The Athletic

Let’s just pretend for the sake of this exercise that the Los Angeles Rams’ biggest offseason question has been resolved, shall we? It’s mock draft time, and frankly, I don’t want to feed the “will Matthew Stafford stay or go?” machine any further than the reporting I’ve done to this point until something changes about his situation. Obviously, his status and the outcome of his most recent contract dispute with the team could affect what the Rams do in the draft, for any number of reasons. So we’re going to do what NFL people do best when faced with a potentially complex matter: Pretend like nothing is wrong and churn into the draft cycle portion of the calendar! Here’s my first mock draft of the year including some insight from our analyst Dane Brugler and others, keeping the Rams’ picks intact (they almost certainly won’t be) and some of their needs front of mind in a scenario where Stafford is the quarterback in 2025.