I was surprised when the Rams re-upped with Tutu Atwell for $10 million. He wasn’t much of a factor in his first four seasons, so I figured they’d be done with him.
But they opted to keep him, while making no effort to re-sign Demarcus Robinson (who’s now with the 49ers). It’s now going to be Atwell rather than Robinson serving as the team’s third receiver.
The Rams also have Jordan Whittington, who looked like he might be a find in the preseason last year. Maybe if Puka Nacua or Davante Adams gets hurt, they’ll plug Whittington in as a replacement.
But Sean McVay sounds very confident that it will be Atwell in that third receiver role. He says the plan is to get more out of the former second-round pick.
“When you look at the times when he’s been able to play, whether that be because some people were out or not, he has produced and he’s delivered, and we’re looking forward to seeing more of that ascension,” McVay said at the league meetings. “He’s going to be on the field a lot more, particularly in a lot of those three-receiver sets where, when he’s been on the field, he’s done a really good job. And like I said, if you project that over the course of 17 games, and hopefully you’re in the right to play afterwards, I think that’s going to be something that’s well worth the investment we made in him.”
Since McVay brought it up, I dug out the numbers. I see 14 games in the last two years in which Atwell played a starter-type role (on the field for at least 70 percent of their plays). And I went only with games where Matthew Stafford was also playing.
In those games, I see Atwell catching 51 passes for 669 yards, with 3 TDs, and another 38 yards on 6 carries. That’s 3.6 catches for 48 yard in a typical game, showing up around 50th among wide receivers (for fantasy purposes) in a typical week.
Note that the Rams in some of those games didn’t have Nacua or Cooper Kupp. When the Rams are at full strength, I would think Atwell’s production would be a little lower.
But McVay sounds very confident that it will be Atwell rather than Whittington as their third guy.
| TUTU ATWELL WHEN STARTING WITH STAFFORD | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Year | Opp | Tgt | No | Yds | Avg | TD | Rush |
| 2023 | at Sea. | 8 | 6 | 119 | 19.8 | 0 | 0-0-0 |
| 2023 | S.F. | 9 | 7 | 77 | 11.0 | 0 | 1-5-0 |
| 2023 | at Cin. | 9 | 4 | 50 | 12.5 | 1 | 1-22-0 |
| 2023 | at Ind. | 9 | 5 | 24 | 4.8 | 0 | 0-0-0 |
| 2023 | Phil. | 5 | 2 | 9 | 4.5 | 1 | 0-0-0 |
| 2023 | Ariz. | 1 | 1 | 30 | 30.0 | 0 | 0-0-0 |
| 2023 | Pitt. | 2 | 1 | 31 | 31.0 | 1 | 0-0-0 |
| 2023 | at Dall. | 4 | 2 | 21 | 10.5 | 0 | 2-8-0 |
| 2023 | Sea. | 3 | 1 | 17 | 17.0 | 0 | 0-0-0 |
| 2023 | at S.F. | 4 | 2 | 7 | 3.5 | 0 | 1-(-4)-0 |
| 2024 | S.F. | 5 | 4 | 93 | 23.3 | 0 | 0-0-0 |
| 2024 | at Chi. | 6 | 4 | 82 | 20.5 | 0 | 0-0-0 |
| 2024 | G.B. | 10 | 6 | 58 | 9.7 | 0 | 1-7-0 |
| 2024 | L.V. | 9 | 6 | 51 | 8.5 | 0 | 0-0-0 |
—Ian Allan