NFL PREVIEW 1988 : Ram Youth Movement Ready to Come of Age : Everett’s Mastery of Offense, Changes in Defense May Get Results This Season
The Rams moved quickly after last year’s staging of Dickerson’s Follies, assuming a new attitude of zero tolerance. Basically, the front office went at the old roster with garden shears.
No one can accuse the Rams of taking their 6-9 season lightly. You wanted action, season-ticket holders?
OK, for starters, replace 16 faces from last year’s opening-day roster. Sixteen . Include on the list seven rookie draft choices and one rookie free agent.
Also, say goodby to Nolan Cromwell, Dennis Harrah, Reggie Doss, David Hill, Hugh Millen, Steve Dils, Kevin House, Ron Brown and Donald Evans.
Say hello to the young bunch: Flipper Anderson, Gaston Green, Aaron Cox, Robert Delpino, James Washington, Fred Strickland, Anthony Newman--IDs required at all liquor stores.
Followers will be hard-pressed to find an honest-to-goodness, old-time Ram hero, unless it’s someone like 34-year-old linebacker Carl Ekern, who boldly fought off the charge of youth to save his job.
The whole movement is making even 26-year-olds feel old.
“I was looking at my rookie team picture a couple of nights ago,” receiver Michael Young said, reflecting all the way back to 1985. “Where did all those guys go?”
One went to Indianapolis (Eric Dickerson), another for a long run on a short track (Brown). Others just faded away.
These are new Rams, shiny Rams, squeaky-clean Rams. Maybe not Super Bowl Rams, though. These Rams are mostly young, talented and as green as Gaston. Thanks to the Dickerson trade, the Rams took 5 of the first 47 players in the college draft. Next year, they have the same deal.
The Rams figure it was the next-best thing to hitting the Lotto.
Gone also from last year’s opener are lingering contract headaches, holdouts, walkouts and lockouts. Guard Tom Newberry made a brave 34-day stand during training camp and actually came back with more money in his pocket. He played a half against the Chargers last week and pronounced himself fit, pretty much denouncing training camp as an archaic ritual.
This summer, there were some areas that were brighter shades of gray.
Two Rams--quarterback Jim Everett and cornerback LeRoy Irvin--have matured a bit, one technically, the other emotionally.
After a bitter contract dispute that somehow ended in July with handshakes and a three-year extension, Irvin returns to his corner on defense, determined to reclaim all that was lost in 1987, which was pretty much everything.
“I’m sick about what happened last year,” said Irvin, who is handing out apologies like gumdrops.
First, though, Everett and the offense:
Everett, who is entering his third season, did as much off-season footwork as one of the Dirty Dancers.
When offensive coordinator Ernie Zampese set eyes on Everett last year, he told him forget everything he had ever learned about being a quarterback. It was like telling Roger Clemens to forget everything he knew about pitching.
Everett wasn’t exactly chopped liver when he came to the Rams in 1986. He could have flashed Zampese his first-round draft card.
But Everett was not a Zampese-type quarterback.
“He’d been a deep-drop passer with a lot of arm,” Zampese said. “He liked to gun the ball in there. It’s a different style.”
Zampese’s style was more a five-step drop-and-throw. For reference, please see film clips of Dan Fouts.
Last year Everett seemed to be a man caught between styles, and it showed in his quarterback rating (68.4). So during the winter, he went to work on his five-step.
“It was just working on mechanics, moving his feet, sliding in the pocket,” Zampese said. “Now you don’t see his legs spreading out when he throws. It just becomes habit.”
Everett hopes to become a five-step addict. In the exhibition season, he completed 65% of his passes for 650 yards and 6 touchdowns. The Rams averaged 327 yards on offense in 5 exhibition games. Everett gives at least half the credit to his new offense, featuring such faces as rookie receivers Anderson and Cox, veteran tight end Pete Holohan, rookie tailback Green, veteran tailback Greg Bell and fullback Buford McGee.
Life is a breeze when you can throw to someone other than Henry Ellard once in a while.
“Why do you think I’m much more comfortable?” Everett said. “We have the type of people this year that know how to run our offense. Pete Holohan raises the expectations at tight end 10-fold from last year. I’m not ripping on anybody that was here, I’m just talking about expectation levels. . . . Henry was the most consistent receiver we had. That’s no secret. I’m sure teams will double team him this year, and that will leave Flip and Aaron open for big plays, which is fine.”
These Rams are a team that figures to have multiple looks and to rotate as many as 16 or 17 players into the offensive game plan. These Rams will no longer ask one running back to carry the team in or out of the playoffs.
This is the year of the three-headed tailback, with Charles White, Bell and Green being asked to share the load in the backfield.
On the showroom floor, at least, this year’s Ram model perhaps is not a team for the thin-skinned. Youth has its place and its price.
“It’s hard to be considered a contender when you have so many new faces,” Irvin said. “Most teams that are contenders are more stable. But we were able to get good young talent to help us.”
Most believe the Rams are a team of the future, that all those Dickerson draft picks are going to pay off.
For now, they’re very much a team of mystery, even to their head coach.
“I think there’s a genuine excitement and curiosity about ourselves,” John Robinson said. “I think we’ll be interesting to watch. We’ll have our ups and downs. We’re not very predictable.”
The Rams were always that, at least, on offense and defense.
On defense, where the Rams slipped from fifth overall in 1986 to 21st last season, all hands reached for the panic button.
Surviving and succeeding for years with a basic zone defense, the Rams have made changes to get someone to breathe heavily on the opponent’s quarterback. Veteran Gary Jeter led the Rams last year with seven sacks.
Ram coaches, realizing that their best pass rushers are all linebackers, finally emerged with something called “Eagle,” a defense that puts five linebackers on the field at once.
More important, it gets the team’s three outside linebackers--Mel Owens, Mike Wilcher and Kevin Greene--on the field more often.
They’ll throw the kitchen sink at opponents this year, hoping to catch and keep offenses off-balance.
In fact, the Rams won’t be satisfied until the Eagle has landed in Joe Montana’s backfield, which would amount to one giant leap for Ramkind.
As defensive coordinator Fritz Shurmur put it, you don’t fall 16 rungs on the NFL’s ladder and not feel the pain.
“It affected all of us,” Shurmur said. “We made it a point never to let it happen again. That’s the way we attacked it. And we think we have corrected some of those things.”
The summer reviews were mostly four stars. And no one has been more affected by the change than Greene, who has acted like the second coming of Lawrence Taylor.
In five exhibition games, Greene had 5 sacks for minus-44 yards, 5 pass deflections, 1 interception and 7 tackles.
“All of a sudden, Kevin Greene becomes a dominant player,” Shurmur said.
Greene, with a football personality best described as maniacal, refuses to take credit for anything he has done that doesn’t count in the standings.
“We haven’t accomplished anything yet,” he said. “There’s no money in the bank. Sunday, we go back to square one.”
Would Greene admit, though, that this aggressive defense is much to his liking?
“I’ve got one job and one job only,” Greene said. “That’s to kill the quarterback.”
With more blitzes, the defense also figures to be more dangerous, exposing Ram defenders in more one-on-one coverages. It means that the Rams must get career seasons out of cornerback Irvin, linebacker Mark Jerue and strong safety Vince Newsome, in particular.
“Those are huge issues,” Shurmur said.
So far, those players haven’t disappointed. Irvin has seemingly regained a leadership role. Jerue appears to have recovered from major knee surgery and Newsome seems at full strength after a season plagued by nagging injuries and the death of his father in a carpentry accident.
The support group in the secondary, safety Michael Stewart especially, gives Shurmur more confidence that his defense will work.
“I’d be very surprised if we didn’t come out of the chute fast,” he said.
The Rams have a chance. Their first three opponents--Green Bay, Detroit, the Raiders--were a cumulative 14-30-1 in 1987. If you care to throw in the fourth opponent, the New York Giants, the numbers jump to 20-39-1. Of course, many expect a comeback year for the Giants, although the Rams will not have to deal with All-Pro linebacker Taylor, who--darn the luck--will just be finishing up a 30-day drug suspension.
