Kaye Cowher loses battle with cancer

I have long admired Coach Cowher for so many various reasons, but top among them is his strength of character. He's a great guy that personifies what is good about football.  As such, it breaks my heart to read this story.  His wife was only 54 when she died.  54?!  That is far, far too young.   I think it would be safe to say that everybody here has lost somebody to cancer.  If you haven't, then you are lucky.   Hell I'm only 31 but I've lost 6 close relatives to cancer.   I watched my grandpa go from being able to bend a railroad tie with his hands, to becoming a living skeleton.

My heart and prayers go out to Coach & his girls, they lost their mom way too soon.  Everybody take a second to fire off a quick prayer to help them through their time of mourning.   It'll be tough... I know.

via www.esquire.com

Let me start by saying that I am in no way advocating the Rams getting Vick! I think it would border on ruining the franchise.

My point in writing this post is to compare Michael Vick to another mobile QB, Tim Tebow.  I would actually like to see Tebow in the Blue & Gold.  I'm not sure on his future in the league as a QB, but if we spent a 4th or 5th rounder on him I wouldn't mind. 

Now for the stats:

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http://www.stlouisrams.com/article/75819/

I just read this article on the Rams website, and I gotta say, on first impression it has me rethinking our draft/FA needs. 

I'll be honest, I have totally overlooked Clifton Ryan and his play.  I guess the article is right about DT being an oft overlooked position. 

So, if the article carries some water and Ryan is what we're looking for on DT, I'm still expecting Chris Long to do great things, and we have Leonidas, so should we shift our draft crosshairs elsewhere?  Before reading this article I had decided that QB or DT would need to be taken 1st, now I'm not so sure. 

Your thoughts?  Is Ryan the DT we've been looking for and just not realized that we already have him?

I've been so focused on the draft of '10 that I haven't really scoured the web to see who will potentially be available next year.  There are some quality guys out there that I think would make a nice fit on our team, or are at least interesting.

Here's a breakdown:

Lee Evans WR - UFA (Unrestricted)

Tank Johnson DL - UFA

DeMarcus Ware DL - UFA

Terence Newman CB - UFA

Aaron Kampman LB - UFA

Will Allen CB Dolphins - UFA

Logan Mankins OL - UFA

Vince Wilfork DL - UFA

Pierre Thomas RB - RFA

Eli Manning  QB - UFA

Chris Snee OL - UFA

Corey Webster CB - UFA

Richard Seymour DL - UFA (Leonard Little is a free agent in '10)

Ellis Hobbs CB - UFA

Lofa Tatupu LB - UFA

Rob Sims OL - UFA

Kyle Vanden Bosch DL - UFA

With Incognito, Barron, and Little all going unrestricted in '10 we have some opportunities to make some serious moves in free agency.  Of course there are players on this list that we have slim to no chance of getting, i.e- Eli Manning, but there are some players that I would absolutely love to see in our jersey.  Snee, Ware, Newman, Kampman, Allen, Mankins, Wilfork, Seymour, Lofa, or Sims would have and immediate and, I think, profound impact on this team. 

Not that this will probably happen, but could you imagine if we paired Lofa with Leonidas as LB's with freakin' Wilfork up front!!  (By the by, I am no longer calling Laurinaitis by his name but by the name of the great King Leonidas.  In case you didn't know, he's kind of a big deal)

I watch teams time and again throw a large percentage of their salary space into the salary of their 1st round pick.  Of course we can all find players that deserve every penny that they receive, but then we can also find more players of the other type. 

Usually I am an ardent supporter of letting the market take care of itself, i.e- supply & demand, but on the matter of rookie salary caps I have, until now, been opposed to them.  When I look at rookie WR's getting Larry Fitz or Moss-type coin, I have some serious issues with that.  I know that the team exec's agree to the contracts, but they are also somewhat forced to pay according to previous contracts.  What sense does it make, however, to pay an unproven commodity according to what the highest paid active player is receiving?? 

I don't think any one component can be blamed for the current situation.  Agents are doing their job by trying to milk the team for as much as they can and team exec's are making sure to sign their pick or lose him.

Your thoughts?

I had an interesting thought concerning Tim Tebow.  What if we draft Tebow to actually use him as a QB?  Wait, wait, before you start throwing your mouse at me just chew on this idea.  Tebow, I would think, is not another Brees or Manning.  What if, however, Spags changed the way the Rams play offense from what we've been known for, throw down the field and pass like mad, to more of a power offense?  It's not like we can get any worse!

Even in my own mind this is somewhat far-fetched, but look at it like this.  Tebow can throw the ball.  He has a good completion %, very nice YPA, and of course he can run very effectively.  He has some good size on his frame (6' 3" 245 lbs), a very sharp head on his shoulders (Academic All-American), and he has that moxie that Cowherd always loves.  I would think that he might bring that spark back to the team that we've been missing for quite some time.  He would allow us to open up the playbook a bit, and I think he would enter the league humble, but with a BIG chip on his shoulder.  He'll be out to prove that he can play QB in the bigs.

I'm still hoping we get Bradford, but I just thought I'd throw this out for debate.

Your thoughts?

Alright we officially suck!!  Looking forward, though, I see some glimmers of hope.  We have a 1st round tackle, Smith, 1st round DE Chris Long, and a 2nd round LB in James Laurinaitis, Adam Carriker, Leonard Little, and James Butler.  Combine all those guys with Coach Spags, and I can see our D really coming around.  It's not going to happen this year, but maybe next.

The offense, however, is flat out atrocious!!  Granted we drafted Smith in the first, which should help, but other than Jackson what else do we have.  I'm not sold on any of our WR's yet.  Bulger is not the answer.  He isn't and I don't care what "improvement" he's made.

So, I'm trying to decide what we need to do in 2010.  Obviously we're going to be picking in the top 5, maybe top 3.  What I'm trying to decide is whether we should pick a QB in the 1st round, a WR, or maybe some more O-Line help.  If we go QB I would like to think we could get our hands on Sam Bradford.  I'm skiddish about picking WR's in the first due to their high bust factor.  If we go O-Line, there should be a quality QB available in later rounds.  I'm leaning towards QB simply because I look at guys like Ryan, Sanchez, Flaco, etc that do well in their first years.  Obviously they went into situations that would allow them to succeed, i.e- good ground game and good defense.  If our D steps up, and S-Jax stays healthy, then a QB would be the right choice.

What do ya'll think?