RAM NOTEBOOK : Cardinals Flocking to Sick Bay

There’s a distinction to be made between injuries being a part of the game and injuries taking a team apart.

The Phoenix Cardinals, the Ram opponent on Sunday barring any last-minute cancellations because of lack of players, are dropping at an uncommon rate.

Few in the league can easily explain the injury plague sweeping through the Arizona desert. The Cardinals even play their home games on grass.

At last count, Phoenix had listed 19 projected starters who have missed at least one game this season. For good reasons, the Card=inals devote nearly an entire page of their weekly press release to the subject, charting their injured players into categories of Projected Starter, Week Injured, Week(s) Missed, Surgery and Injury.

How bad is it? The Cardinals say only seven starters who have not missed a game because of injury. The team hasn’t fielded the same starting offensive lineup twice this season.

Still, Phoenix has managed a 5-5 record, no small feat under the circumstances.

“It’s been awfully hard, really,” Phoenix Coach Gene Stallings said Wednesday. “We’ve just sort of hung in there about as well as we possibly could. I think it’s a credit to the players and coaching staff and everybody that we’re still .500 at this point.”

The team has endured season-ending injuries to quarterback Neil Lomax (hip), running back Stump Mitchell (knee) and linebacker Randy Kirk (ankle).

Three more starters missed Sunday’s victory over Dallas, including J.T. Smith, the National Football League’s leading receiver, and left tackle Luis Sharpe.

Jim Everett’s back was still sore enough Wednesday to require further X-rays at Centinela Hospital Medical Center, although tests proved negative.

Everett said his back was feeling better and that the X-rays were precautionary, “to make sure there’s no real damage to it.”

Everett has been seeing a chiropractor, Robert Moore of Irvine, but doesn’t believe the injury is chronic.

“I don’t want to look too much into it,” Everett said.

The Ram quarterback missed Wednesday’s practice because of the injury, and didn’t return from Centinela until late afternoon.

“Traffic’s a pain,” Everett said, “especially when you’ve got a bad back.”

Roster move: Linebacker Mark Messner, the Rams’ sixth-round draft choice from Michigan, was released from the team’s developmental squad to make room for linebacker Brian Smith, the second-round choice from Auburn.

Smith remains on injured reserve at full salary, but under new NFL rules, he must be counted against the developmental squad once he resumes practicing, which Smith did Wednesday.

Ram Notes

Jim Everett, bad back and all, was named the NFC’s Offense Player of the Week for his performance in Sunday’s 31-10 victory over the New York Giants. The Ram quarterback completed 23 of 33 passes for 295 yards and two touchdowns, while setting a team record with 18 consecutive completions. Everett has moved up to third place among NFC passers with an 85.3 rating, trailing only Joe Montana (118.3) and Bobby Hebert (94.2). . . . The Rams meet the NFC’s Defensive Player of the Week, safety Tim McDonald, when the Phoenix Cardinals come to Anaheim Sunday. McDonald leads the NFL with six interceptions, returning one 53 yards last week in the Cardinals’ 24-20 victory over Dallas. McDonald was a second-round pick in 1987 who was available to the Rams when they selected Donald Evans. . . . Sunday’s victory did wonders for the Rams’ defensive numbers. They moved up seven places in total defense, from 26th to 19th, and have at long last surrendered last place in pass defense to the New York Jets, who now rank 28th. The Rams are 27th against the pass, but fourth against the run. . . . Jack Faulkner, Rams’ director of football operations, told a reporter last Thursday that the Rams would beat the Giants. Big deal? Faulkner said the score would be 31-10. And no, he doesn’t know next week’s Lotto numbers. . . . Everett and offensive tackle Irv Pankey, still nursing sore backs, didn’t practice Wednesday. Cornerback Darryl Henley was also excused to have a wisdom tooth removed. . . . If it never rains in Southern California, why are players continuing to slip and slide on the natural turf at Anaheim Stadium? Rams Coach John Robinson continues to wonder, hoping his words will get through to somebody with a rake and some dry Bermuda. “We’re very hopeful that if the rains let up here in Southern California, the field will get better,” he said. What rains? . . . A QB and a VP: Everett said the chiropractor who’s treating him, Robert Moore, is cracking Vice President Dan Quayle’s back today. . . . Phoenix Coach Gene Stallings refuses to say whether Gary Hogeboom or Tom Tupa will start at quarterback against the Rams. “It doesn’t make all that much difference,” Stallings said.