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Rams executive Kevin Demoff: 'This is not a rebuild'By Alden Gonzalez
LOS ANGELES -- The Los Angeles Rams' first year back in Southern California finished with a 4-12 record and went down as the franchise's 10th consecutive losing season. They lost their last seven games, two of them on late meltdowns and five of them by lopsided scores. And all throughout, their offense was statistically the NFL's worst by a wide margin. Now the search is underway for a new head coach and a new direction.
The man leading that search, chief operating officer Kevin Demoff, insists that the Rams are not in a rebuilding phase.
The Rams are looking to recent examples where young quarterbacks made huge improvements in Year 2. Gary A. Vasquez/USA TODAY Sports
"I think this team has talent, still has a very young core at its heart, and we need to find our way," Demoff said in a recent phone conversation. "But this is not a rebuild to me whatsoever. This is maximizing the talent we have. And we do have to go into the offseason and improve our personnel across the board. It’s what we said when we made the coaching change. It’s not just a coaching issue. We need to get better on the personnel side."
In search of hope, Demoff looks at close, down-to-the-wire losses to three playoff teams -- the Detroit Lions, New York Giants and Miami Dolphins -- as an indication that the Rams may not be far from contention. And he points out the fact that the Rams were 6-2 in an eight-game stretch that included the last quarter of 2015 and the first quarter of 2016, a record matched by only seven other teams.
"Every year in the NFL you should be able to compete," Demoff said. "And I think the hard part about the NFL is looking at teams who go from worst to first, how competitive they get quickly, and making that push."
The Rams, who will spend the week interviewing coaches for teams who are either out of the playoffs or on a first-round bye, remain open-minded in their search. They are not yet ready to commit to someone who is either offensive- or defensive-minded. One way or the other, though, they must completely reconfigure the offensive staff and somehow improve a unit that has gained the NFL's fewest yards each of the last two years.
So much of that will hinge on their quarterback, Jared Goff, who was drafted first overall in 2016 and played horrendously as a rookie.
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