Early-season scouting visit could tip the Los Angeles Rams’ hand for their plans in the upcoming 2026 NFL Draft
The Los Angeles Rams could have fired off a signal regarding their plans for the 2026 NFL Draft
As the Los Angeles Rams gear up for the 2025 NFL season to kick off, they are already looking ahead to the future. More specifically, they are already doing their due diligence on finding their future under center at quarterback once Matthew Stafford officially decides to hang it up.
General manager Les Snead has already traveled around to see the country’s best upcoming prospects over the summer. However, a recent visit could have slightly spoiled the team’s draft plans for the upcoming 2026 NFL Draft.
Les Snead Visits Talented Dual-Threat Quarterback Prospect
As the college football season kicked off, there were some tremendous games for the upcoming 2026 quarterback prospects. Arch Manning took on Ohio State, Garrett Nussmeier squared off against Cade Klubnik, and Carson Beck went head-on against Notre Dame’s talented defense.
However, none of those games got a visit from the Rams general manager, Les Snead. That personal visit went to Virginia Tech-South Carolina, where South Carolina’s dual-threat playmaker LaNorris Sellers went to work on the Hokies’ hapless defense.
If you’ve followed or covered the Rams for long, you know that this is an aberration for Snead. The Rams, and conversely Snead, rarely make in-person visits to prospects. I think I can count on one hand the number of times I remember Snead scouting a prospect in person and still have fingers left over.
Sellers is the right kind of quarterback the Rams should be targeting as well. McVay has wanted a dual-threat quarterback ever since he coached Robert Griffin III back in Washington. It’s an element of his offense he’s never been able to explore with Jared Goff and Matthew Stafford.
Sellers’ timeline matches up perfectly with the Rams as well. While talented, Sellers still has some areas of refinement he needs to continue working on with his accuracy, and ideally would take a year of refinement to reach his ceiling.
Fortunately, that’s the exact time the Rams will need to find their quarterback of the future. Simply put, the Rams can’t do anything with Matthew Stafford’s contract until after 2026. If he decides to retire at the end of the season, the Rams will be faced with a $47.46M dead cap hit, a monumental hit.
That dead cap hit drops over $20M following the 2026 season, opening up $20.8M in cap savings. While it’s still a major hit, it’s much more affordable than the aforementioned one.
If the Rams draft Sellers, they have the chance to sit him behind Stafford for a season while McVay works his magic as one of the best quarterback developers in the NFL.
Armed with a rookie contract, the Rams’ cap space opens up significantly in that scenario, prompting another potential reload of the team as they look to maintain their standing as one of the best teams in the league. Thanks to the Atlanta Falcons, the Rams are armed with two first-round picks in the upcoming draft to make this possibility a reality.
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