Rams Master Draft in Reverse : Pro Football: They’ve busted in the first round recently, but struck it rich later on.

If the federal courts ever abolish the National Football League’s draft system for being unjust, they might hang the majority opinion around the Rams’ neck.

The team that promised to rebuild its team with draft choices after the Eric Dickerson trade has effectively done so, although the Rams appear to have been working with the draft board turned upside down.

While the team has wasted millions on failed first picks such as Mike Schad, Donald Evans and perhaps Gaston Green, the Rams have saved face by re-stocking their starting lineup with lower-level choices.

What gives?

“This draft must be all screwed up,” Coach John Robinson said jokingly, for lack of a better explanation. “We got the wrong guys. . . . I can’t give you an analysis of that, although it’s a legitimate subject.”

Example: The Rams blew their 1986 first-round pick on Schad, a tackle, but scored big on round two with guard Tom Newberry, a consensus All-Pro. Schad was left unprotected after the 1988 season and now starts for Philadelphia.

Example: In 1987, the Rams used their first pick on defensive end Evans, the incredible reach (as in odds, not wingspan) from Winston-Salem State. He’s no longer in the league. However, three lower-round choices from that draft are Ram starters: cornerback Cliff Hicks (third round), linebacker Larry Kelm (fourth round) and safety Michael Stewart (eighth round).

Evans, to whom the Rams paid good money in the hope he would be a pass-rush specialist, was cut last season to make room for a free-agent pass-rush specialist, Brett Farynairz.

Example: The Rams used the 14th overall choice in 1988 on UCLA tailback Gaston Green. Yet, it’s Robert Delpino, the team’s fifth-round pick that year, who’s making a huge impact. Mike Piel, a third-round choice in 1988, has recently moved in as a starter at right defensive end.

Do blunders turned wonders ever cease?

No.

This year’s unexplainable pick is Alabama linebacker George Bethune, a seventh-round choice who has overcome the odds to become an effective player in the Rams’ pass rush package.

Bethune’s chances of making the team in training camp bordered on the absurd. The Rams, who already had three outstanding outside linebackers--Kevin Greene, Mel Owens and Mike Wilcher--used second-round picks on two more outside linebackers: Frank Stams of Notre Dame and Auburn’s Brian Smith.

Stams figures to be a big-time player someday, but Smith remains on injured reserve with a wrist injury linked intimately to his lack of progress.

Bethune, in fact, has more quarterback sacks, one, than this year’s first-round pick, defensive tackle Bill Hawkins.

“When I first came up here for training camp, I came here to make a little money to pay for my tuition next year,” Bethune said. “I wasn’t expecting to make it. Now that I’m here, and I can see I can play, who knows? I’m very shocked.

“Every day I come over here and I walk in, I check the locker room and I make sure my name’s still up there, because this is a very strange job. You can’t really take nothing serious here.”

If you did, you’d lose sleep over a disproportionate pay scale that rewards nonproductive top-round picks and penalizes the overachievers, whose only financial recourse for unexpected success is a training camp holdout, a tactic almost always squashed by Ram management.

But why isn’t Delpino ($333,500 for three years) worth as much as Green ($1.85 million for four) if he’s outplaying him? Is it Delpino’s fault the Rams wasted $240,000 on Donald Evans’ signing bonus alone?

Naturally, everyone has a theory. Robinson says some of his top picks--Hawkins, Smith, Cleveland Gary--were slowed considerably by contract hassles that led to late signings.

Robinson didn’t need to wait for the follow-up question.

“That doesn’t explain Gaston Green or someone else,” he said. “I’m not sure. Delpino and Green play different positions, and Green came in here and had (Greg) Bell and Charlie White to deal with. At the time we didn’t think Bell would do much, then he has the great year.”

Piel says the problem with the draft is that scouting departments rely too heavily on combine scores to evaluate talent.

“All the draft combine does is put numbers on the board and it’s added up,” he said. “And whoever’s got the best numbers is drafted higher. They should go off how the guy plays on film. You see guys who come in here that are just huge and you say, ‘Oh, man.’ Then when he gets the pads on. . . . “

Nothing.

The Rams made that mistake with Schad and Evans, exceptional athletes when it came to vertical leaps and dodging pylons.

Piel also thinks there’s more pressure on high picks than low picks.

“There might be such a hype on the first-round guys to perform that maybe in their first year they’re just not ready to do it,” he said. “They’re getting the money, thus they should be able to do something for the team right away. And that’s not always true. Only a few guys stand out in their first year.”

Piel spent a quiet, low-profile year on injured reserve last season, which gave him stress-free time to mature mentally and physically, he says.

The draft has proven to be a crap-shoot. Last year’s first pick overall, linebacker Aundray Bruce, was recently benched in Atlanta. Strange. Bruce was once a college teammate of Ram linebacker Kevin Greene at Auburn. Greene, a former intramural player and fifth-round pick, has 11 1/2 sacks. Bruce is a multi-millionaire. Greene makes $250,000.

Since 1985, the Rams have picked only one legitimate first-round plum, cornerback Jerry Gray. Receiver Aaron Cox started as a rookie in 1988, but lost his job to Flipper Anderson this year. Gary and Hawkins appear headed for solid careers.

Few can explain why the Rams have been more successful in the lower rounds. One source guesses the scouting department becomes less involved as the draft progresses, allowing more input from a coaching staff more attuned to football skills rather than raw numbers from a combine report.

Meanwhile, there’s the Rams’ starting defensive front to consider. Shawn Miller, a free agent, will start ahead of the injured Doug Reed (fourth round) at left defensive end this Sunday against New Orleans, joining nose tackle Alvin Wright (free agent) and right end Piel. This group, primarily responsible for stopping the run, leads a defense that ranks third overall against the rush.

A summary conclusion?

“I think the draft’s a bunch of crap,” Miller said. “What the draft doesn’t measure is a guy’s heart.”

Spoken like someone with a big heart who wasn’t drafted.

Ram Notes

In the annual Thanksgiving caper, several Ram rookies were lured to a local supermarket with a promise that a free turkey awaited. Ram veterans arranged for pictures to be taken as the rookies roamed the aisles. Cleveland Gary, who’s making $1.8 million over four years, denies he was ever at the market, even after Mike Lansford showed Gary a picture of him standing in the frozen foods section. . . . Lansford’s favorite turkey story remains the one involving former Ram Mike Schad, who continued to chide a teammate for not picking up his turkey even after a team meeting to announce the whole thing was a hoax. . . . The Rams hope to get defensive end Doug Reed (sprained ankle) back for the San Francisco game on Dec. 11. . . . Jim Everett (88.8) is the NFC’s second rated quarterback behind San Francisco’s Joe Montana (115.5). . . . The Rams’ defense, ranked 26th overall two weeks ago, has moved up to 18th. . . . The receiving numbers of Henry Ellard and the 49ers’ Jerry Rice are remarkably close after 11 weeks. Ellard, the NFL leader in yardage, has 61 receptions for 1,176 yards with a 19.3 yards-per-catch average. Rice has 60 catches for 1,149 yards and a 19.2 average.