What was the Rams’ plan with Tutu Atwell?

Following a hamstring injury back in Week 7, the Los Angeles Rams placed wide receiver Tutu Atwell on injured reserve. However, Atwell was not placed on IR right away and the team waited until prior to Week 9 to actually do so. The injury was something that Atwell re-aggravated and it caused him to miss the next four games.

Atwell was slated to make his return in Week 13 against the Carolina Panthers via the team website and team reporter Stu Jackson. Despite being eligible to return and being activated into the 21-day practice window, Atwell was not brought up to the active roster from injured reserve. According to Adam Grosbard of the LA Daily News, there is a possibility that Atwell isn’t activated off of IR at the end of his 21-day practice window. Said McVay,

“We haven’t gone down that road yet but there are a number of things, like what we’ve talked about. I have a lot of love for him and what he’s done and how he’s handled it. It’s been a unique set of circumstances relative to the timing and figuring out how you get 48 guys up and being able to balance that out relative to how many on offense, how many on defense and your three specialists. That’s not something that we’ve explored or really thought is a possibility, but you never know.”

The circumstances around Atwell is certainly odd to say the least. NFL teams can designate up to eight players to return for the regular season and if that team makes the playoffs, they get two more. The Rams have currently used just one of those spots on Ahkello Witherspoon. They will also likely at least use two more on Tyler Higbee and Quentin Lake when they get healthy. Even if the Rams were to activate Rob Havenstein, they would still have 4-6 more IR activations available.

It’s not as if the Rams are scrambling when it comes to IR activations. While the offense has managed without Atwell, he’s still one of the more dynamic playmakers in the offense. Even with the Rams running more 12 and 13 personnel, Atwell still brings a unique deep threat ability and is better in that role than Xavier Smith.

This all goes back to the question of why the Rams brought Tutu Atwell back in the offseason. It’s not as if Atwell was being used when he was healthy. The Rams wide receiver has four receptions on nine targets. Even when he was healthy, he was fourth in the pecking order behind Jordan Whittington. Whittington was out-snapping Atwell on passing snaps 123 to 116.

During the offseason, the Rams signed Atwell to a one-year, $10 million deal that was fully guaranteed. While Atwell was signed before Davante Adams, McVay admitted in April that he hadn’t done a good enough job utilizing him and said that he would be on the field more. However, the exact opposite has happened.

[As I noted back in...