Kevin Greene Expects Sackful of Success for Rams This Season
It’s mid-August and linebacker Kevin Greene is already putting on his game face. It’s a frightening face, not unlike those pinned up on post office walls.
Greene’s eyes open wide as saucers as he warns visitors not to bring up events of the past, as if his were sordid or controversial.
Hardly. Greene emerged from nowhere last season--ask about half a dozen opposing quarterbacks--to the brink of stardom in the National Football League.
His 16 1/2 sacks were second in the league only to the prime-time minister himself, defensive end Reggie White of the Philadelphia Eagles, who had 18.
Greene’s is an ultimate success story. He is a former intramural flag football player who walked on at the University of Auburn and rose steadily from the depths of the depth chart. He was the Rams’ fifth-round pick in 1985 and flourished last season when the team converted to the attacking Eagle defense, a five-linebacker scheme tailor-made for Greene’s skills as an outside pass rusher.
“Those are your attackers,” Coach John Robinson said of his backers. “Those are the guys who are screaming at you. And we felt Kevin was a screamer.”
Greene had more sacks in 1988 than Lawrence Taylor’s 15.5, Bruce Smith’s 11, Richard Dent’s 10 1/2 and Cornelius Bennett’s 9 1/2.
Yet, Greene, who spends part of his off-seasons crawling out of foxholes as a captain in the Army Reserve, claims he has already blipped last year from his radar screen.
“Of course it was satisfying,” Greene says between bites and gulps of training-camp chow. “It was a good time. I had a lot of fun last year. But I don’t want to talk about last year anymore. So many people are asking me about last year. That’s over with.
“I’m looking from here on. Sixteen-and-a-half sacks are under the bridge, compared to what’s coming up here in the next couple weeks? You know what I mean?”
Yes sir.
“I really don’t want to talk about it anymore,” he says. “I can’t keep talking about this.”
Greene, was promoted to this higher rank by Robinson after a few years of special teams--football’s version of KP. He says he never kept track of other players last season. His orders are to attack the opposing quarterback as often as possible, not compile statistics like some company clerk.
“I didn’t even think about it,” he says. “Nope. I didn’t. I feel like I can be a dominant player in this league regardless of who else is a dominant player. You say Reggie White, whoever. I feel Kevin Greene can be a dominant player. To beat out Lawrence Taylor, am I supposed to freak out on that?”
Robinson realized a few years ago he had a live wire in Greene, who listens to old war songs before games just to set the mood.
It was that sort of talent and devotion that moved Robinson to experiment with the Eagle, which might lead Greene and Mike Wilcher on clearer paths to the quarterback.
Robinson could almost predict big things for Greene if all went as planned.
“I still lit candles and all that stuff,” Robinson said. “But it’s the design. We expect him to have a better year, he and Wilcher both. Maybe it’s exceeding our expectations, but not our hopes.”
Greene is off to another fast start--”Right on target,” as he calls it. He sacked Denver’s John Elway twice in the first quarter last Saturday night, chasing the Broncos’ million-dollar investment to the bench.
As usual, Greene completed another two week, off-season stint of active duty at Ft. Knox in Kentucky. He says it’s a good way to get ready for a war or a season.
“I’m very patriotic,” Greene says. “I like the discipline, the regimen, following orders.”
Unlike some players, who have to be lassoed and dragged to training camp, Greene came to California a month early, just to work out the kinks and soak up the scenery. Days before veterans were due in, he could be found prowling the sidelines as rookies practiced, waiting for the second he could fasten his chin strap.
“Football training camp is a pain in the butt,” he says. “But we’re still living the dream.”
By all rights, Greene’s dream should include a few more decimal points. Like a good soldier, though, he’s playing out the last year of a $250,000 contract, peanuts compared to the millions Taylor and Smith and White are fighting over.
Greene bites his upper lip and lets loose his best maniacal stare.
“I’ll get my dues when it’s time,” he says.
As if Greene’s in this game just for the money.
“I’m living a dream, man,” he says. “That’s all I can say. Are you kidding? Kids growing up would give their left arm to be here.”
Ram Notes
With Fred Strickland out with a knee injury and the team a little thin at inside linebacker to begin with, Coach John Robinson has moved second-round choice Frank Stams inside in some alignments. “We’re anxious to get him in an area where he can help us the most this year,” Robinson said. “Whether he stays there for long term I don’t know.” Stams, from Notre Dame, was drafted as an outside linebacker. . . . Free agent Richard Ashe, who was making great strides as a blocking tight end, will be out another week with a sprained ankle. There was more bad news at Tuesday’s evening practice when Gary Knudson, the team’s only healthy tight end, was carried off the field with a lower back strain. Linebacker Mel Owens also missed practice with a back strain. Free-agent receiver Brian Hawkins left the field on a cart after suffering a hamstring pull.
