Rams Know Physical Style Is Oilers’ Ticket

Houston Coach Jerry Glanville is in town, which means all kinds of fun and football games such as leaving 50-yard line tickets at will call for deceased entertainers.

Last week at Memphis, where the Oilers were playing the New England Patriots, Glanville, as a joke, left two seats for Elvis Presley.

When the Oilers go to Indianapolis for their season opener Sept. 4, Glanville says he’ll leave two at the gate for James Dean, the late actor.

“He grew up 100 miles from there,” Glanville said this week.

So what about tonight’s exhibition game with the Rams at Anaheim Stadium?

The best Glanville could come up with is free tickets for singer Robert Goulet, who is very much alive, though perhaps trying to resurrect his career.

“He came here to town and I had a real nice visit with him,” Glanville said. “He was here doing his musical. The man can sing, can’t he? He was a showstopper.”

This, of course, is the lighter side of Glanville, the man in black, who can aw shucks you to death with his drawl and homespun humor. Glanville is also the coach who led the Oilers into the National Football League playoffs last season for the first time since 1980. The jokes seem to come easier when you’re winning.

Yet, this is the same coach who was pulled aside by Pittsburgh Steelers Coach Chuck Noll after a game last year and lectured in full view of cameras about the Oilers’ alleged cheap-shot tactics.

The Rams have their own memories. In the first exhibition game of 1986, then-safety Bo Eason essentially ended quarterback Dieter Brock’s career on a first-quarter blitz. Eason came low and hard, taking Brock’s knee with him.

At the time, Ram Coach John Robinson was livid, not only about the location of the tackle, but also because the Oilers were blitzing that early. It was thought Glanville had broken a coaching code of honor concerning meaningless exhibition games and their effect on player attrition.

Brock’s injury probably expedited negotiations for quarterback Jim Everett, the first-round pick the Oilers couldn’t sign that year.

But Robinson hasn’t forgotten the Brock incident. He chooses his words carefully when discussing the Oilers.

“This team plays the way they’re going to play all the time, so they have a standard that you have an expectation of,” Robinson said.

So the Rams are ready this time?

“Check with me Saturday night,” Robinson said.

It should be noted that Robinson is holding tailback Charles White out of this game. White suffered bruised ribs last week but would have started tonight had this been the regular season, Robinson said.

Maybe the coach thought White, had he played, might have ended up on Glanville’s next ticket list?

Interestingly, Glanville said he interviewed with Robinson for an assistant coaching position in 1983 and shares many of the Ram coach’s philosophies.

“I was so impressed in what he believed in physically,” Glanville said. “It was refreshing for me to be interviewed, because he believes in the same things I did as an assistant. Maybe that’s why he was interviewing me at the time. He’s one of the only coaches I’ve ever talked to that really wants the secondary to be involved in the hitting and stopping the run game.”

Ram Notes

The Rams are reportedly close to making a deal to send wide receiver Ron Brown to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. The hitch is, in the NFL, you trade contracts, not players, so the Rams must sign Brown to Tampa Bay’s terms and then trade his contract to the Buccaneers. According to the Tampa Tribune, the Rams are more interested in obtaining players than draft choices in exchange for Brown, who retired in April to pursue a track career. Some of the names mentioned are defensive end John Cannon, nose tackle Dan Sileo, linebacker Chris Washington and defensive end Ron Holmes. . . . Holmes was the team’s first-round pick in 1985 and had 8 sacks in 10 games last year. He’s making $280,000 this season, a figure that might also have to be renegotiated in a Ram trade. . . . With Charles White out tonight, the Rams figure to take a long look at tailbacks Gaston Green and Greg Bell. Bell, who came to the Rams from the Buffalo Bills in the three-team Eric Dickerson deal, has been impressive this summer, averaging 4.1 yards per carry. Bell is a former No. 1 pick who has not always lived up to the billing. “He’s been an enigma,” Robinson said. “There are sides of him that are talented. Others question his desire to play. But he’s been fine. I can’t think of anything negative about him.” Bell may have changed some minds about keeping just two tailbacks, White and Green. . . . .Houston quarterback Warren Moon has played only the first series of his team’s first two exhibition games, but is expected to go much longer tonight. . . . Fullback Alonzo Highsmith will make his debut after missing the first two games with knee problems. . . . The Rams have released cornerbacks Ledell Glenn and Darren Lambert, tackles Jerry Maynard and Erick Johnson and nose tackle Anthony Hudson. . . . The team, with 79 players in camp, must reduce to 60 by Tuesday.