RAMS : Draft-Day Melodrama Has Only Just Begun for Knox

The slow, tortuous buildup to the Rams’ first draft in Chuck Knox Era II is beginning to quicken, and, as we should have expected, the Rams might be headed straight into a typical draft-day dilemma.

The Rams, starved for defensive linemen and positioned third in a draft year loaded with big, hearty defensive linemen, may end up selecting a cornerback one year after cashing in the No. 5 pick on cornerback Todd Lyght.

There are weeks to go, of course, and heaven knows what kind of twists and turns lie ahead, but right now, a consensus is growing about the third-best player available.

There is debate about exactly who is No. 1 and who’s No. 2. But at No. 3, there are lessening doubts, even among Rams.

Wisconsin’s Troy Vincent is considered the best cornerback prospect since Rod Woodson, although didn’t we hear that a year ago when a previous Ram coaching staff drafted Lyght? Or maybe Lyght was the best since Albert Lewis, we forget sometimes, this drafting business being a science more complicated than astrophysics.

The fact that cornerback is not exactly a need position is less important, partly because Darryl Henley performed quite ably and inexpensively last season. And when you go 3-13, you can’t afford to let great players go by, you just collect them, let them play and hope you never lose 10 consecutive games again.

The real complication in the Rams’ draft preparations is whether any of the available defensive linemen, aside from Steve Emtman, whom the Rams are pretty certain will be taken by Indianapolis with either the first or second pick, is worth the third choice.

If not, or if he’s gone, the Rams could take Vincent or move down the ladder in a trade with a team desperate for either Vincent or Texas A&M; middle linebacker Quentin Coryatt, hoping to get the defensive lineman they want and maybe pick up another second-round pick.

Beyond Washington’s Emtman, a sure-fire NFL producer, Sean Gilbert of Pittsburgh is a physical wonder and Clemson’s 350-pound Chester McGlockton could be the best and brightest (if not the lightest) of them all.

But in the Rams’ search for a dominant defensive lineman, any dominant defensive lineman, the current crop of draft-eligible behemoths comes up short in one vital area:

When they were in Seattle, the current Ram coaches worked with Cortez Kennedy, they drafted Cortez Kennedy, they still love Cortez Kennedy . . . and Emtman, Gilbert and McGlockton are not Cortez Kennedy.

The last time a Chuck Knox team drafted this high was in 1990 when they traded two lower first-rounders for New England’s third overall pick, and that is when they took Kennedy, a Pro Bowl player last season, No. 96 in the playbook, No. 1 in their hearts.

“I don’t think there is a Cortez Kennedy in this draft, unfortunately,” says Ram defensive coordinator George Dyer, who was Kennedy’s defensive line coach in Seattle the last two seasons.

“There’s nobody like Cortez Kennedy. There’s certainly some great football players. Emtman’s a great football player, a great football player. The kid Gilbert at Pittsburgh, he’s a tremendous football player.

“But Cortez Kennedy was a different guy. And his best football is still ahead of him. You’ve got tremendous quickness, tremendous balance. He was a tremendous athlete, and I think he’s going to be one of the great ones that ever played.”

Emtman is the 290-pound lineman whom everybody likes, a quick, bruising Dan Hampton-type, and Chuck Knox does not hide the sparkle in his eye when he talks about the workout Emtman went through in Washington recently for a bevy of interested NFL officials.

But the Rams know that the Colts sent everyone but their ticket manager to Seattle to watch Emtman, and not selecting him would be a major public relations boo-boo in Indiana. Emtman is a heartland kind of guy, and the rumblings that Emtman doesn’t want to play in Indy are considered negotiable.

Even if Emtman drops, the Rams aren’t sure to select him. There are concerns among some NFL people that Emtman’s pro playing shape will end up around 275 (he was 283 at his workout), which is not exactly prototype dominant defensive tackle poundage, and some wonder about his ability to rush the passer consistently.

Gilbert, a 6-5 monster, has registered every number a draft coordinator could want to see in the weight room and on the track surface, but he has had a roller coaster college career, and not everybody is sold on his work habits. At No. 3, he could be risky, especially for a team that desperately cannot afford another miss in the first round.

McGlockton is even more fascinating, a man who came to the combine workouts weighing more than 350 but still able to run a 5.0-second 40-yard dash, which is a barrier some 220-pound running backs fail to break.

He could be the sleeper Ram selection. Why? Plug him into the Ram line, and he would be almost 100 pounds heavier than practically everybody the Rams started there last season. You don’t often get a chance to get athletic 350-pounders. You teach him the rest.

McGlockton, if his stock begins to rise (or if the Rams move down to pick No. 6 or 7 in a trade), could be the closest thing to Cortez Kennedy in the Rams’ point of view.

Jerry Gray was tired of hearing that he had no starting role with the Rams, sick of thinking the Rams were just keeping him around because of the talent he used to have, the Pro Bowls he used to make, the left knee that used to be healthy. Thinking maybe they wouldn’t keep him around much longer, anyway.

“Last year was the most miserable year I’ve had in my life. People kept telling me what I couldn’t do,” Gray told the Houston Chronicle this week. “Now I want to show the Oilers what I can do.”

His was an unsentimental journey away from his pro home to his real home, in Texas, with the Houston Oilers this week as a Plan B free agent. But those who watched Gray struggle for the Rams at cornerback last season shook their heads when Oiler Coach Jack Pardee said Gray would strictly be a cornerback for them.

And they silently understood what it meant when Gray did not get a signing bonus: There is a chance he could get cut before the regular season, since Houston has nothing invested in him. If they cut him, his non-guaranteed $775,000 contract disappears.

Houston, loaded with young defensive backs, has no room for Gray at safety, and has only one hole, at right cornerback, where Richard Johnson struggled, including the famous play in the AFC playoffs where he bit on a John Elway fake, allowing the big completion that sealed Denver’s last-second victory.

But Gray did not leave the Rams and a $900,000 contract because the Oilers were by far a better opportunity. He left because he didn’t want to play against everybody’s perceptions of what he used to be.

In the NFL, unfortunately, one bum knee is always a bigger deal than five old Pro Bowl watches.