Rams Updates: Kyren Williams Returning Punts? Puka Nacua Back at Practice? Jonah Jackson at Center?

what's up everybody welcome back to another episode of rams Brothers I'm your host Dean and I'm joined as always by my brother and the other great hosts of this show Nick and Nick seems like the last two three days have been filled with a little bit of drama as we're approaching what 11 10 days to the regular season the kickoff on Sunday night football against the Detroit Lions but first and most importantly how are you my good brother I'm good I feel like you can get a finger on the pulse of the entire organization when a reporter asked McVey what do you mean by this was a football decision to get rid of Ernest Jones and you could tell he was just like what do you think it means like he was the most aggressive I've maybe ever seen him that's kind of how all the fans feel right now so I you know I'm good I'm just excited we are so close to NFL football it just gets me gets my you know the juices flowing I will say about that clip on sea McVey I think that when it comes down to cutting from 90 players to 53 players you got to make a lot of tough decisions it's probably a really emotionally draining day and then all of a sudden you're kind of asked the same question three or four different ways I would imagine that he was a little ticked off over the fact that you know it probably wasn't something that they ideally wanted to do they probably wanted to keep him if they could have for another year but you know things happen you want to be able to put him in a better situation you're not going to pay him they communicated that all the way back in March so yeah I mean the Ernest Jones thing is is definitely ongoing we got a lot of other things we're going to talk about in this episode in relation to Chile Davis being terminated right so special teams assistant Chile Davis was terminated the ram signed two players Nevin gallamore and Cody shrer to their 53-man roster Zack Evans was terminated from the practice squad so was Tully latu um they ended up putting Corey Duran um as a waiver he was waved and then they put him onto the practice squad we're GNA talk about Jonah Jackson potentially moving to Center and Steve aula moving back to left guard pukan n is finally fully back of practice Kiren Williams returning punts and this is within the last 48 to 72 hours so like you could imagine why some Rams Fans are emotional but implicit trust in this front office and this coaching staff they're going to do a great job things change so quickly so before we jump into the episode I want to make sure that we're mentioning that this episode is brought to you guys by autograph you guys are doing an incredible job there so much respect for you guys over the fact that you guys have taken the time to download the app you punched in our referral code b1b 3F 930 um and all you got to do is consume Rams content I put out a tweet yesterday make sure you guys are following us on X for all updates everything related to the Rams but you guys all you have to do is consume Rams content and you're going to find all Rams content creators in one place the Ram's YouTube channel so this app is is really great the interface is incredible and there's actually some new stuff that autograph is going to be introducing in the next week that we're going to be talking about on the next episode in anticipation of the Lion so some fun stuff make sure to download the autograph app punch in our referral code and be a part of the movement and also we want to remind everybody [Music] to like And subscribe be a part of the Rams Brothers YouTube channel we we need you guys we're trying to bump up this YouTube channel we're putting out some decent content for you guys so make sure to be a part of it and subscribe and like I would say more than decent I would say it's top quality content also something that I've realized is you've just you will no longer call Twitter Twitter you call it X every time and I'm just like it's oh I hate that but know it's its name that's uh it's not important no I can't say that I blame you but yeah follow on X right because we never really promote X or Twitter whatever you guys want to call it um and we have daily content tons and tons of tweets X posts whatever the hell you want to call it daily talking about all the updates the practice squad moves the roster moves and everything that is changing and I just want to flash this on the screen real quick because this is a quote from the voice of the Rams JB long and just a reminder to everybody how many how many things can possibly change over the next three four months in relation to last year JB said this time last year for the Rams Kevin doson was just Landing in Los Angeles cam acres and Van Jefferson were starters puka nikua was on zero fantasy teams we hadn't met the conductor or Agent Zero Dr Rob's First Target in the pistol formation were months away which we didn't see the pistol formation until after the buy and the whole offense was changed for the better once you saw Matthew Stafford in the pistol it complimented the Run game and then he also mentioned the end of August is the starting line it is not the finish line so I think a great way to relevel set expectations for Rams Fans before we jump into this episode JB saw the chaos of the fans this last week and was like I need to pull everybody back and I will add he was on puka was on at least one fantasy team he was he was it was Dean's fantasy team he selected he selected him last year and now he's one of Dean's Keepers Dean looks like a like a genius just following mcve and needs uh you know path you you got to follow uh this front office that has a ton of EXE Ives who are looking to build out better methodologies on how to draft players they use the uh a couple new systems to draft players as of recent years the hexico leadership test was one that I thought was really interesting they have a couple acronyms that they like to use in house in terms of how they identify prospects they don't always go to events they don't always go to you know trainings and whatever it is like they don't have to have a presence there they have videos they have other services other ways to identify these kind of kids which is why this roster has been built out with so many young players it was Jason OTC who mentioned that the Rams lead the NFL with 17 rookies on the roster in 2024 Raiders are second U with 15 followed by the commanders at 14 so yeah I mean they got a young roster they're the fourth young youngest roster in the NFL um so I mean this is this is how they conduct business it's a interesting way to handle the salary cap it's an interesting way to get some of these new names in the building get them up to speed get them on boarded that they're ready to go in week one I'm just overly impressed with the staff and I think they're going to be just fine the product on the field is really good for the most part with the exception of the 2022 season when the speak speaking of the staff I think we should get started I I I I like to be I feel like I've taken the moniker of the Special Teams uh guy who will not stop complaining about special team so let me just jump right in with Chile dog Davis terminated as special teams assistant he was tired in February of this year already fired which is wild he was originally the replacement for Jeremy Springer who is now in New England as their special teams coordinator McVey confirmed yesterday that they will hire a new assistant special teams coach news should break on this in the next few days of who it's going to be but they talked about changing the direction of the role entirely a bit so that leaves you to wonder what exactly wasn't up to Snuff is it of how Chile dog was judging Talent was it you know something that they didn't like what they saw in just like you know the preseason you don't know exactly what it was but expect some changes in special teams which I I sit here and say finally the 32nd rank special teams unit and it wasn't close needs some change in Direction so you know I think that that's going to uh it's going to happen sooner than later and it's probably for the right reasons it's one of those things that they like to keep in- housee it's similar to the Aller Jackson situation where he violated the personal conduct policy but the details of the suspension are not available the details of the termination are not available outside of just a change in Direction outside of just a violation of the privacy or of the policy rather so outside of special teams I also wanted to tap into uh what's going on with there in his Jun so obviously he was traded he had a press conference the other day this is the details of the trade if you missed the last episode um he had a press conference with the Titans I thought it was really interesting he's really well-respected uh in terms of just how he appreciated the coaching staff how he appreciated the organization and the players on that organization but Troy reader is the favorite as of right now everybody's favorite Ram to replace Ernest Jones as a starter and to wear the Green Dot so a little bit of concern I think you you compile things like Zack Evans you know being terminated from the practice squad Chile dog Dave this being terminated as a special teams coordinator Ernest Jones getting traded puka AA coming back to practice which is seems like the only positive and then Kiren returning punts Rams Fans head were heads were in a tizzy so we're going to get in all of that um and then as of recent they also signed defensive tackle Neville gallamore who sounds like he should he belongs at the Knights of the the round table with that name Nevin gallamore um he was uh he was he was added because they waved Cody Durant if you days ago and then he was signed Cody Duran was or Cory Durant was signed back to the practice squad many were surprised that the Dolphins let him go he was sixth in pressures this preseason amongst all defensive tackles gallamore is a former third round pick from 2020 who is both a three Tech and a on Tech so has the versatility there in terms of being able to move around up front 62 315 the rams' defensive line is going to be Bobby Brown the third Kobe Turner Braden Fisk and then you got deuan Johnson Tyler Davis and nin gallamore as death so they they also while they added Nevin gallamore they also added Cody shrer so this is a guy Nick I think that a lot of Rams Fans will end up liking because he was beloved by Rams by fans at mizou so he's actually from St Louis so really similar to Kiren in terms of the upbringing he was a big special teams presence for the 49ers this preseason he runs with an attitude had four kickoffs for a total of 120 yards this preseason and there are stories about him parking his red truck at the missou facility at like 4:30 a.m. to beat the strength and conditioning coach there to ensure that he was noticed so he has a pretty good background pretty good reputation he may even beat Shawn McVey to the facilities in the morning yeah he I he was described as a Shawn McVey guy which I I would imagine is just somebody that is impressionable and is the first in the room the last to leave like similar to what we saw with Aaron Donald 100% like lives up to the expectation hopefully and anybody from that uh running back room from San Francisco I will gladly accept because their running back room has been lights out for quite some time I very very impressive and just to speak on returning kicks really fast I don't want to see Kiren doing it it kind of scares me that that was the that was who they decided at this point is going to be returning kicks so hopefully there is something to be you know explored here with Cody returning some kicks yeah I mean he'll probably return some kickoffs if he's even going to be on the active game day roster because they only have 48 players that are active on the game day roster but like there were reports that they were only going to keep three running backs you lost Boston Scott you lost Zack Evans you bring in uh Cody shider which seemed like you know a lot of changes all at once but I think Kiren returning punts is absolutely fascinating I want to jump to this now because nobody cared about Kiren Williams returning punts in weeks one to three last year when he actually did it because he wasn't Karen Williams yet yeah like that's why nobody really it was like ah this is our our top running back he was hurt the season prior on like the opening play of the preseason he's finally coming back you want to be able to maybe get him some additional touches but he wasn't kiring yet and I think a majority of the punts that he had returned were Fair catches so they weren't really notable but he had played 86% of those offensive snaps during that span had 39 carries and 19 targets from weeks one to three so like you know Kiren returning punts maybe a lot of Rams Fans don't like it but Mike laflor was like anytime you can get the ball in 23's hands I would consider that to be a good thing plus I think they really love Blake corm yeah see I I think you're burying the league because if you think Korum is going to be as Fantastical and practical and amazing as he could be then you can sell me on Kym returning kicks but it's not as simple as let's put the ball in the hands of our playmaker right here in this situation because it's it's putting an insane amount of pressure on somebody that is are you already asking so much of on like a regular offensive snap basis and they tried this with with Cooper cup and my main worry was it's special teams like he's gonna be thrown around and like hit more if he's returning punts I or kicks I don't want you don't want to see one of your top guys in that position in my opinion is somebody who's been watching football i' much rather it be somebody who's more of like a specialist in that situation but if you think Korum is going to be on the same level as Kiron then I think it's okay and I think that's what that's where they are coming from where they're really impressed with him and then at the same time let's just bring it back and just give it to Cody which I hope they eventually do because I don't want either of them honest returning it and I thank you it's thank God it's not 2 two I'll say that I was going to say you could even go back to 2 two but I mean like I think if there's one area on this team or one unit rather that you can kind of nitpick and poke holes in it would be special teams so I understand the doubts that many would have if Kiren is going to return punts but I think that this Blake Korum pick it threw so many fans especially fantasy football fans in a tizzy right because McVey everybody was like McVey can't draft running backs they drafted a running back too high again they spent a third round pick on Daryl Henderson they spent a second round pick on cam acres in consecutive years like we didn't need this but when Kiren was on the field last year in 2023 the Rams had the number one ranked 52% offensive success rate which in coaching terms is called staying ahead of the sticks we've talked about this in previous episodes Kiren went over 100 yards in three straight games down the stretch and it was the only time in Matthew Stafford's career that that had ever happened happened so I understand trying to prioritize him bubble wrap him and and put him in a good situation to where he can get a majority of the offensive carries but when the kir Williams wasn't on the field the rams' success rate dropped to 39.9% which ranked 30th overall they drafted Blake horum so that this drop off wouldn't happen at all in 2024 and I think just in terms of being a being elusive being able to make Cuts being Swifty being able to navigate both the duo runs scheme both the Zone run scheme which was like a 6040 split obviously in favor of Duo last year I think Blake corm kir goes down for any reason you're going to be able to run your offense at an extremely efficient level even with kir not on the field so I I do think that they have a ton of confidence in Blake corm and I think that the draft picks of Cam acres and Daryl Henderson in consecutive years and you go back to Kiren in the fifth round and then Cor in the third round three years later kind of muddied everybody's mind and then in the middle of that they won a Super Bowl yeah thank you with no Run game yeah that was going to be my U my rebuttal right there was even if the Run game was you know you could say that those draft picks of akres and uh Daryl were you know disappointments Acres that first year in 2020 was lights out everybody thought the Run game was back and you know Daryl Henderson and cam Acres both had very important plays in that Super Bowl so I mean yes you could say that that overall they were disappoint disappointments but I mean I would argue that they did what they had to do in those years and they did just enough to get us over the hump and that's kind of really all you can ask for and those teams weren't really designed around the Run game where now I think they're trying to bring it back to that kind of you know aspect where we have a run game and then we can explore with all these amazing wide receivers that we have but keep it on the ground because they saw that last year with kir so hopefully you know corm can just add to to that as opposed to subtract because we saw Daryl Henderson come back last year which was kind of hilarious but he came back for one game and he looked really good and then you know the the Daryl Henderson that we all knew kind of came back after that they gave him like 30 carries coming off the couch which was insane um so I think yeah I think this is a good transition into Jonah Jackson and Steve Ula because what's going on with these two I think is really fascinating I want to flash this quote up from Jordan because Jordan had tweeted yesterday that the Rams have gotten a long look at Jonah Jackson at Center in his return to action Sean McVey says that they're leaning towards starting Jonah Jackson at Center and Steve abula at left guard to try and get the best combination on the field that they possibly can in the opener so I think this is a pretty fascinating develop vment this has nothing to do by the way with how Steve Ula was performing at Center all offseason they need to be able to help out the left side as much as humanly possible with Aller Jackson being on a two- game suspension and avula being such a force in the Run game and also the screen game don't you feel like this picture should be the NFL logo he looks like uh Elvis Vegas Elvis that's a tough comparison hopefully aula he's always man do I look big in this shirt no no he's he's a he's exactly what you T tuggers yeah yeah he's a t- Tugger U but yeah I think avula is you know the kind of guy that you need played 100% of the snaps at left guard last year and I think that the controversy comes from Jonah Jackson they paid him guard money on his current deal and guards make more than centers but if he were a center he'd be the second highest paid Center in the entire league behind you guessed it Creed Humphrey ah I thought Kelsey was still making money on his Center deal he's making $100 million with Amazon right now Jesus for him he and Travis if only two brothers got together and did a podcast and did it well like the benefits there you go turn we need a little more Travis out of you and probably a little more Jason out of me I don't know the the debate is open on who's who uh we'll let the comments decide that but I do want to say I all of the you know like the worrisome of bringing Jonah to Center I think brings more of you were doing so well at where you were at we kind of need you your stab ability in the like maybe the most key position on the line as opposed to you being really great over here we need you to just be solid here because we don't know what's going on with W with the rest of the line which is a little scary headed into week one but I don't I don't hate the ideology there let's bring our most stable person into the you know position of the person that touches the ball every single play so it's it's a little frightening just changing you know swapping that on the fly like this close to the starting line but you know I trust I trust in their decision making I don't I don't hate it I I mean implicit trust right it's because Mike mun is still there and it's because Andrew Whitworth is still somewhat of an offensive consultant um and you know I have faith in terms of like Mike mun being right up there with a Jeff stoutland from Philadelphia in terms of being able to structure the best possible offensive line unit with the players and the Personnel that they do have being able to craft and Implement a run scheme that complements all of the Personnel um going away from Zone primarily laying down a heavier dose of Duo I think that that's what Mike mun does really well and I think that if he's there Consulting um and you know offensive line coach Eric Wendell too like you know you have all these Minds that are in the building so much better than it was previously and in terms of last year like going back to that JB long quote you didn't even have Kevin Dawson at this point last year he was on a plane on his way to Los Angeles so like you know you're still always going to be moving things around and Kevin doson became everybody's favorite offensive lineman almost overnight so you continue to kind of Shuffle things around you make sure that things work um and if if something that you know McVey talked about he has a ton of confidence in Jonah Jackson that's fine with me I trust I trust the head coach he might not be a lefty snapping like Steve Ula and Coleman Shelton over the past couple of years um but if they have confidence in him I'm I'm good to go let's go play the Lions and yeah and work on like Stafford while he may be more comfortable with the Lefty he's been in the he's been in the game in Long like I have I it's more so wor I some of like a potential start situation um what was the update on uh the longest 10-year Ram are they saying he's good to go week one I don't think so mcy was talking about potentially putting him on the IR U but I don't think that he's going to be on the IR I think they're just going to take it week to week you never know he could be ready to go for a week one and if not confidence in Warren McClendon but you know you want to see Rob havenstein out there especially considering but I don't know though because you got if he's banged up he's got to go against Aiden Hutchinson one-on-one consistently Hutchinson kind of had his number in that wild card game last year so if he's not fully healthy maybe you get a younger Warren McLendon out there to just you know squeeze a little extra juice out of the offensive line havenstein is a St Louis to Los angelist re Legends so we just want to see him out there doing well yeah absolutely and then also PUK is back at practice so McVey mentioned that he'd be ready to roll there's no structural damage in his knee there were no reported setbacks with the btis and maybe all the finite details aren't there maybe they're not all being shared with us but puka is a really tough kid if you want to fade him in fantasy whatever you can fade him in fantasy but he's GNA be ready to go week one he might not get as many targets as he got earlier on in the season last year with Cooper Cup starting the season on the IR but he's still ping a COA yeah it's it's funny how we kind of have a little bit of of a reversal of last year where cup was 100% And then puka comes out and completely balls out and becomes you know this world-renowned rookie so you might see a little bit of that to start of the Season where it's the inverse where cup just kind of goes out and balls out and reminds the world who he is and puka kind of takes a little bit of a back seat I think that's okay I think eventually probably week three which I believe is San Francisco both of them will be 100 100% yeah so that is kind of I'm I'm not gonna lie to you Dean I am very worried about this week one matchup I do not feel overtly confident that we can go into Detroit again and kind of take a Sunday night football game but we are the underdog so it is exciting whenever you're not expected to win because then you can surprise some people but I'm I'm I'm already looking forward to week two two and three two divisional matchups Arizon Arizona and San Francisco you win those games and I think you're fine I always like in week one matchups the coach that has more experience that has a super B under his belt that can prepare his Squad which seems like on you know snap of his fingers I just remember back to last season when they had that Sunday night game against Washington and then they had to go Thursday night against the Saints in a must-win scenario at home and they they were able to get the job done they could prep in a 7 72h hour period like they got all this time to prepare for the Lions it's still Jared gof right that he lost some of his pass catchers he's got pen Su a little bit banged up he's got uh jir Gibbs a little bit banged up so I I think that you're kind of splitting hairs in terms of who could potentially win the game we'll talk about this all in next week's episode but um you know I always like the the more qualified head coach the one that has the better track record in the week one game McVey is totally like his record for week one is just spe spectacular it is like one of the best records of week one I just kind of Envision more of a um 2020 start of the Season you know where it was bills right after they won the Super Bowl and everything was really high and they kind of just fell on their face early um so we'll see we will absolutely see they were never leading in that game I remember I had a bet that was like some site that we were uh probably you know it was one of our sponsors at a time it was just like weird sight and they were like if the Rams are leading at any time you win your bet no point did they ever take the lead in that game so I lost wasn't that Bill's game wasn't that opener was that the uh first game of the co year I think that was coming off of was coming off at 19 they they won this Super Bowl after Co oh you're talking about you're talking about the 2022 season yeah okay I thought you were talking about the 202 that 2020 Bills game was awesome though they were in their all blues and they almost came all the way back and there was a controversial Ramsay call at the end that was one of my favorite Rams games ever even though they lost I just I I want them to win a game in the all Blues so bad their record in the blue blue top blue pants is like so bad that reminds me of uh the Christmas game I think they were in all blue against the Broncos and they put up 56 points yeah against Shawn pton I hate him can't stand him um so yeah I think there's a lot of stuff going on that's why we wanted to jump on today um and wanted to say happy Friday and hope you guys all have a great great Labor Day weekend um real quick before we jump off did we talk about Zack Evans being terminated from the practice squad um we talked about it I think briefly Tully Le to also being terminated from the practice squad and Corey Duran Duran rather uh was waved and added onto the practice squad so I think there is still one open spot on the practice squad so look for another roster move here or there's brother he was C from the Saints bring him on have him return kicks why not would absolutely love that that would be awesome yeah you got I mean you got special teams help if the direction is changing hopefully it's for the better and hopefully it's implemented on week one and is H is properly ironed out let's say yeah you spoke we listened Nick's pick are back next week uh with a new theme song similar to I don't know if anybody saw the video of the Colts fan who did this is our Cults this is our team we love them so bad so bad but Nick Picks we'll be back I can't wait it's gonna be a lot of fun we will we will talk to you guys after the weekend hopefully you guys are enjoying everything we're putting out follow us on X like And subscribe on YouTube download the autograph app and we will be here for all things Rams content in the meantime appreciate you guys go Rams appreciate you guys porns up go Rams