Today May Be Start of the End for Rams in O.C.
Unappreciated, unwanted and severely undermanned, the Los Angeles Rams begin what could be their final season in Southern California today with a game against the Arizona Cardinals in Anaheim Stadium.
Blindfolds, anyone?
The Rams went 0-4 in exhibition games, scored three touchdowns and were penalized 35 times, a guffaw-inspiring performance that has many predicting another last-place finish for the team.
Add the specter of a possible move to Baltimore, St. Louis or Hartford, Conn., in 1995, the fans’ ill will toward Rams’ owner Georgia Frontiere and President John Shaw for even thinking about leaving, and there is a potential for some real ugliness in the Big A this season.
But for die-hard Ram fans--the guys in the end-zone seats with watermelons on their heads and the 24,000 who actually purchased season tickets for these Not-So-Mighty Lame Ducks--there is this glimmer of hope:
The last two times the Rams played their final season before moving, they enjoyed remarkable success.
In 1979, the year before the Rams moved from Los Angeles to Anaheim, they had an 11-8 record and lost to the Pittsburgh Steelers, 31-19, in Super Bowl XIV. In 1945, the Cleveland Rams went 9-1 and beat the Washington Redskins, 15-14, in the NFL championship game before moving to Los Angeles.
“Football is a very strange game,” said Deacon Jones, former Ram defensive end who made the Hall of Fame in 1980. “The odds can fall your way, and you can have a miracle season.”
Or the odds can catch up with you and you could have a marginal season, incurring the wrath of fans along the way, much like the three recent lame-duck NFL teams.
One year after winning the Super Bowl, the Oakland Raiders were 7-9 in 1981, with home attendance dipping to an average of 48,989 amid speculation the team would move. The Raiders came to Los Angeles in 1982.
The Baltimore Colts were 7-9 and crowds slipped to 41,968 a game in 1983, as fans cursed owner Robert Irsay for having the gall to even threaten to move their beloved Colts. The team was in Indianapolis by 1984.
And in one of the nastier lame-duck situations, the St. Louis Cardinals were 7-8 in 1987, and attendance fell to a paltry 27,821 a game in Busch Stadium that season, before the team moved to Phoenix.
“For a lot of guys it was like a joke, going out there and playing what felt like an exhibition game because there were only 25,000 people there,” said Neil Lomax, the Cardinals’ quarterback in 1987. “It was like playing in a library. We just said, ‘Well, that’s OK, another four or five more games and we’re out of here anyway.’
“There was a lot of (owner Bill) Bidwill-bashing. Fans would hang him or burn him in effigy. He got a lot of hate mail and some death threats. It was a very negative atmosphere throughout the city toward Bidwill and the team.”
This is what the Rams have to look forward to in 1994. And what some players are already experiencing.
“It’s kind of like we’re getting the boot,” Ram linebacker Roman Phifer said. “From a players’ point of view (the talk about moving) isn’t a positive. There are a lot of distractions, a lot of things that can take your focus away. But it’s out of our hands. We just have to roll with the punches.”
This, at least, the Rams are accustomed to. They’ve been Orange County’s punching bag since 1990, suffering four consecutive losing seasons, watching attendance dwindle in Anaheim Stadium and bearing the brunt of fan apathy and media scorn.
So the small crowds that are expected this season certainly won’t shock these guys.
“It would be different if we had 70,000 people and then all of a sudden we had 20,000, but we’ve only been getting 35,000,” defensive back Anthony Newman said. “Sure, we miss playing in front of 70,000 fans, but you go back to 1989 when we went to the NFC championship game and we still didn’t sell out--what does that tell you? That people here don’t follow football whether you win or lose.
“This atmosphere is totally different than anywhere in the country. People say if you don’t win you won’t attract fans, but you look at Cleveland, Detroit, Seattle, their stadiums are packed in the colors of their teams.
“Seattle has a losing team, and you can’t even hear yourself in that stadium. The fans understand that when you’re down and out, that’s when you need a pick-me-up.”
Several Ram players and coaches said small crowds won’t affect their play, but they also acknowledge that huge, partisan crowds can give home teams an advantage.
“The fans are upset with the way we’re playing, and rightfully so, but I’ve been in places like Seattle where the fan base has been partly responsible for us turning things around,” said Joe Vitt, Rams assistant head coach and former Seahawk assistant.
“There’s no question fans are a big part of it. Knowing you have 65,000 screaming fans, where the opponent can’t hear its quarterback’s cadence, that’s a real challenge to overcome. When teams come here it’s not like that.”
Lomax, who now runs a sports management company in Portland, Ore., recalled the small crowds affecting defensive players more than the offensive players.
“I remember being very relaxed when it was real quiet,” Lomax said. “You expect a lot more of yourself when you have 55,000 screaming fans at home, but I didn’t feel that pressure.
“It seemed to affect the rah-rah guys, like the linebackers, more than anyone. You see the intensity of players after a tackle or big hit, you see guys who want the crowd to get involved. Emotions play a big part of the game.”
Jones, who will be working in the Rams’ radio booth this season, disagrees.
“You can’t predicate your game on what happens in the crowd,” said Jones, a member of the Rams’ Fearsome Foursome, their legendary defensive line of the 1960s. “I came out to kill quarterbacks. I didn’t care if there were people there. It helps to be cheered, but if you lock yourself into that, you can’t take the other side of the coin, because the boos are going to come.”
They’ve been coming in bunches lately, which hasn’t made the job any easier for the Rams or the business leaders trying to keep the team in Orange County.
Since presenting its proposal to refurbish Anaheim Stadium, build a new training complex and purchase a minority interest in the team, the Save the Rams Task Force has splintered into three subcommittees, one to refine the proposal, one to sell luxury suites and season tickets, and one to help market the team.
The major obstacle: indifference.
“There’s no question we’ve inherited a number of years of fan frustration with team performance, front-office moves and ownership, and it certainly would be a great help if the team could score a touchdown,” said Newport Beach agent Leigh Steinberg, Save the Rams co-chairman.
“But to deal with this whole set of issues it’s necessary to look beyond the present. This is not a test to determine whether people are delighted with the preseason, the last few seasons or ownership. It’s a question of whether we want NFL football in Orange County.”
Steinberg urges short-sighted Ram fans to consider New England, where the Patriots, spurred by a new coach (Bill Parcells) and promising young quarterback (Drew Bledsoe), recently cut off season-ticket sales at 48,000 and have sold out all but one game in Foxboro Stadium. The team averaged 38,551 fans a game during a 2-14 season in 1992.
And then there’s Steinberg’s star client, Dallas quarterback Troy Aikman, who endured the punishment of 1-15 and 7-9 seasons (1989-90) before the Cowboys turned things around.
“The question with Aikman was whether he’d live to see the next season,” Steinberg said. “He spent a lot of time on his back. Now he’s won two Super Bowls, so these conditions are not permanent.”
Added Newman: “The New York Giants, the Steelers, the Cowboys, they all went through peaks and valleys, and now it’s happening to us. You can’t stay on top forever, but the fans here don’t stick with you in the valley.”
One major difference between the Giants, Steelers, Cowboys and Rams, though: The first three teams stuck with their fans--and home cities--during lean times. The Rams, it seems, have not.
With a series of questionable front-office moves and very little improvement on the field, some believe Ram management has welcomed atrophy. A projected loss of about $6 million this season has merely made it easier for the Rams to justify moving to another city.
Still, despite the team’s problems and a lack of support, Ram players have no desire to move.
“If you took a poll in here, everyone would want to stay,” Newman said. “This is a dream place to play football--you have natural grass, sunshine in December. I don’t want to deal with cold weather or artificial turf.”
Players, though, would be least affected by a move. With free agency and trades, their situations are tenuous to begin with. Moving is part of the business.
It’s the support personnel in the front office and locker rooms, the longtime employees such as Ram cinematographer Mickey Dukich, in his 39th season with the team, and senior equipment manager Don Hewitt, in his 28th year, who are feeling the most anxiety.
“It’s traumatic,” said the 71-year-old Hewitt, whose son, Todd, is also an equipment manager. “One day you have a feeling we’re not going to move, the next day you feel we’re out of here, the next day you’re not moving. I can’t help but think about it because I’d hate to see Todd and four of my grandchildren leave. I don’t want the team to move.”
Neither does Van Larsen, an independent photographer whose car, with a “BYERAM” license plate, was at Rams Park on Friday.
“It’s my way to show my sorrow,” Larsen said. “Some might take it the wrong way, but it would absolutely devastate me to see the Rams go to another city and win a Super Bowl. I’m of the mind-set that they’re gone.”
The Rams, an institution in Southern California for 49 years, playing in Baltimore, St. Louis or Hartford in 1995?
“The Rams leaving Southern California would mean a step backward for the NFL,” said Anaheim Mayor Tom Daly, who grew up collecting Ram football cards. “Like the Green Bay Packers, New York Giants and Dallas Cowboys, they’ve been one of the cornerstone franchises of the league.”
Ram offensive tackle Jackie Slater, entering his 19th season with the team, would also find it hard to imagine.
“But at one point in time I never would have imagined Eric Dickerson not being here or Jim Everett not being here or me being here so long,” Slater said.
“So anything is possible.”
Good Riddance?
Records and average home attendance of the three most recent NFL lame-duck franchises:
Year Team Record Attendance Next Destination 1981 Oakland Raiders 7-9 48,989 Los Angeles 1983 Baltimore Colts 7-9 41,968 Indianapolis 1987 St. Louis Cardinals 7-8 27,821 Phoenix
Source: NFL teams
