Ram Digest

'Trade Aaron Donald, Tank, Draft Caleb Williams!' Rams 'Masterplan' Proposed

Tank for Caleb Williams in the draft ... and trade Aaron Donald to a playoff team? Isn't it a bit early for the Rams to be thinking this way?

Mike Fisher

In this story:

How to rebuild the Los Angeles Rams in three simple steps? NFL minds - including one former team GM - are offering a vision that starts with the trading of All-Pro defensive tackle Aaron Donald and culminates with the drafting of USC quarterback Caleb Williams.

And in between, of course, as suggested on the Pat McAfee Show today by former NFL executive Michael Lombardi ... the Rams would be in the business of losing on purpose over the course of the 2023 season.

"My question is if the Rams start off slow and they're headed for Caleb Williams in the draft ... Do they try and move Aaron Donald to a playoff team at the deadline?" Lombardi said.

Stated in that particular way, the three-step program seems a less incendiary idea. That particular scenario - Los Angeles starts the season o-fer, and as things progress beyond September it becomes crystal clear that coach Sean McVay's team is a zero-chance non-contender? Heck, it is quite possible that Donald might welcome an exit to a playoff team.

This idea is far less ridiculous than the one that ProFootballTalk.com is insisting is in play, which would have the Rams in the future move away from QB Matthew Stafford in favor of winning a bidding war with the Niners for the services of Kirk Cousins. After all, would a bad 2023 Rams team rather move forward - should Stafford somehow not be around - with Cousins or with Williams, the Trojans star who might be the prize of the 2024 NFL Draft?

Know this, though, for now: No team - not the Rams, not anybody - is "planning'' on being bad in 2023. So let's be careful to separate "smart analysis'' from the "filling TV segments until camp gets here,'' shall we?

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Mike Fisher
MIKE FISHER

Mike Fisher - as a newspaper beat writer and columnist and on radio and TV, where he is an Emmy winner - has covered the NFL since 1983. He is the author of two best-selling books on the NFL.

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