Countdown to Camp: Rams tight ends aim to turn experience into more 13-personnel leverage

The Los Angeles Rams are entering training camp with a clear theme shaping their tight ends room: depth and experience at the position were central to a mid-season offensive pivot that, by the numbers, paid off. In the seventh and final installment of the team’s Countdown to Camp series, the Rams frame their tight end group as a building block for the way they used 13 personnel last season, when they increased reliance on sets featuring two tight ends rather than simply defaulting to more conventional groupings.

The Rams’ 13 personnel shift is not treated as a one-off wrinkle. According to the team’s write-up, Next Gen Stats credited Los Angeles with leading the league in 13-personnel usage rate by a wide margin after the adjustment took hold. That is the operational point of emphasis heading into camp: once the team could trust its tight end depth to execute the run game roles and pass protection responsibilities that 13 personnel tends to demand, the Rams could use the formation more consistently and build it into their in-game rhythm.

In practical terms, 13 personnel asks a lot of the tight end position. A group that can comfortably stay on schedule as a blocker, threaten as a receiver, and communicate effectively with the rest of the formation gives a coordinator more freedom to repeat concepts without changing personnel every few plays. The Rams’ series entry ties last year’s formation success directly to having “deep and experienced” tight ends, suggesting that reliability, not just talent, made the broader tactical change sustainable.

Training camp will be where that reliability gets tested at full speed, because the benefit of 13 personnel does not come from the label. It comes from how quickly a tight end group can coordinate movements at the snap, pick up coverage and blitz indicators, and maintain leverage in the run game. The Rams’ framing implies that these are the areas the staff will want to see again from day one, especially as opponents learn the tendencies that emerge from a higher share of two-tight-end sets.

The team’s approach also reflects a larger NFL reality: formations are often treated as indicates to defenders, and high-volume usage raises expectations. Once opponents understand that a team can repeatedly line up in 13 personnel and still create value across run and pass, those defenses can begin to adjust coverage structures and pressure packages specifically to the tight end matchup. For Los Angeles, the question is whether the tight end group can continue to produce enough efficiency in those moments to justify the formation frequency.

Camp reps will therefore matter less for dramatic, standalone moments and more for consistent execution across the run game, pass protection, and route coordination responsibilities typically layered into tight end work. The Rams’ series language emphasizes experience and depth as the foundation for what they did last season, and that suggests the team is aiming to preserve the trust that allowed the mid-season pivot in the first place.

The story arc to watch is whether Los Angeles can translate last season’s 13-personnel advantage into continued flexibility, not by changing its identity every week but by sustaining it. If the tight ends room can reliably support the formation’s demands, the Rams should be able to keep using 13 as a base platform, forcing opponents to spend their defensive answers on a package Los Angeles is already proven capable of deploying.