New Los Angeles Rams defensive coordinator Raheem Morris has some big shoes to fill given the job his predecessor did with this group in the 2020 NFL season.
Despite being in his first year at the position, Brandon Staley managed to lead the No. 1 defense in the NFL. As a result, his efforts have helped him become the new head coach for the Los Angeles Chargers this offseason.
Morris is well aware of the expectations after inheriting a talented group led by what he believes are two future Hall of Famers in Aaron Donald and Jalen Ramsey. He will be tasked with replicating the same level of success the Rams had on this side of the ball throughout the 2020 campaign under Staley.
Of course, Morris will be looking for ways to kick things up a notch. Although he plans to stick with a 3-4 base approach, he expects them to be much more fluid when it comes to sub-packages, via Stu Jackson of the team’s official website:
“When you go into your sub-packages, which the league has kind of developed into, you see a lot more four-down fronts,” Morris said. “Whether you’re talking about odd or even fronts, whether you’re talking about bringing different people in to do some different things, you’re going to do all those things, you’re going to have all those different types of packages. Obviously, you’ll talk about who you are and what you are. We’re going to look like a three-four base team, something that we tried to look like in Atlanta.”
Morris added that the “if it isn’t broke, don’t fix it approach,” is not going to cut it if the Rams are going to win a Super Bowl:
“I wasn’t brought here to try to duplicate what they did last year,” Morris said. “We were brought here to win and we’re brought here to win a championship.”
It is encouraging to see that Morris is not planning on resting on the laurels of this group’s performance last season. While Donald and Ramsey will remain as the focal points of the defense, nothing is set in stone just yet with key players like safety John Johnson III, outside linebacker Leonard Floyd and cornerback Troy Hill all set to test the market as unrestricted free agents.
Fortunately, the Rams have good reason to be optimistic about all the different looks they can provide thanks to the bevy of versatile talent at their disposal. Morris is going to do what he can to put his own twist on the base 3-4 scheme just like Staley did with former defensive coordinator Wade Phillips.
