Les Snead: ‘Kicker was a dire need’

Rams GM Les Snead revealed how desperate the team was to add a new kicker to the roster in the draft

The L.A. Rams drafted Stanford kicker Joshua Karty in the sixth round of the 2024 NFL Draft and general manager Les Snead pulled the curtain back after to explain the team’s draft process. Some things were bigger needs than others, but no position was graded as being more “dire” to add talent than kicker.

“I guess we call it dire needs. One of them was kicker and we didn’t really handle that until the sixth, so there is an element of strategy monitoring that situation: How many you have, when are they going? What teams might be probable to draft a kicker,” Snead said in a press conference with head coach Sean McVay after the draft.

“There’s always a list of needs, maybe there’s medium needs, less than medium needs, and you try to at that point let the board say, ‘Wow, we still may need that position but there’s a better player at least subjectively at that moment in mind, and you follow your board. That’s the puzzle.”

McVay also joined the Rams broadcast team after the draft to discuss L.A.’s picks and strategy in his eighth draft with Snead.

Rams 2024 draft class

1.19 – EDGE Jared Verse, Florida State

2.39 – DE Braden Fiske, Florida State

3.83 – RB Blake Corum, Michigan

3.99 – DB Kamren Kinchens, Miami

5.154 – EDGE Brennan Jackson, Washington State

6.196 – DL Tyler Davis, Clemson

6.209 – K Joshua Karty, Stanford

6.213 – WR Jordan Whittington, Texas

6.217 – OL Beaux Limmer, Arkansas

7.254 – OL KT Leveston, K State