NFL Nation

          Rams will lean on youth for depth at defensive tackle

          OXNARD, Calif. -- The NFL draft is over, free agency is over and we are now in the clear, with nothing really big planned until, you know, football actually begins. For the Los Angeles Rams, it's a chance to come up for air after one of the most eventful offseasons in league history.

          Still, there are plenty of questions facing this team as we trudge toward the summer and wait for training camp to start. That's what we're here for in the weekly Twitter mailbag. As always, you can find me on Twitter @nwagoner or shoot me questions at any time using #Ramsmail.

          Let's get to your questions:

          @nwagoner: The short answer from my end is Westbrooks, at least this early in the offseason. He has more experience and is looking to transition inside on a a more regular basis moving forward. But I actually want to use this question as an opportunity to discuss an underlying issue for the Rams' defense: depth on the defensive line, particularly at tackle. They said goodbye to Nick Fairley in the offseason after using him as the primary backup to Michael Brockers and Aaron Donald a year ago. Clearly, Donald and Brockers remain the stalwarts at the position, but the Rams will have to lean heavily on some young, inexperienced options to provide the depth. The in-house options are Westbrooks, Trinca-Pasat, Doug Worthington and recently-added Dominique Easley. Westbrooks looks like the best bet to stick and land in the rotation, but the Rams took a flier on Easley in hopes that he can follow in the footsteps of Fairley. In other words, he's a former first-round pick who has something to prove and the Rams will give him the opportunity to do that in a reserve role if he can stay healthy and land on the roster. Trinca-Pasat is still an intriguing, high motor young player who will compete for a spot and Worthington spent some time on the roster last year. It's really an interesting group because most of the names deeper on the depth chart than the starters have been on a 53-man roster but haven't necessarily played a lot of snaps. The good news is, not much will be asked of the backups barring injury, but the Rams would love to have another youngster or two develop and contribute so they can go with their preferred rotation and not feel obligated to force the starters to play more snaps than necessary.

          @nwagoner: Barring some sort of crazy offer that the Rams couldn't pass up, I just don't see that happening. We've gone too far down the road here with Nick Foles to expect him to return and Keenum is still serving as the starting quarterback at the moment. Obviously, the Rams want Jared Goff to be the starter and I still think he'll win that job in time for the start of the regular season, but having Keenum around as insurance still makes more sense than potentially moving him for a mid-round or later pick. The plan for now seems to be to hang on to Foles (unless or until they get a trade offer) in order to protect themselves from possible injury. In the meantime, if injuries strike elsewhere, perhaps a market could form for him and they can get a late pick for him. Barring that, the Rams could release him but it probably won't happen right away. At the end of this, it's still quite likely that the Rams quarterbacks will be Goff, Keenum and Sean Mannion. It seems at this point only injuries could change that.