The Los Angeles Rams enter an important offseason in which all the chips will be in the middle of the table as they push for another Super Bowl. That\u2019s partially what makes the situations with their own free agents that much more complicated. How much do they prioritize running it back with a group that made the NFC Championship versus upgrading certain positions? Here is what the Rams should do with their unrestricted free agents.<\/p>\n
The Rams did well to take care of free agents set to become available this offseason during the year. They re-signed Quentin Lake and Nate Landman, who played big roles on the defense last year. Those were two players that the Rams would have pushed hard to keep before free agency anyway. However, the job is not finished. The Rams will still need to make room for two more players that should be brought back.<\/p>\n
Curl didn\u2019t have a strong first year with the Rams, but he became one of the most important players in the secondary in 2025. While the Rams had weaknesses at cornerback, safety was one of their strongest position groups and Curl was a big part of that. Curl switched between free safety and playing down in the box where he became one of the best tackling safeties in the NFL. He was second among safeties with 122 total tackles and his 8.3 percent missed tackle rate was just outside the top-10. Curl had three interceptions and the game-changing interception in the playoffs against the Chicago Bears. The Rams would be smart to sign Curl to another two-year deal.<\/p>\n
What the Rams do with Garoppolo depends on how they view the quarterback position. Do the Rams trust Stetson Bennett to take over the mantle as the experienced backup in the system and then draft someone in the middle rounds? Still, it might make sense to cut ties with Bennett, draft a quarterback, and roll with Garoppolo. Matthew Stafford has remained healthy over the last two years. At the same time, if something were to happen, Garoppolo can still be trusted if Stafford were to miss a game. Hopefully it doesn\u2019t come to that, but Garoppolo remains a good backup option at 34 years of age.<\/p>\n
Rams Have Tough Decisions<\/p>\n
The Rams will have decisions to make at cornerback, specifically when it comes to Roger McCreary and Cobie Durant. McCreary and Durant are similar in the sense that they are inside-outside versatile. When he played on the outside, Durant was arguably the Rams\u2019 best cornerback. McCreary got a run on the outside in the playoffs and performed admirably. This is going to be an either-or situation and it wouldn\u2019t be surprising to see the Rams move on from both. Still, even needing to rebuild the cornerback room, keeping some familiarity makes sense. Durant is much better as a third or fourth cornerback on the depth chart while McCreary can also be used in a specific role. Depending on the price, the Rams may look to keep Durant on a one-year deal.<\/p>\n
Witherspoon spent most of last season injured, but it may be time to move on. He\u2019s a product of the situation in that he\u2019s seen as much better than he is because the players around him simply aren\u2019t up to par. Witherspoon was fine for what the Rams needed at the time, but they are in a place now where they need to upgrade. Depending on how free agency goes, the Rams may opt to bring back Witherspoon, but moving on would be the best path forward.<\/p>\n
The big one on this list is Tutu Atwell. At the end of the day, this is a partnership that simply hasn\u2019t worked out. The Rams didn\u2019t utilize Atwell as often as they should have and at the same time, for whatever reason, Atwell was phased out of the Rams offense. The blame doesn\u2019t fall on either side as both are to blame. It is simply a pairing that didn\u2019t work. Moving on will be the best thing for both parties.<\/p>\n
As far as the rest of this list goes, there shouldn\u2019t be too many surprises. The Rams could bring back Ronnie Rivers, Jake McQuaide, and Troy Reeder for special teams purposes. Still, with a new special teams coach, the Rams may look to go in another direction. While a backup tackle is needed, Humphries wasn\u2019t good in his lone appearance last year.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Los Angeles Rams enter an important offseason in which all the chips will be in the middle…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":748687,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2079],"tags":[7,1014,58,84504,2444,2611,6,424],"class_list":{"0":"post-748686","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-los-angeles-rams","8":"tag-football","9":"tag-los-angeles","10":"tag-los-angeles-rams","11":"tag-los-angeles-rams-analysis","12":"tag-losangeles","13":"tag-losangelesrams","14":"tag-nfl","15":"tag-rams"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/116062043870857989","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/748686","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=748686"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/748686\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/748687"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=748686"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=748686"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=748686"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}