INGLEWOOD, Calif. (AP) — The Los Angeles Rams chose Alabama quarterback Ty Simpson with the 13th overall pick in the draft on Thursday night, making a bold move to secure their eventual successor to NFL MVP Matthew Stafford.
Rams general manager Les Snead made a first-round pick for only the second time in the past decade — and he turned in a shocker by taking Simpson, who wasn't considered a first-round talent on some draft boards.
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Alabama quarterback Ty Simpson poses on the red carpet before the first round of the NFL football draft, Thursday, April 23, 2026, in Pittsburgh. (AP Photo/Gene J. Puskar)
Alabama quarterback Ty Simpson poses on the red carpet before the first round of the NFL football draft, Thursday, April 23, 2026, in Pittsburgh. (AP Photo/Gene J. Puskar)
Alabama quarterback Ty Simpson poses after being chosen by the Los Angeles Rams with the 13th overall pick during the first round of the NFL football draft, Thursday, April 23, 2026, in Pittsburgh. (AP Photo/Gene J. Puskar)
Alabama quarterback Ty Simpson poses with NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell after being chosen by the Los Angeles Rams with the 13th overall pick during the first round of the NFL football draft, Thursday, April 23, 2026, in Pittsburgh. (AP Photo/Gene J. Puskar)
“The fact that an organization like the Los Angeles Rams believed in me and took a chance on me is just something that I’m so grateful for,” Simpson said.
Simpson was a starter for only one season with the Crimson Tide, passing for 3,567 yards and leading them to the Rose Bowl after three seasons as a backup. Now he'll have to compete with Stetson Bennett to begin his NFL career as the backup to Stafford, according to Rams coach Sean McVay.
“Let’s make one thing clear: This is Matthew’s team,” McVay said.
This pick was a stunner on several fronts.
After winning his first MVP award, the 38-year-old Stafford has already announced he is returning to the Rams next season, and perhaps longer. Simpson also said he had almost no contact with the Rams prior to the draft, leaving him just as surprised as the Rams' fans.
When asked what he liked most about Simpson's game, Snead curiously cited “the perseverance that you have when you go through hard things," namely Simpson's three years as a backup to Bryce Young and Jalen Milroe, followed by the Crimson Tide's progression from a season-opening loss to the College Football Playoff last season.
McVay was also measured in his praise of Simpson, only saying that Alabama's offense under offensive coordinator Ryan Grubb has similarities to the Rams' schemes. The 6-foot-1 Simpson doesn’t have the arm strength or size of many top NFL quarterbacks, but the Rams will have a vacancy behind Stafford if Jimmy Garoppolo decides to retire.
“(We) get a chance to be able to address the backup quarterback,” McVay said. "But there was a lot of players that we liked, and there was a lot of thought that kind of went into it.”
Indeed, analysts and fans widely thought the Rams would add a No. 3 receiver — like Makai Lemon, the star Southern California wideout who was still on the board — or an offensive lineman, not a quarterback who won't play in 2026 if everything is going well.
The pick didn't seem like an intuitive move in the Rams' desire to maximize the rest of their time with Stafford, who hasn't committed beyond this season, his 17th.
Snead said it's not that simple.
“I hate sitting here and going, ‘You’re a player away in a draft from going to the Super Bowl,'" Snead said. “At the end of the day, what we want to accomplish in the draft and any acquisitions that we have is try to engineer as confident a team as possible, and then let’s go to work. … I don’t want to sit here and it’s April and say, ‘OK, we draft one player and let’s go to the Super Bowl.’ There is a lot of work to do between now and then.”
Although the Rams finished one game shy of the Super Bowl last year following their eighth winning season in nine years under McVay, they still had the 13th pick from Atlanta after a draft-day trade one year ago. McVay referred to the 13th selection as “basically ... an extra pick,” seemingly saying the Rams felt free to take a flyer on the second-best quarterback in the draft rather than taking a lesser risk.
Snead rarely picks in the first round, repeatedly moving his top selections for veteran talent or trading back. Los Angeles' only previous first-round pick since Jared Goff in 2016 was Jared Verse, the AP Defensive Rookie of the Year chosen 19th overall in 2024.
Snead repeated his belief that the Rams have no urgent roster needs after a 12-5 regular season and two playoff victories before a heartbreaking loss to Seattle in the NFC championship game — and he apparently used that strength to take a flyer on his possible quarterback of the future earlier than anybody expected.
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Alabama quarterback Ty Simpson poses on the red carpet before the first round of the NFL football draft, Thursday, April 23, 2026, in Pittsburgh. (AP Photo/Gene J. Puskar)
Alabama quarterback Ty Simpson poses on the red carpet before the first round of the NFL football draft, Thursday, April 23, 2026, in Pittsburgh. (AP Photo/Gene J. Puskar)
Alabama quarterback Ty Simpson poses after being chosen by the Los Angeles Rams with the 13th overall pick during the first round of the NFL football draft, Thursday, April 23, 2026, in Pittsburgh. (AP Photo/Gene J. Puskar)
Alabama quarterback Ty Simpson poses with NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell after being chosen by the Los Angeles Rams with the 13th overall pick during the first round of the NFL football draft, Thursday, April 23, 2026, in Pittsburgh. (AP Photo/Gene J. Puskar)
SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — North Korea said Tuesday its latest missile tests involved a new weapons system of “great significance,” with photos indicating it launched a missile previously described as hypersonic.
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un said the weapon’s development would strengthen the country’s war readiness and give its enemies an “incurable headache,” the North’s official Korean Central News Agency said. He did not describe what the weapon was.
Kim observed Sunday’s tests with his teenage daughter, widely seen as a potential successor.
South Korea’s military detected North Korea firing two short-range missiles three hours apart from the eastern coastal Wonsan area Sunday. South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff said the missiles flew about 450 and 600 kilometers (280 miles and 370 miles) toward the sea, while Japan’s military said they landed in waters outside the country’s exclusive economic zone.
The launches extended a recent run in military displays, including live-fire exercises and the commissioning of a new warship, as Kim continues to flaunt his growing nuclear program despite U.S. calls to revive diplomacy.
Following years of intensified testing, Kim now has an extensive arsenal of nuclear-capable missiles, including long-range weapons potentially capable of reaching the U.S. mainland and shorter-range systems designed to overwhelm missile defenses in South Korea and Japan.
Among the weapons North Korea has tested in recent years are various missile systems fitted with purported hypersonic weapons, which are designed to travel at more than five times the speed of sound. Their speed and maneuverability are intended to help them evade regional missile defenses, but some experts have questioned whether they have consistently reached the speeds claimed by the North during tests.
KCNA’s photos of Sunday’s tests showed what appeared to be two missiles tipped with conical, finned vehicles being fired from launcher trucks. Kim is seen looking at a monitoring screen that identifies the missile as a Hwasong-11Ma, a system North Korea has previously described as hypersonic.
Graphics on the screen showed a missile trajectory overlaid on a map, along with figures for a speed of 2,146 meters (1.3 miles) per second, an altitude of 35.8 kilometers (22 miles) and a range of 908.2 kilometers (564 miles). The reported distance exceeded the flight range announced by South Korea’s military. Jang Do-young, a spokesperson for South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff, said the military was assessing the details from the North Korean report and cautioned that the North’s claims about missile capabilities “cannot be 100% trusted.”
The launches were the latest in a series of weapons demonstrations by North Korea even after U.S. President Donald Trump scaled back a joint military exercise with South Korea last month in an apparent effort to revive diplomacy with Kim, who has called such drills invasion rehearsals. Kim’s sister and senior official, Kim Yo Jong, dismissed Trump’s overture, saying that shortening the drill would not change its “provocative, aggressive nature.”
North Korea has a long history of ratcheting up pressure on South Korea when it doesn’t get what it wants from the United States, and Kim Jong Un has recently taken a particularly hostile stance toward Seoul, suspending virtually all inter-Korean cooperation and dialogue and declaring the South a permanent enemy.
In a written response to questions by The Associated Press, liberal South Korean President Lee Jae Myung, who favors engagement with the North, expressed hope Tuesday that a resumption of Trump-Kim diplomacy would help reopen dialogue between the two Koreas. He called for a practical, step-by-step approach to North Korea’s denuclearization, with incentives offered as Pyongyang makes progress toward eliminating its nuclear weapons.
Emboldened by his advancing nuclear arsenal and deepening ties with Russia and China, experts say Kim likely sees himself as having greater leverage in any renewed diplomacy with Trump. His government has said Washington must first drop its “hostile policy” — a term Pyongyang mainly uses to describe U.S.-led sanctions and joint U.S.-South Korea military drills — and abandon demands for North Korea’s denuclearization as a precondition for talks.
In this photo provided Tuesday, Sept. 22, 2026, by the North Korean government, its leader Kim Jong Un, center right, watches missile tests in an undisclosed location, North Korea Sunday, Sept. 20, 2026. Independent journalists were not given access to cover the event depicted in this image distributed by the North Korean government. The content of this image is as provided and cannot be independently verified. Korean language watermark on image as provided by source reads: "KCNA" which is the abbreviation for Korean Central News Agency. (Korean Central News Agency/Korea News Service via AP)
In this photo provided Tuesday, Sept. 22, 2026, by the North Korean government, its leader Kim Jong Un, center right, watches missile tests in an undisclosed location, North Korea Sunday, Sept. 20, 2026. Independent journalists were not given access to cover the event depicted in this image distributed by the North Korean government. The content of this image is as provided and cannot be independently verified. Korean language watermark on image as provided by source reads: "KCNA" which is the abbreviation for Korean Central News Agency. (Korean Central News Agency/Korea News Service via AP)
FILE - In this photo provided by the North Korean government, its leader Kim Jong Un attends a parade with his daughter in Pyongyang, North Korea, on Feb. 25, 2026 as the North wrapped up the Workers' Party congress. Independent journalists were not given access to cover the event depicted in this image distributed by the North Korean government. The content of this image is as provided and cannot be independently verified. Korean language watermark on image as provided by source reads: "KCNA" which is the abbreviation for Korean Central News Agency. (Korean Central News Agency/Korea News Service via AP, File)
A TV screen shows a file image of a North Korean missile launch during a news program at Seoul Railway Station in Seoul, South Korea, Sunday, Sept. 20, 2026. (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)
