I would argue that the best way to increase interest for your team is to start winning (especially true when you’re talking about L.A. and its notoriously fair weather fans). However, I can see your argument. The Rams had decent roster on paper heading into the 2016 season, so they felt they were only a QB away from playoff contention.

The fact that Goff was terrible (imagine the front office’s horror when they realized Goff couldn’t even beat out the esteemed Case Keenum for the starting job!), only illustrates to me the perils of this “all in” approach. When the gamble doesn’t work out, you screw yourself for years.

I my mind, they would have been better off staying at their draft position, and taking a chance that they might have hit on a QB taken in the later rounds (they may have lucked into Prescott. Heck, maybe Cody Kessler would have been better if had played for a decent team). Even if that approach didn’t work out, they at least have more chances at the table later on.

The Packers are another team that is very conservative in trades. They had 8(!) starters that they drafted in the 3rd round or later.

The Cowboys had 9.
The Chiefs had 6.
Even the Falcons, who I criticized for trading for Julio Jones, had 5.
I was surprised the Steelers only had 3.

On the other end, the Bears had 3. Cleveland had 3. 49ers had 5. Jaguars had 4. The Rams had 6 (4 of those on defense).

One of the hard things to tease out on the bad teams is if those late round picks are going to be the key players on their next playoff teams, or if they are guys who are playing only because the teams don’t have much talent.