We’ve got a pair of power rankings today that just re-affirms how highly the Los Angeles Rams are being thought of right now and how the expectations are for what’s being billed as a Super Bowl or bust season.
Over at CBS Sports, Pete Prisco puts the Rams in eighth place which probably feels really weird for Rams fans as they’ve typically come in the top five of these lists recently:
They are all-in on this season with the moves they made this spring. I think a big issue remains: Can they rush from the edge?
I think that’s a fair assessment of the team. For a team that’s all-in with aspirations for Super Bowl LIII, the edge rusher position is unusually weak. They’ll be relying on very young players in Samson Ebukama and Ogbonnia Okoronkwo and a guy who has been a reserve rusher who happens to be coming of off back surgery in Matt Longacre.
As for the rest of the NFC? Prisco has the Eagles at one, Vikings at four, Saints at five, and the Packers at seven.
Meanwhile at ESPN, they’ve updated their rankings following the 2018 NFL Draft and have the Rams slightly higher:
6. Los Angeles Rams
2017 record: 11-5
Post-free-agency ranking: 6The Rams didn’t make a pick until the third round, but they still walked away with 11 selections and a clear strategy. After bolstering the secondary with trades, they used seven of their picks on offensive and defensive linemen. They hadn’t selected seven linemen in a single draft since the 1970s.
We probably won’t see any new power rankings until we get to training camp and get the preseason going, but it’s obvious that the Rams are being considered one of the best teams in the NFL this year in what’s shaping up to be a stacked NFC.