year when the school joined the Big 12), the Nacua-Samuel comparison does make sense.
“We’ve seen how he’s tough to bring down, how he’s always falling forward in the NFL," Snead said. "You can imagine what he might do in the Mountain West so that was kind of his nickname. You see some of those skills in the run after catch, toughness.”
During his time with the Cougars, Nacua was sort of a receiver/running back hybrid like Samuel is for the San Francisco 49ers. In 2022, he had 48 receptions for 625 yards and five touchdowns through the air, as well as 25 carries for 209 yards and five touchdowns on the ground. Those numbers aren't too far off from what Samuel has done in San Francisco recently, and he's a key piece to their offensive success.
The Rams haven't been quite as creative with Nacua so far, as he has just two carries for four yards, but his early performance has been essentially everything they could ask for.
“You could be as conscientious as you want to be, but you might not have had enough experience to get to their level of physics," Snead said. "That just takes time. For him to come in and do that from OTAs to now is pretty special.”
