Still, as the Rams prepared to get their first on-field look at the team's rookies at minicamp, a lot of the eyes will be trained on three players that arrived in the draft.

Following the selection of tackle Jason Smith with the second overall pick, the Rams added a player from each of the defensive units in the next three rounds.

The linebacker was James Laurinaitis, who came in the second round; cornerback Bradley Fletcher was a third-round pick, and defensive tackle Darell Scott was selected in the fourth round.

The Rams hope Laurinaitis will emerge as a starter in the middle, and be the quarterback of the defense. Scott should immediately be the backup, possibly to both tackles Adam Carriker and Clifton Ryan. Fletcher, who wasn't a fulltime starter until his senior season, will be competing for the nickel-back spot at the outset. Some of his competition will come from second-year player Justin King, who was making quick progress last year before seeing his season end because of a toe injury suffered in the first preseason game.

Of course, after Scott was picked, the draft switched back to defense, with the next three choices on that side of the ball.

After the draft was over, Spagnuolo joked about the way things went the defensive way after the drafting of Smith.

"I was thinking about that walking down here," he said. "Bang, bang, bang."

But, just like that (bang, bang, bang), it went in the other direction.

Said a smiling general manager Billy Devaney: "It was kind of a stealth (move). (He) never said it, but then all of a sudden the draft's going on, and I said, 'This thing's starting to get away from us. We've got to get some offensive guys.'"

Those offensive guys were fifth-round receiver Brooks Foster, sixth-round quarterback Keith Null and seventh-round running back Chris Ogbonnaya.

The bottom line is that Devaney and Spagnuolo knew they needed to add as many good players as possible.

When asked if there was anything the team wasn't able to accomplish in the draft, Devaney said, "I don't think so because we didn't come in over the last couple days saying we have to have or this is what we really have to have coming out of this. We're just hell-bent, as we said before, bringing in many good players that were going to be part of this process. It wasn't a case where we have to have one receiver, we have to have a quarterback, we have to take a tackle. It wasn't anything like that at all. So, we're like 31 other teams, we're pleased with the way it went.

"We missed on some guys; it never goes perfect. You get close to some guys and they get taken and you get (ticked) off, but that happens. It didn't happen that often. I think for the most part it went according to plan and overall we're really happy. Now we have to see if these guys can play, if we were right in our evaluation."