Four NFL teams' playoff dreams ended early this weekend. In the AFC, the Browns were surprisingly stomped by the Texans in Houston, while the Dolphins battled frigid conditions and a brutal run of injuries in a frustrating loss to the Chiefs. In the NFC, the Cowboys were embarrassed at home by a dominant performance by Jordan Love and the Packers, and Jared Goff gained a measure of revenge on his former team by knocking Matthew Stafford and the Rams out of the playoffs in Sunday's nightcap.
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For these four organizations, the offseason begins now. And while they'll probably look back and be pleased to have advanced to the postseason, the goal naturally will be to take a step forward and make it further in 2024. Let's look at the big question for each of the four teams coming out of their postseason loss and how they might rectify or solve that issue to be better next season. I'll go in chronological order, starting with Cleveland:
Jump to a team:
Browns | Cowboys
Dolphins | Rams
Cleveland Browns: Are they better without Deshaun Watson?
Wild-card weekend result: 45-14 loss to Houston
The Joe Flacco experience ended in tears for Browns fans on Saturday. Flacco was his usual self, combining inch-perfect passes with turnover-worthy decisions. The Texans took two Flacco picks to the house in a matter of minutes of real time. The Browns had been able to respond earlier in the season by forcing turnovers, but as I mentioned in my piece about potential flaws for postseason contenders, they matched up against a Texans team that protected the football at the league's best rate when C.J. Stroud was under center. With the defense struggling after Myles Garrett's shoulder injury and unable to force any takeaways, Houston lapped Cleveland in a 45-14 victory.
Now, after an impressive season and a Flacco fairy-tale, the Browns will need to get back to the drudging reality of their biggest problem. Watson hasn't played since midseason after surgery on his injured throwing shoulder. He didn't get to suit up against his former team during its two matchups with the Browns this season, and while Cleveland should undoubtedly regard the 2023 season as a success, there are even more big-picture questions about the most notable decision of Andrew Berry's tenure as general manager.
On one hand, Browns fans might feel like Watson wasn't a problem. The team went 5-1 with him as the starter and 6-5 with its four other quarterbacks. In his final start, he helped lead the Browns to a 33-31 comeback victory over the top-seeded Ravens, with the Browns scoring 16 unanswered points in the fourth quarter to take home the victory.
It's easy to poke holes in that record, though. Watson is given credit for a 39-38 win over the Colts in which he left the game in the first quarter after starting 1-for-5 with an interception. Three of the wins saw the defense allow a total of six points. The two games in which Watson posted a passer rating over 75.0 were victories over the Titans and Cardinals, who ranked 24th and 32nd, respectively, in QBR allowed.
The game against the Ravens was the one win in which Watson faced a tough defense and had his defense give up more than three points. In that game, he went 20-of-34 for 213 yards with a touchdown and an interception on a pick-six to Kyle Hamilton after 40 seconds. Watson was terrible in the first half before playing much better after halftime; there's no doubting the best two quarters of football he played were his final two of the season, when he went 14-of-14 for 134 yards and a touchdown while adding another first down on a scramble.
I've also seen Browns fans point to Watson's performance in the second half across all of his games as proof he was playing at a much higher level than expected. And certainly, by passer rating, it's again hard to argue: He posted a 116.8 passer rating in the second half of his games this season, which was the second-best mark for any quarterback who attempted at least 150 passes.
The problem -- to stick with passer rating for the purposes of this argument -- is Watson ranked 41st out of those 42 passers in passer rating during the first half of games, where his 63.9 mark was worse than anybody besides Daniel Jones of the Giants. Watson had a 6.6% drop rate in the first half of his games this season, which is among the highest in football, but that fell to 0.0% in the second half. Unless he was really good at giving halftime speeches in which he reminded his teammates to catch his passes, that's some bad luck in the first half and good luck in the second half.
For the second-half success to be something meaningful, we would need to see it as a trend throughout Watson's career as opposed to simply in 2023. In 2022, dropping the sample down to passers with 100 pass attempts to include him, he ranked 39th in passer rating in the first half and 35th in the second half. And during his time with the Texans, he was 10th in passer rating during the first half and fifth after the break. I could see a conclusion where he gets a little better late in games because pass rushes tire and his ability to extend reps on scramble drills plays up, but he's not going to morph into an MVP candidate after halftime in 2024.
The reason Watson had such a better record than his teammates is the Cleveland defense. Removing drives that resulted in kneel-downs, defensive touchdowns and the meaningless Week 18 game in which coach Kevin Stefanski sat his starters most of the way, the Browns averaged 1.9 points per drive in the games in which Watson started. (This includes the first quarter of the Colts game before Watson left injured.) They averaged 1.0 points per drive with Dorian Thompson-Robinson or PJ Walker on the field, but that figure rose by a full point to 2.0 points per drive with Flacco.
Flip that to the defense. Jim Schwartz's unit allowed just 1.0 points per drive during the stretches in which Watson was the team's quarterback. Without him, that figure rose to 1.7 points per drive. I would chalk that up to Garrett's shoulder injury and the subsequent struggles the defense had when they weren't forcing turnovers as opposed to something Watson was doing to make the defense better.
Flacco's offense was better than Watson's on a drive-by-drive basis, even as the Browns battled more injuries around the veteran quarterback. Both players were without right tackle Jack Conklin and running back Nick Chubb for most of the season, but Watson had left tackle Jedrick Wills Jr. for most of his time on the field. Flacco even lit up the Jets without receiver Amari Cooper, who didn't finish the regular season after his mammoth Week 16 game against the Texans and then didn't made an impact in the rematch Saturday.
One of the reasons Flacco was better? He fits what Stefanski does best on offense. Going back to his time in Minnesota, Stefanski has gotten the most out of quarterbacks when they've operated with heavy doses of play-action. Kirk Cousins and Baker Mayfield had their best seasons when Stefanski took over playcalling and upped their play-action rates. Both Stefanski and Houston offensive coordinator Bobby Slowik learned from different branches of the Gary Kubiak/Kyle Shanahan tree, and Saturday's game was almost funny to watch given that so many of its big plays came off the same play-action boot flood concept that has permeated that offensive tree for decades.
Watson has gotten a small boost from play-action, but the Browns don't use it with their franchise quarterback as often. His QBR this season jumped from 34.2 without play-action to 40.1 with a play fake attached, but Stefanski had play-action involved on only 23.4% of his pass attempts. That's just over the leaguewide rate, which is 23.3%.
With Flacco, that play-fake percentage jumped to 30.4%. And while Watson and Flacco were basically identical in terms of QBR without play-action, Flacco's QBR skyrocketed with a play fake. The Super Bowl XLVII MVP posted a 78.7 QBR with play-action and a 33.3 mark without it this season. He finished with a QBR five points ahead of Watson, entirely because of what he did on those play-action passes.
One of the related issues here is Watson doesn't prefer to operate from under center, which changes up the running game and forces a different sort of play-action. He took just over 16% of his dropbacks from under center this season and struggled mightily as a passer there, posting a 10.1 QBR. Flacco took more than 27% of his dropbacks under center and had a 64.9 QBR. In 2020, Mayfield's best season with Stefanski, he was under center on nearly 33% of his dropbacks. Cousins was under center more than 49% of the time in Stefanski's season as Vikings coordinator in 2019.
The league as a whole is more comfortable operating out of pistol and shotgun than ever before. Teams can certainly run a coherent play-action attack without being under center, but the impact is muted. Under center, the QBR with and without play-action nearly doubles; quarterbacks in 2023 posted a 33.3 QBR without a play fake and a 60.2 mark with one. In the pistol or shotgun, the effects are much less significant; quarterbacks posted a 55.1 QBR without play-action and a 63.9 mark with a play fake.
Coaches should mold their offenses to the players and not vice versa, so the Browns need to build and employ the best offense they can to play to Watson's strengths. I would argue that neither the 2022 nor 2023 situations have been ideal for him given that he was coming off a suspension last season and battling injuries and missing players this season. The Browns surely wouldn't have made the trade for him if they knew they were getting the quarterback who has struggled to both stay healthy and play effective football for an extended period of time since arriving in Cleveland.
The Browns can't undo the trade, but would Flacco's success lead them to give up on Watson? He is owed $138 million over the next three seasons, all of which is guaranteed, but the structure of his contract would make him movable. The Browns can't cut him, but if they found a trade partner, they would owe $62.9 million in dead money, which is essentially what they'll owe for him to be on the roster next season. Their cap would be clear of Watson in 2025, and while they would be down three first-round picks from a disastrous deal, they would be able to move forward without a player accused of more than two dozen cases of sexual misconduct on their roster.
While there's no way the Browns would be able to expect a significant return for Watson after two disappointing seasons, would they find another team willing to accept the responsibility of his deal for the cost of a conditional seventh-round pick? I would say no, but I've learned never to underestimate how desperate teams can talk themselves into quarterbacks. The Bears were willing to eat $22 million in guarantees to get Nick Foles on their roster when his contract was underwater with the Jaguars in 2020.
And for the Browns, if they don't get financial flexibility from moving on from Watson, they're about to be in a difficult bind. Cooper, Wills, cornerback Greg Newsome and linebacker Jeremiah Owusu-Koramoah are all free agents after next season. They are missing significant draft capital after the trade for Watson and will be missing multiple cost-controlled starters from their roster, meaning they'll have to go out and find those guys in free agency. They'll likely cut Conklin and ask Chubb to take a pay cut this offseason, but this might be the best version of the Browns we see for the next few years if they don't make any changes.
Stefanski already has come out and suggested Watson will be the starter heading into the offseason, which is no surprise. What happens next will be fascinating. The Browns should bring Flacco back based on his performance, but will a 38-year-old quarterback who has made more than $175 million in his career really want to come back to sit behind Watson? If he struggles again, would Stefanski bench him for Flacco? And if he doesn't, will the fans and the Browns' locker room be willing to accept an inferior quarterback, knowing they've had more success with the guy on the sideline? This has been a difficult season for the Browns, but what happens next might be hardest of all.
Miami Dolphins: Does their collapse mean they shouldn't pay Tua Tagovailoa?
Wild-card weekend result: 26-7 loss to Kansas City
Let's start with the positives. The big question heading into the season was whether Tagovailoa would stay healthy for an entire year. Thankfully, whether it was improved offensive line play, a better run game or his jujitsu training, we got to see a full season from him. He played a team-high 95.1% of the offensive snaps, completed more than 69% of his passes, averaged 8.3 yards per attempt and led the NFL with 4,624 passing yards. Any Dolphins fan would have signed up last summer for that sort of season.
In light of how the season ended, however, things don't feel quite as good. The offense scored 30 points against the Jets, and a late drive by Tagovailoa fueled a comeback win over the Cowboys, but the offense stalled from there. With an opportunity to claim the 1-seed in the AFC, the Dolphins were blown out 56-19 by the Ravens. The following week, they blew a halftime lead against the Bills with one of the worst second-half offensive performances of the season and lost out on the AFC East. Left to travel to Kansas City in frigid conditions Saturday, Tagovailoa and the Dolphins did little on offense besides one 53-yard touchdown pass to Tyreek Hill in a 26-7 defeat.
In three losses over a three-week span, the Dolphins erased so much of what they had accomplished over the prior four months. Win even one of those first two games and they get a home playoff game. (It was 70 degrees and rainy in Miami on Sunday afternoon, in case you were wondering.) Win the third and they've upset the defending champs. While facing a trio of good defenses, they scored a total of 40 points and generated minus-0.12 expected points added (EPA) per play on offense. That would have ranked 29th in the league over the full season and been in line with what the Giants produced.
Much of the criticism directed toward the Dolphins' collapse has surrounded the idea they can't beat good teams and/or that the offense beats up on bad defenses. The most straightforward evidence backs that up: They went 1-6 and averaged 15.1 points per game on offense against teams with a winning record. Against the rest of the league, they went 10-1 and more than doubled their scoring, generating 35.5 points per game. Every team gets better when it plays teams with losing records, but that's an extreme swing.
To steal a phrase from soccer coverage, are the Fins "flat-track bullies?" I'd argue that quoting the record against winning teams is too simplistic. The Dolphins beat the Cowboys the week before their losing streak, which should have counted as a meaningful win against one of the league's best teams. A year ago, with virtually the same core, Miami went a much more respectable 4-6 in those same games, beating the Bills, Lions, Ravens and Steelers. (Yes, that was the Ravens before the Lamar Jackson injury.) Its offense averaged 23.5 points per game against teams with winning records and 24.1 points per game against teams that were sub-.500.
Their famous 70-point game came against the Broncos, who finished 8-9. Would the Dolphins really be a better offense if the Broncos had, say, hit a 2-pointer to tie the game in Week 2 against the Commanders and won in overtime, pushing Denver to 9-8? Not really. And while the Jets didn't have a winning record, the Dolphins dropped 57 points on offense across two games against one of the NFL's best defenses.
And while the frigid conditions in Kansas City seemed like an easy excuse for Miami, I argued beforehand and still feel that injuries sank the Dolphins before they ever got on the field. Running back Raheem Mostert and wideout Jaylen Waddle played after missing the previous two games, but they were both likely less than 100%. On defense, Miami was down its top three edge rushers (Jaelan Phillips, Bradley Chubb and Andrew Van Ginkel) and two more key starting defenders (Jerome Baker and Xavien Howard).
Defensive coordinator Vic Fangio had to dramatically change his philosophy; facing a quarterback in Patrick Mahomes, who has historically torched blitzes, he upped his blitz rate from 20.7% during the regular season to 51.2% Saturday. It helped, as Mahomes' QBR dropped from 95.2 without the blitz to 76.2 with one, but the Chiefs had little trouble moving the ball in the big picture.
We can't say the same for the Dolphins' offense, which had a total of six first downs through the first three quarters. The vaunted duo of Mostert and De'Von Achane ran the ball 14 times for 42 yards. Hill had a 53-yard catch, but his seven other targets produced nine yards. Cornerback L'Jarius Sneed wasn't on Hill on that play, but he spent most of the game on the star wideout and was able to manhandle Hill at the line of scrimmage. Coach Mike McDaniel wasn't able to use his long list of motions and stacks to create the releases the Dolphins needed to get Hill open.
Tagovailoa simply wasn't good enough. Facing a stiff wind, he wasn't able to reliably complete passes he normally hits, either sailing throws incomplete or having them arrive late enough for the defense to break them up. He posted a minus-18.1% completion percentage over expectation (CPOE), his worst mark in a single game since a 2020 start against the Rams, when his leading wideouts were DeVante Parker and Preston Williams. Tagovailoa's minus-0.25 EPA per dropback was also his worst mark of the season; his second-worst performance, at minus-0.17 EPA per play, was against the Chiefs during the regular season.
It all culminated on the final meaningful drive of the season for the Dolphins' offense. Trailing by 19 points with 11 minutes to go, Miami needed to score to have any hope of launching a miraculous comeback. Needing to go fast, it burned nearly five minutes off the clock to advance 44 yards. Facing a fourth-and-16 to keep his season going, Tagovailoa took a three-step drop and, without pressure, threw an 8-yard slant to Cedrick Wilson. While it probably didn't matter in the big picture, it was an inexplicable decision to make with the season on the line.
All of that leads to another difficult decision. The Dolphins are $43 million over the projected cap for 2024. They can get down by restructuring contracts for Hill, cornerback Jalen Ramsey and left tackle Terron Armstead and releasing edge rusher Emmanuel Ogbah to save $13 million, but this isn't a team that has a ton of flexibility. By snap-weighted age, it is the league's eighth-oldest offense, the 10th-oldest defense and the fifth-oldest team overall. This is a team built to win now.
Can the Dolphins do that with Tagovailoa? And should they be confident enough about that belief to offer Tagovailoa a contract extension when that deal would likely cost nearly $60 million per season and more than $150 million in guaranteed money? By the numbers, he's a franchise quarterback. If you ascribe more of his success to Hill, Waddle and McDaniel, the last three weeks have given you more reasons to be skeptical.
There aren't many alternative options available to the Dolphins, who will pick in the bottom half of the first round in April's draft. Their backup is former Jets quarterback Mike White. The draft picks from the Trey Lance and Laremy Tunsil deals have been used elsewhere. This isn't an offseason with many significant options in free agency; the best-case scenario might be Kirk Cousins, who also appears to have a meaningful postseason ceiling and is coming off a torn Achilles. Trading for Justin Fields could work, but that move would only delay the decision about whether the Dolphins have a quarterback they can trust to win a Super Bowl.
Tagovailoa has a $23.2 million fully guaranteed fifth-year option for 2024, which the Dolphins can restructure to create cap space. Teams typically want to extend their quarterbacks before they enter the final seasons of their deals, but with Tagovailoa, this is a scenario that calls for playing out that option. Sometimes, in the case of Jameis Winston and Marcus Mariota, it leads to teams deciding that they're happier without their former top draft picks.
On the other hand, there's Joe Flacco, who had lost four straight times on the AFC side of the bracket during his first four seasons in the league. Entering his fifth season, the Ravens weren't able to come to terms on an extension with him before the 2012 season began. You know what happened next: Flacco went white-hot in the postseason, won a Super Bowl and ended up getting two massive contracts from Baltimore as a result. The Dolphins might also feel like they need to see it from Tagovailoa before committing a market-value contract. And he might have little choice but to bet on himself and hope that next season turns out to end much more comfortably than this one did.
Dallas Cowboys: Should this be the end of the Mike McCarthy era?
Wild-card weekend result: 48-32 loss to Green Bay
Well, I felt good about my playoff bracket after Saturday. After sticking with my preseason prediction and picking the Cowboys to advance to Super Bowl LVIII, I saw things fall apart very quickly for Dallas on Sunday afternoon. The Packers scored touchdowns on six of their first seven possessions, gashing a defense that had allowed just 15.9 points per game at home during the regular season. Dak Prescott threw one interception to set up a short field before a second produced a pick-six. The 48-32 final score flattered the Cowboys; they were simply embarrassed by a much better team.
After winning just one playoff game in four seasons and losing to a team that Tommy DeVito and the Giants beat last month, is that the final straw for McCarthy in Dallas? He has gone 12-5 in each of the past three seasons, and coaches with those sorts of records don't usually lose their jobs. To account for the 16-game era, the last time a coach won 10 games in a season and was fired after it was in 2014, when the Broncos "mutually parted ways" with John Fox. Two years earlier, the Bears fired Lovie Smith after a 10-6 campaign, albeit one without a playoff berth. The closest comp might be Marty Schottenheimer, another veteran offensive coach who was fired after a 14-2 season in 2006 and two postseason losses by the Chargers.
Overall this season, I felt like McCarthy had done a good job. The offseason comments about wanting to stop "lighting up the scoreboard" and committing to run the ball were concerning, but after a slow start, the Cowboys built their offense around an aggressive early-down passing offense and increased uses of motion. Their offense was modern enough to thrive, and even with a middling rushing attack, Prescott had his best season as a pro. In the big picture, that's an argument in McCarthy's favor.
On the macro level? It's tougher to make that case. The Cowboys looked to be badly outcoached Sunday. They weren't able to run the ball with what is supposed to be an excellent offensive line against a Packers front that hasn't been good. Facing a Green Bay defense that had been shredded by passes over the middle of the field, Dallas wasn't able to find reliable ways to get throws in that area until after halftime. Prescott was just 4-of-8 for 39 yards on throws to the middle of the field in the first half, including a pick-six to Darnell Savage.
The bigger problems Sunday were on the defensive side of the ball. The Packers averaged 0.39 expected points added per play (EPA/play), which was the sixth-best offensive performance of the season. If we take out the fourth quarter, when they mostly were sitting on the football, they generated 0.57 EPA per play, which was the best single offensive performance by any team all season, topping the Dolphins dropping 70 on the Broncos.
It's one thing to give up a ton of points, but the Cowboys did so in embarrassing fashion. Running back Aaron Jones picked them apart on the ground, racking up 118 yards and three touchdowns on 22 carries. Quarterback Jordan Love eliminated the pass rush with a series of spectacular off-platform throws. One of the league's fiercest pass rushes had zero sacks on 21 Love dropbacks, as Micah Parsons had a quiet game. Wideout Romeo Doubs had six catches for 151 yards and multiple runaway plays from defenders.
More than anything, the Cowboys looked undisciplined and sloppy. Jones ran through multiple tackles from linebacker Markquese Bell. Cornerback DaRon Bland played off coverage on a third-and-4 that produced a quizzically easy conversion for tight end Luke Musgrave. Corner Stephon Gilmore tried to peek into the backfield in zone coverage and slipped, allowing Doubs to be wide-open for a 46-yard completion on a play where only two receivers went out on routes. Bell and safety Donovan Wilson both chased Love on a boot play, leaving Musgrave open across the field on a classic leak concept for a 38-yard touchdown. With 17.2 yards of separation, Musgrave was more wide open than any other receiver has been on a pass all season, per NFL Next Gen Stats.
The problem is the defense is under Dan Quinn's purview. Under different circumstances, this would be the sort of performance that gets a defensive coordinator fired while the head coach remains, but Quinn hasn't been under the same level of scrutiny that McCarthy has endured. If anything, there was speculation the Cowboys might fire McCarthy and promote Quinn to ensure that the former Falcons coach sticks around to coach one of the league's best defenses for years to come.
Yes, McCarthy ultimately is the highest-ranked person who isn't a member of team owner Jerry Jones' family, and he's responsible for everything underneath him. But firing him for a terrible game from a defense that has been closely associated with Quinn when things have worked doesn't seem to make sense. Quinn was a hot head-coaching candidate elsewhere the past two offseasons; could the Cowboys really fire him as their coordinator after one bad game? In a normal universe, I would say probably not, but Jones said he was "floored" by how poorly Dallas played Sunday. He didn't sound like somebody who was ready to run it back in 2024.
None of these solutions is really satisfying. Firing McCarthy for a game that was more about the defense's problems seems like getting rid of the wrong guy. Letting go of Quinn after his defenses have generally been excellent for three seasons doesn't add up, especially given that those defenses have also typically played well in the postseason before this last game. Firing them both would be a dramatic move and would force the Cowboys to start over after winning 36 games over the past three years; Jones would have to truly believe there's something distinctly wrong with their ability to advance Dallas through the postseason.
In a normal year, maybe getting rid of those guys wouldn't make sense given their success in the past. Right now, with the talent available in the coaching market? The story's different. Bill Belichick is available. So is Mike Vrabel, who got the Titans to the AFC Championship Game a few years ago. Pete Carroll could presumably be extricated from his advisory role with the Seahawks. Michigan's Jim Harbaugh is going to take interviews with NFL teams after winning the national title. There are suddenly more Hall of Fame-caliber coaches on the market than the past decade combined.
If Jones wants to try to make significant changes to the roster over the next few years, the clearest path to doing so is going to be via the coaching staff. This is likely the best version of the Dallas roster we will see over the next three years. Parsons and wide receiver CeeDee Lamb are both now eligible for massive new contracts, and while Jones & Co. will undoubtedly keep them around and structure their deals in team-friendly ways, those two stars made about $4.7 million combined in 2023. They're going to be making about $60 million combined per year on their new deals, and that money has to come from other places on the roster.
The other contract hammer to drop is with Prescott, who is entering the final year of his deal in 2024. He's set to take home $34 million in cash, but with a cap hit of $59.4 million, the Cowboys would typically prefer to give him a new deal that lowers his cap hit. He famously insisted on a shorter contract during his last set of negotiations to get another crack at potential free agency in the prime of his career. He also has no-tag and no-trade clauses in his contract, meaning he could leave for nothing after the 2024 campaign.
Despite another frustrating playoff loss, Prescott holds the leverage here. Cowboys fans who are sick of disappointing Januarys might want to move on from Prescott and put their future in Trey Lance, who will also be a free agent after 2024, but Prescott propelled the team forward as it won a division title this season. If Dallas wants to make a major change this offseason, it'll come via the coaching staff, not the quarterback.
Los Angeles Rams: Where should they use their capital this offseason?
Wild-card weekend result: 24-23 loss to Detroit
There wasn't much separating the Rams and Lions in Detroit on Sunday night. The Lions had 23 first downs to the Rams' 22. Both teams went 3-for-9 on third down and converted their lone fourth-down attempt. Neither team turned the ball over. L.A. punted twice on seven meaningful possessions, while Detroit punted three times on eight drives.
The big difference was in the red zone. The Lions went 3-for-3, scoring on each of their first three drives to get an early lead they would never relinquish. Matthew Stafford hit wideouts Puka Nacua and Tutu Atwell for a pair of long touchdown passes, but the Rams went 0-for-3 in the red zone, with each of their three trips producing field goals. In the end, a holding penalty on right tackle Rob Havenstein knocked the Rams out of field goal range, and after a hold on Nacua at the top of his route went uncalled, they punted and won't see the ball again until September.
Even with the loss, this season has to be considered a success. Written off by many (but not all), a Rams team that finished 5-12 in 2022 improved by five games and jumped to 10-7. Moving on from several veterans and stocking up on middle-rounds picks, general manager Les Snead landed on a series of standouts in Nacua, guard Steve Avila, outside linebacker Byron Young and defensive lineman Kobie Turner. Running back Kyren Williams and linebacker Ernest Jones played at a Pro Bowl level. L.A. has a class of cost-controlled young talent to underpin its three veteran stars in Stafford, Cooper Kupp and Aaron Donald.
For the first time in several years, the Rams also have flexibility. They are missing their fourth-round pick but otherwise have a full complement of draft picks for the first time since 2015. (That pick was used to acquire guard Kevin Dotson, who has been a standout up front.) They also project to receive three Day 3 compensatory picks in April's draft. After last year's cutbacks, they now have $41 million in cap space, a figure that could grow with releases and restructures. They have never had much trouble attracting free agents under Sean McVay. Now they have the space to compete for top talent.
So, if we're putting together a shopping list for McVay and Snead, what should be on it?
Dotson. The Rams have never been conservative about letting free agents leave to amass compensatory picks -- and I'm not sure they see the interior of their offensive line as a place they want to spend significant money -- but a reunion with Dotson would make sense. After struggling to find his place in Pittsburgh, the 2020 fourth-round pick emerged as a force for the Rams in their new gap-heavy rushing attack and allowed pressures on just 6% of dropbacks, per NFL Next Gen Stats research.
Calculating the market for Dotson is tough given his relatively limited level of reps as an upper-echelon guard, but I would expect a fair deal for him to come in around three years and $27 million. L.A. can afford to pay that if it wants, but if it loses him, it will need to either draft a guard or sign a cheaper one in free agency.
An edge rusher. The Rams are in solid shape up front. Donald still is a Hall of Fame-caliber player. Turner looks like a very fun second player on the interior and was white-hot during the second half of the season on stunts and twists. Young wasn't always a consistent pass-rusher from week to week, but he finished with eight sacks and 19 knockdowns, which are extremely solid numbers for a rookie.
This team probably needs another difference-maker up front. Michael Hoecht has developed into a useful player over the past two seasons, but it's tough to ask a 300-pound lineman to do the things edge rushers do in most NFL defenses. The Lions were able to stretch Hoecht on Sunday; he ended up in coverage on Sam LaPorta out of a stack on Detroit's fourth-and-1 touchdown pass in the first half, then wasn't able to bring down David Montgomery on a pass to the flat with 3:24 to go on a play that ended up producing a first down. He had a couple of pressures and didn't play poorly, necessarily, but the Rams are asking him to do things he shouldn't be doing.
Moving Hoecht into a rotational role and bringing in a more explosive edge defender would be an upgrade. The one player who stands out in that discussion is Brian Burns. Snead reportedly offered two first-round picks and more to the Panthers to acquire Burns in October 2022, but Carolina declined. Now, Burns is a year-and-a-half older and likely about to be franchise-tagged, which both makes him less valuable to the Rams (he'll cost more) and leaves the Panthers with less leverage (he's closer to free agency). With the Panthers missing draft capital from the Bryce Young trade, would they take less to do a deal now?
There's also the potential for more pass-rushing options in this free agent class. The big name is Danielle Hunter, who is coming off a 16.5-sack, 23-tackles-for-loss season and has a no-tag clause for 2024. I'm not sure the Rams would make a huge financial investment in a player at that point of his career, although they signed left tackle Andrew Whitworth in his 30s and certainly don't regret that decision. (They were also in to retain Von Miller, who ended up joining the Bills in 2022.)
If the Rams want younger options, they'll have choices. Josh Allen probably will be franchised by the Jags, but Bryce Huff is 25 and coming off a 10-sack, 21-knockdown season with the Jets. Marcus Davenport endured a lost season with the Vikings, but he's a better run defender and is still only 27. Chase Young is 24 and has No. 2 pick upside, although he didn't post great numbers after joining the 49ers. Even Josh Uche, who had 11.5 sacks for the Patriots in 2022, could be a logical buy-low option for L.A. Whether it's one star or a couple of rotation contributors, adding players to the pass rush should be a high priority for this team.
At least one cornerback. The Rams got much better work than anyone would have expected from Ahkello Witherspoon, who was an above-average starter after bouncing around the league over the prior few seasons. He seems more like a player the Rams would let leave for a bigger deal elsewhere, although there's obviously a price tag where a reunion would make sense for both parties. The rest of the lineup in the secondary evolved as the season went along. Cobie Durant and Derion Kendrick both had stretches in and out of the starting lineup, while Russ Yeast eventually yielded his starting safety job to veteran John Johnson. Quentin Lake, who was out of the defense for most of the first half of the season, was the defender in coverage on Amon-Ra St. Brown on the first down that essentially ended Los Angeles' season Sunday.
This could be a place where the Rams go big. The Chiefs have been willing to let standout cornerbacks Marcus Peters and Charvarius Ward leave in seasons past, and the latest player off their assembly line is Pro Bowl snub L'Jarius Sneed, whom I had as a first-team All-Pro. It's unclear whether the Chiefs have any plans of using a franchise tag to try to keep Sneed, but with Chris Jones also a free agent, general manager Brett Veach will need to make some tough choices.
With his ability to cover in the slot and outside and his physicality around the line of scrimmage, Sneed might have the ability to play the "star" role in Raheem Morris' defense. And unlike their trades for Peters and Jalen Ramsey, the Rams wouldn't need to deal picks to acquire Sneed, 26, if he hits free agency. If not Sneed, the Rams could try to add more size in the vein of Witherspoon and replace him with Jeff Okudah, 24, who hasn't lived up to expectations after being the No. 3 pick in the 2020 draft but who might still turn out to be a starting-caliber cornerback if given the right opportunity. With corner as the first priority, L.A. could try to add multiple starters in the secondary this offseason.
A tight end. This wasn't really on the list until last night, when Tyler Higbee suffered a knee injury after a hit by Kerby Joseph. Reports after the game suggested he tore his ACL, an injury that is almost always confirmed by an MRI the next day. Given the timing of the injury, the ACL tear could jeopardize his availability for the start of the 2024 season.
The Rams just signed Higbee to a two-year, $17 million extension in September, so he'll be on the roster next season. The No. 2 tight end on the roster is rookie fifth-rounder Davis Allen, who had four catches for 50 yards and a touchdown when Higbee was sidelined for the overtime loss to the Ravens in December. No. 3 tight end Brycen Hopkins is a free agent after the season.
Allen should get more opportunities next fall, but I'd like to see the team bring in a second tight end, both to eventually replace Higbee and to open up more 12 personnel opportunities in 2024. The Rams were back in 11 personnel nearly 95% of the time on offense this season, and while that's perfectly defensible when it works, McVay has traditionally used two-TE sets far more often than he did this season. This seems like a position that would be more likely filled in the draft than via free agency.
An offensive tackle. After Whitworth's retirement in March 2022, the Rams re-signed swing tackle Joe Noteboom with the idea he'd take over as the starting left tackle. That didn't last long. Noteboom tore his Achilles that October, missed the remainder of the season and wasn't a full-time starter this season. He started the season at right guard, but after Dotson emerged, the Rams moved Noteboom back into his swing role as a reserve lineman, with Alaric Jackson, who was signed as an undrafted free agent in 2021, holding on to the job protecting Stafford's blindside. Noteboom didn't play a single offensive snap in the loss to the Lions.
With $10 million of Noteboom's $15 million in 2024 compensation unguaranteed, the Rams could cut him this offseason. They also could start preparing for a future without right tackle Havenstein, who is 31 and owed $11.5 million in each of the next two seasons. Havenstein had a dismal 2022 before improving this season, but both he and Jackson allowed quarterback pressures north of 11% of the time, per NFL Next Gen Stats data, which were below-average figures. Both also posted below-average marks by ESPN's pass block win rate measure, with Havenstein ranking 40th and Jackson 58th among 69 tackles.
There's not really a player for the Rams to hit with a significant investment in free agency here. They once made a move for a veteran who was on the tail end of his career in Whitworth and got five years of generally excellent play. Would they make that sort of offer for Tyron Smith, who will hit free agency after 13 seasons with the Cowboys? Would they offer the Chargers two first-round picks for Rashawn Slater? More realistically, this seems like a position the Rams could target in the draft.