With Matthew Stafford as the only quarterback on the roster, the Los Angeles Rams were expected to take another one at some point during the 2023 NFL draft. In the fourth round, they selected Stetson Bennett out of Georgia a two-time national champion. Recently, general manager Les Snead went on the Rich Eisen Show and he unsurprisingly iterated that the Rams plan on having Bennett become the immediate backup to Matthew Stafford in 2023.
“I would say on paper that that is our vision. Anytime you go into the draft, you never know with a QB, there’s only so many of them,” Snead said. “But we did think that it could be very beneficial if we could find a young quarterback to develop as a backup. That way you don’t get into, let’s call it, renting QBs for a year. And also, with our cap situation, veteran backups do cost more in salary against the cap than players on their rookie contracts. So there’s a lot of variables in that.
“But the vision was, hey, let’s try to find the best backup QB available, and if we can do that in the draft, that’s even more of a benefit to us. If not, we would’ve pivoted into a different direction.”
The term “young” is used loosely here by Snead as Bennett will be turning 26 years old during the 2023 season. That being said, Bennett’s age and his experience as the starting quarterback at Georgia (who has won back-to-back national championships) could expedite his development in the NFL.
Besides Bennett, the Rams recently signed Brett Rypien to a one-year deal to give the team three quarterbacks on the roster. Rypien is entering his fourth season in the NFL and is only a little over half a year older than Bennett. They also added Dresser Winn as an undrafted rookie after the draft.
Even though the transition from college to the NFL can be tough on rookie quarterbacks, the Rams are confident that Bennett can be a reliable backup behind Stafford in 2023.
