Getting Jared Goff up to speed is crucial for Rams this spring/ESPN

Getting Jared Goff up to speed is crucial for Rams this spring

Alden Gonzalez
ESPN Staff Writer

LOS ANGELES -- The Los Angeles Rams' offseason program began with T-shirts and platitudes, but some real, substantive work immediately followed.

The NFL grants teams with a new head coach an extra week in their offseason program, and there's a reason for that. So much is involved with introducing an entire roster to an entirely new staff, and thus the Rams will have a lot on their plate this spring -- all of which must be done within the constraints of a restricted on-field schedule.

In phase one, which absorbs these first two weeks, players are limited to strength, conditioning and physical rehabilitation. Phase two, the next three weeks, does not allow live contact or offense-versus-defense drills. Phase three limits teams to a total of 10 days' worth of organized team practices, spread out over four weeks, with no live contact allowed there, either.

The Rams' OTAs will take place May 23-25, May 30-31, June 1, and June 5-8. They'll follow that with a mandatory minicamp June 13-15, which will wrap up the 10-week offseason program.

Below is a look at their three most important tasks.

1. Get Jared Goff up to speed.

It's really hard to overstate just how important this upcoming season is for Goff, 2016's No. 1 overall pick. After struggling mightily as a rookie, Goff -- now operating under a system that is essentially built to help him succeed -- needs to show signs that he truly has the ability to be the Rams' franchise quarterback. And that process begins this week, while finally being formally introduced to Sean McVay's offense.

Goff said he has a "good feel" for what that looks like, but the concepts and the verbiage are far different from what he absorbed in 2016. The Redskins were very pass-heavy while McVay served as their playcaller over the past two years. Ideally, he will establish a better balance with the running game in Los Angeles, where he has Todd Gurley. But McVay's offense will revolve around the quarterback.

"For our quarterbacks as a whole, there’s a lot of work," McVay said. "It’s just making sure we have that one-day approach. If you look at it where you want to go from A to Z, then you end up getting overwhelmed with the amount of information. I think as long as you just take little steps at a time, that continuous improvement one day at a time, then I feel like that will lead to the things that we want."

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