Rams Have Shown Massive Improvement at Head Coach

It truly never made much sense when trying to figure out why Steve Spagnuolo was so awful as the then St. Louis Rams head coach. The four-time Super Bowl winning defensive coordinator is one of the most intelligent, prepared, personable individuals in football and yet, he couldn't get it done.

As a result of Spagnuolo's failed tenure with the team, he was ranked as the 15th worst coaching hire in the 21st century by CBS Sports' Cody Benjamin.

"Another example of a fearsome coordinator who couldn't translate defensive genius to head coaching dominance, Spagnuolo is currently the face of the Chiefs' perennially stingy Super Bowl-contending defense," wrote Benjamin. "Long ago, however, right after a separate successful stint running the Giants' defense, "Spags" struggled to keep Sam Bradford upright and supported while the Rams bumbled through some of their last seasons in St. Louis."

Spagnuolo, coming off a victory over the Patriots in the historic Super Bowl XLII, where his defense shut down Tom Brady, Randy Moss, and the record-setting Patriots offense, was hired by the Rams to be their head coach during the 2009 offseason.

Despite having Steven Jackson, Leonard Little, and Chris Long, the Rams went 1-15 that season. However, the tide should have turned when the Rams selected Sam Bradford overall and it almost did.

In 2010, Spagnuolo and the Rams were not that good, but the good news was that the NFC West was awful, and despite entering the final week of the season with a record of 7-8, they were leading the division and needed to not lose to the Seattle Seahawks in the season-finale and Spagnuolo would have brought playoff football back to the Edward Carrier Dome.

To make things better, the Seahawks were without starter Matt Hasselbeck and were forced to start Charlie "clipboard Jesus" Whitehurst and yet, the Rams still found a way to lose.

Not only did the Rams lose, Seattle's victory led to Marshawn Lynch's "Beast Quake" touchdown run in a victorious effort over the defending Super Bowl Champion New Orleans Saints, giving legitimacy to Pete Carroll's NFL comeback and laying down the foundation to the Super Bowl-winning Legion of Boom defense.

In 2011, the Rams were a disaster. Only four out of eight draft picks made the final roster, Bradford missed the first game of his career, starting his journey of continuous injuries, and the Rams fired Spagnuolo after the season.

That offseason, the Rams hired Les Snead and Jeff Fisher, with Fisher being fired in the middle of the 2016 season, with Sean McVay taking over soon after.

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