We asked 4for4 Scout at 101 ESPN in St. Louis to give us his thoughts on Isaiah Pead's performance against the Packers on Saturday night:
Isaiah Pead's night was largely a wash. On his first carry of the game, he got to the edge with purpose while picking up 9 yards. Later in the first half, he caught a dump-off pass from Sam Bradford, made a nice move to shake a defender on the sidelines, and picked up 10 yards in the process. But on the very next play, he chose to bounce a run outside instead of following his guard through the hole, which resulted in a loss of a yard instead of a potential gain. Despite starting and playing the majority of the first half, he converted his 12 touches into just 29 total yards while failing to make much of an impact. And while some of that can be blamed on the Rams' shoddy run-blocking, Daryl Richardson continues to run with more decisiveness and remains the favorite to start early in the season.
That said, there was one takeaway from Pead's night that you won't find on the stat sheet. He did a great job picking up the blitz on two separate pass plays in the first half, including on Bradford's 57-yard completion to Chris Givens in the first quarter. Seeing as how blitz pickup has been a problem for Pead this offseason, at least he shined in that area on Saturday night.
The Rams RB situation is being closely monitored by fantasy owners this preseason. At this point, it appears as if Richardson is well ahead of Pead, while Zac Stacy is an afterthought. While there is some risk here, Richardson is looking like a nice RB3 with some upside in the 6th/7th round. Pead can be had cheaply in the later rounds.
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