Of course it is more of a sure thing to trade a high pick than to pick a great player in the draft. This is especially true when you are picking at the lower part of the round.
Unlike George Allen and he over the hill gang there is a salary cap and trading a high pick must be done within the strategy of building the roster. If you are going to trade high picks you better get lots of low picks and hit on a higher than average number of potential starters. You can only have some many expensive players so you need to balance that with inexpensive players. The key is that those inexpensive players need to be able to make the team and become eventual starters. It seems the Rams have found this balance.
Snead uses every method to acquire talent for the current roster. He has hit on high draft picks: Goff, Gurley, Brockers & Donald. He has made trades: Taqib, Peters, Barron and Cooks. Established Free Agents: Suh, Woods, Whitworth. Mid to Low Round Picks: Longacre, Ebukam, Johnson, Kupp, Brown, Higbee and UDFA Littleton. Heck Snead even has a waiver wire in Austin Blythe.
Additionally we have a bunch of talent in backup positions that are lower level free agents, low round picks or UDFA.
My point is that you cannot look at trading high picks in isolation and make a judgement about whether it is a good strategy based on the odds of success. What I find impressive is that Snead if effective and has gotten better at acquiring talent using every possible means necessary. He is also going to reap the benefit of extra 3 round picks for Watson and Johnson which feeds into his overall strategy. Snead seems to find value and positions the team to capitalize on the value based on where the most talent will be available and what our cap strategy is. Example we had a salary slot for a big time wideout and Cooks was a sure thing performance wise and he was still young. He was a value pick for a first rounder. Snead tried to do it with Watkins but Watkins was not a sure thing and his performance didn't warrant the salary slot that Cooks got. What is nice it that with Watkins there was a built in hedge against losing him as we will get a 3rd rounder for the 2nd rounder we gave up.
McVay also plays a key role in talent acquisition. First players want to come to LA and play for him. Second you have to be able to depend on the coaching staff to develop players or the mid to late round strategy doesn't work as well. McVay team does a great job of developing young talent helps to provide the edge in hitting on a higher number of players coming out of the mid rounds.
I think we make a mistake if we focus too much on what Snead has done lately on building the roster for he continues to surprise us and seems to know where the value is and how to take advantage of that value way before anyone else. Usually when he pulls the trigger it is quick and unexpected too. He made a large amount of trades last year some going out in Tree and Quinn for picks in addition to those who came in. For the most part it was quick and unexpected.
Next year we will have new challenges. It is doubtful we will see a 1st rounder traded for an established high cost veteran or a big free agent signing. It seems like we have our stars and they have their salary slots. I think we will move into the mode of acquiring as many picks as possible in the next few drafts to build the rosters around the stars. We probably say goodbye to Barron, Joyner and Suh and I am not sure who else. It will be an interesting off season and the draft should be fun again.
