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It would be a waste for the Rams to draft a receiver on day one
The
Los Angeles Rams should not draft a wide receiver with their first round pick, a position of decreasing value, increasing abundance, and little need of Sean McVay in 2025. Of all the positions that are
frequently mocked to the Rams in round one, receiver makes the least sense.
Chad Reuter of
NFL.com, a draft analyst who often has the most confounding draft predictions,
has the Rams selecting Isaiah Bond with the 32nd pick after trading down with the Eagles. It’s as if Reuter always draws the short straw at
NFL.com and is told, “Okay, you do the weird things to stand out.”
Bond totaled 1,200 receiving yards over the past two seasons
combined, but my opinion that the Rams would waste their first round pick on a receiver — or more accurately, that I think L.A. has a 0% chance of drafting a receiver on day one — has nothing to do with the players who are mocked to them.
Absent the presence of a Justin Jefferson falling out of the top-20 picks this year, of which
there are zero comparable prospects in 2025, no wide receiver makes sense in the first round.
The position is overrated.
The position is overpaid.
The position is overdrafted.
The position is not a need for the Rams.
The position would be better filled on day two.
Wide receiver is the most overrated, overpaid, and overdrafted position in the NFL as of 2025. While analytics continues to repeat the same damn phrases about running backs year after year for a decade,
it is actually wide receivers who “don’t matter”.
Well, sure that’s not true of wide receivers. They matter. As running backs also matter. But the wide receiver position carries roughly just as many of the same cost benefits and risk/reward properties as running backs do:
- Many of the NFL’s best receivers were not first round picks
- Most of the NFL’s most valuable (aka best bargain) wide receivers are on rookie contracts or low-sneaky smart bargain veteran deals
- They get injured way more often than we admit
- Good veteran receivers have WAY more availability than good tackles, quarterbacks, edge rushers, and other positions of great value
- Many of the best teams survive with a “receiver-by-committee” type of approach
- There are tons of examples of bad/injured receivers with bloated contracts sucking the life out of a team’s salary cap
- If you’re a receiver over 28, you’re probably out of the league or have one foot out
If the first round is not a place for running backs, then there is mounting evidence that it is not a place for most receivers either.
Yes, just as there are exceptions at running back like Ashton Jeanty, Saquon Barkley, and Jahmyr Gibbs, so too will there be exceptions at wide receiver. Though he gets forgotten as a receiver because we don’t know what position he will play in the NFL yet, Colorado’s Travis Hunter is one such exception. The
Browns might draft Hunter with the second overall pick and play him at receiver, which would also make Hunter an extremely rare selection:
Top-2 picks at receiver happen less often than top-2 picks at running back.
But for the most part, this is the age of letting wide receivers fall to day two, trading them when they get too expensive/over-26, and signing Davante Adams because you cut Cooper Kupp and both still think they have juice in the tank.
The Los Angeles Rams absolutely should not and almost certainly will not draft a first round wide receiver.
Not Bond.
Not his Texas teammate Matthew Golden, who many
including CBS’s Pete Prisco have mocked to L.A.. Not Arizona’s Tetairoa McMillan, although his availability at 26 has been called unlikely anyway. Although his stock has been “falling” in the media anyway, as will be a more common occurrence for receivers as time goes on.
There are very few transcendent, game-changing, elite receivers, but the Rams also have one of those already.
And Puka Nacua was a fifth round pick. Who costs the team almost nothing. And he was
immediately valuable. Despite his own concerns with injuries —as is the case for many receivers — he will also be L.A.’s number one target for at least five or six more years if all goes to plan.
If it doesn’t and something unfortunate happens in the next couple of years, you know what the Rams will do?
They’ll just got out and get another one. Because receivers, unlike quarterbacks, tackles, and edge rushers, are relatively easy to find.
Heard of Davante Adams?
Reasons the Rams won’t draft a first round receiver
The Rams don’t need a receiver
If you’ve been watching the NFL for the last 10 years, then you know that for the most part wide receivers need less ramping up time as they transition from college to the pros than other positions. In fact, it is a waste of money to use a first round pick on a wide receiver who the team
does not plan to start.
And the Rams can’t possibly draft a wide receiver in 2025 with a plan for him to start.
Sean McVay on Tuesday at the NFL Annual Meeting said "I haven't done a good enough job of utilizing" WR Tutu Atwell and that Atwell "will be on the field a lot more" in 2025:
https://t.co/yXNuexubl0
— Stu Jackson (@StuJRams)
April 2, 2025
In addition to having Nacua and Adams, McVay has insisted that the team plans to give Tutu Atwell more run than ever before in his career next season, Which sure would be a good idea
since they gave him $10 million for it.
L.A. also has Jordan Whittington and
while a sixth round pick is not a major investment, Whittington has shown enough for the plan to look pretty stupid if the Rams immediately turned around and made him WR5 by drafting a first round receiver.
That would essentially be killing Whittington’s career, at least in L.A.. A guy going into his second season should not feel good about it if the team is guaranteeing that when all are healthy, he’s NEVER going to see the field.
The Rams can get a receiver next year
If there’s any concern about Adams’ age or Puka’s health or Atwell and Whittington’s futures, don’t fret. There’s ALWAYS NEXT YEAR when it comes to the wide receiver position.
Several of last season’s most productive receivers were veterans who changed teams:
- Jerry Jeudy, Browns
- Davante Adams, Jets
- Calvin Ridley, Titans
- Darnell Mooney, Falcons
- Keenan Allen, Bears
Plus, Jahan Dotson, a recent first round pick by Washington, caught a touchdown in the
Super Bowl for the Eagles. And already this offseason, the following vets have changed teams:
- Davante Adams, Rams
- Cooper Kupp, Seahawks
- DK Metcalf, Steelers
- Deebo Samuel, Commanders
- DeAndre Hopkins, Ravens
- Stefon Diggs, Patriots
- Christian Kirk, Texans
- Dyami Brown, Jaguars
- Mike Williams, Chargers
- Brandin Cooks, Saints
We can’t guarantee that big names at QB and OT will change teams next year, We can guarantee that plenty of wide receivers will though, with some notables to watch in 2026 being Tyreek Hill, Michael Pittman, DJ Moore, Brandon Aiyuk, Mike Evans, Jaylen Waddle, A.J. Brown, DeVonta Smith, and who knows who else.
It would be much harder for the Rams to go out and find a right tackle next year than it would be a wide receiver, so if they like any tackle in the first round in 2025...they oughta draft him. At least,
draft him over a wide receiver if there are no other prospects you love.
But don’t draft a wide receiver.
Day 2 and Day 3 finds outweigh first round prices
You could be screaming at your TV set that many of 2024’s best rookies were first round receivers such as Malik Nabers, Brian Thomas, Marvin Harrison, and Rome Odunze, with Ladd McConkey barely missing the cut as the 34th overall pick.
Yes, those are good receivers. They were also on terrible teams and were fed the ball at ridiculously high levels. That’s not going to happen to the Rams. A rookie receiver will not get many reps if all goes to plan, and it just doesn’t make sense to make him wait.
If there’s any inclination to get a receiver in this draft, make it day two. Or day three, which is of course where the Rams got their best receiver (Nacua) and he’s replacing a former third round pick (Kupp) as the team’s next era of catching the football.
Notable not first round picks recently:
- Amon-Ra St. Brown, 4th round
- Terry McLaurin, 3rd round
- DK Metcalf, last pick of 2nd round
- A.J. Brown, 2nd round
- Courtland Sutton, 2nd round
- Davante Adams, 2nd round
- Nico Collins, 3rd round
- Tyreek Hill, 5th round
- Alec Pierce, 2nd round
Whittington and Atwell are perfect examples of taking your shots on players after the first round because maybe they work, maybe they don’t, but they didn’t cost a lot and they’re not worthless. They are also...
still on the Rams!
It’s too soon to push them out with yet another receiver in the draft who the team has to give the ball to.
Mock drafts pointing in the direction of a wide receiver in the first round,
like The Athletic’s Jourdan Rodrigue connecting the Rams to Golden last week, are beyond rational comprehension.
I mean, come on. Snead loves the players coming out of Steve Sarkisian’s program these days and Golden is an every-route, every-alignment talent. Golden wins at the catch point and can be a chess piece for McVay alongside Nacua, who can also line up anywhere.
It’s hard to “line up anywhere”...when you can’t get on the field.
In the modern era of NFL roster building, a first round receiver is also just an incredible waste of resources. It makes little sense in general,
but no sense on the Rams.
