I mean they've taken "going all in" to a whole different level, but I sort of like it. I'm a big fan of building through the draft, but I think there's certain teams, including the Ravens, that overvalue said picks. I would never advocate giving up like a half decade of first rounders unless I'm getting a like 15-20 year franchise QB, which the Rams clearly haven't gotten, but at least their approach is different.
I applaud them for a couple reasons:
1. They realized they made a mistake with Goff, and they rectified it. A lot of teams would have just bent over and taken like 2-3 more years of bad coach/QB relationships, and probably not improved much as a team, and then moved on. I give them credit for, at least for now, making a good effort to make their situation, at least in the short term, better.
2. I think they realize what a lot of fans don't realize... this idea of "long term sustainable success" is extremely difficult to achieve in this league, and the idea of making decisions now to hope to win 3,4,5 years from now backfires a TON. The head coaches and GMs that try to play the "long game" with roster management usually aren't around long enough to see it through. There are maybe a small handful of Owners in this league who will tolerate losing, mediocrity, or even small amounts of "winning" (i.e. a playoff appearance or two, but certainly nothing close to a Lombardi) for more than maybe 4-5 years. And for something that long, you have to be coming in to a dumpster fire that needs a complete tear down, and the Owner acknowledges it.
Coaches certainly don't have the luxury of doing a 5 year rebuild. And GM's really don't either. They may get a year or two to get some good players in there, but it has to be a very significant improvement for them to stay. Otherwise, they're gone, and whatever work you did to build the team will be to the benefit of somebody else.
Owners are the only person in the building who can really have no negative consequences of short-term or long-term losing.
Lamar Jackson (or at least the decision to draft him) saved John Harbaugh's job. John gets some credit for that decision, but if he didn't pan out, he would have been fired at least before last season. He was absolutely on the hot seat coming into 2018 and even a little bit in 2019 perhaps. And that was based on 3 years of losing essentially. And his pedigree of success from a W/L perspective is only matched or exceeded by maybe 3-4 other coaches in the league. You think he's super concerned about what his roster looks like 3-4 years from now?
