Jesse Owens Blazed Trail, Cox Follows It Proudly

The Rams’ Robert Cox remembered one of America’s most famous athletes as he practiced on the fields outside Olympiastadion Tuesday.

Cox, who earned his degree in history at UCLA, was standing knee deep in it. Books are books. This, he knew, was education. Cox’s career as an offensive tackle with the Rams, burgeoning as it is, came into proper perspective.

As the team bus rolled into the sprawling athletic complex, site of the 1936 Olympic Games and some of the most vivid and important newsreel footage ever recorded, Cox turned back the clock 54 years in his mind.

“I don’t know if you’d call it eerie, but there was a feeling I got when the bus got there,” Cox said. “I just kept looking around. I kind of closed my eyes and I could see visions of Hitler in his box (seat), the Olympic team, Jesse Owens, the whole thing. Even when we landed here, I was saying man, ‘Here I am, a black man in Berlin, and this man (Hitler) was one war away from maybe controlling everything.’ If he could have beaten the Russians in the cold east, who knows what could have happened? It was very, very, close, and I said, ‘Man, I’m standing here now.’ How would my life have been different? Would I have ever been born?”

The feats of Owens are etched in stone on the walls here; the symbolism apparent. Owens won gold medals in the 100 and 200 meters, broad jump and 4 x 100-meter relay.

Though some of the historical context gets lost in the tranquil setting of surrounding blue skies and the meticulously landscaped lawns, Cox tried to put himself in Owens’ shoes in August, 1936, as Owens spiked one hole after another in one man’s theories of racial supremacy.

“I’m thinking, ‘He was out there running, and Hitler was up there in his box,’ ” Cox said. “He wins and here comes the national anthem, and Hitler’s got to sit there and listen to the national anthem being played four times, for one black man. That’s the ultimate.”

Years later, Cox can thank Owens for paving the way for others. Cox enjoys his good life and fortune, not that he hasn’t earned it. Consider his arduous climb through the Ram organization: In 1986, Cox was drafted in the sixth round to a team that already featured four Pro Bowl offensive linemen--Dennis Harrah, Doug Smith, Kent Hill and Jackie Slater.

In the first round that year, the team selected Canadian Mike Schad, who was supposed to represent everything in a star lineman. In the second, they took guard Tom Newberry, who actually did.

Cox came to training camp that summer with suitcases packed.

“At the outset, it didn’t look very good,” he said. “When I got here, what I wanted was to play well in the preseason games and then go somewhere else. Naturally, I looked at the situation and said, ‘There’s an overload here.’ ”

Four years later, Cox appears ready to make his move. He has crept up the depth chart with the speed of molasses. No matter how they might have tried, the Rams couldn’t shake him. He was better his second year than his first; and better this year than last.

To make a career in the league, Cox became a fly on the locker room wall. He said little and absorbed everything he could.

“I just listened and I looked,” Cox said. “I made a lot of observations, tried to learn as much as I could. I felt I had the best teachers in the game in front of me: Jackie, Pankey, Smith and, at that time, Dennis Harrah. I had a coach who really stressed technique and fundamentals, Hudson Houck. If I could learn from all these men, and do exactly what they did, then I couldn’t be too bad.”

Now, Cox is apparently too good to sit on the bench. It was the team’s plans to rotate Cox into the lineup last year to spell aging tackles Pankey and Slater.

Despite holding out in a contract dispute until Aug. 28, Cox started two games and played his fair share in 1989.

This summer, his fate has been changed by the absence of Slater who, at age 36, decided not to report in protest to a contract he signed but did not admire.

Slater’s strategy caught everyone by surprise, even Cox, who worked out with the veteran regularly in the off-season. “We’ve had some conversations,” Cox said. “He had some concerns on his mind. The thing about Jackie is, when he says, ‘Yeah, I’m thinking about doing this or that,’ you don’t really take it seriously because of all the years he’s been here. He’s never held out.”

But Slater’s out now, and even talking about a trade after 14 seasons in a Ram uniform. In his place, Cox, 26, takes over at right tackle. He does not know for how long, but it’s a day he has been waiting for.

“I want to play,” he said. “That’s everybody’s dream when you get to the NFL. That’s no big secret. When you get here, you don’t want to watch.” Cox doesn’t know how or when the Slater issue will be resolved. It is, no doubt, a sensitive subject.

“I don’t want to get into that,” Cox said. “Jackie is a pillar of strength on this team. He’s a Pro Bowler. Everyone on this team loves him. He’s just a positive person to be around. We realize he has to take care of whatever’s bothering him before he can come back here and give 100% like he’s done throughout his entire career. The players understand . . . I’m not really the best person to talk to about the management. I don’t have any tremendous love for them. It’s a business, and that’s the way it is.”

Ram Notes

Travel updates: Several Ram players and coaches, including John Robinson, toured East and West Berlin by bus Tuesday afternoon. The tour was slowed by bumper-to-bumper traffic and the trip stretched 3 1/2 hours. The Kansas City Chiefs opted for a cruise on the Havel River, which included a buffet lunch. . . . Ram owner Georgia Frontiere has arrived, and will treat her traveling party to a river-boat cruise tonight. . . . Ram tackle Robert Cox, 6-feet-5 and 285 pounds, rented a hammer and chisel in an attempt to break off a piece of the Berlin Wall for a souvenir. He ended up with blisters and dust. “I was so frustrated,” he said. “There was a little tiny guy, and he was going to town with his hammer and knocking off big chunks. I don’t know what I got.” Cox said he also is suspicious of “so-called” pieces of the wall that are being sold around Brandenburg Gate. “I picked one rock up, and then put it down. There was paint all over my hands.” . . . Ram players can’t get over the putting-green quality of the grass that covers 326 acres of the Maifeld practice complex. “You could put 12 football fields in that whole area,” Cox said. “The grass is so green and I didn’t detect one weed.”