Buyer Beware : Not Everyone in St. Louis Is Caught Up in the Euphoria of Having a Football Team Again

Down at Sportsman’s Park, the restaurant recently sold by Jackie Smith, Pro Football Hall of Famer and former Cardinal, they are preparing to add $6.95 Ramchops with Georgia peach sauce to the menu.

Not everyone will be buying.

“I don’t think the Rams are worth it,” said waitress Maureen Toberman. “They’re losers. And we put up that much money? We got people starving in the city.”

But what about that screaming headline across the top of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch Thursday morning? ‘We Got ‘Em’

“I think the people of St. Louis are looking like a bunch of chumps right now,” said Angel Kruse at an area restaurant.

But KFANS radio named Georgia Frontiere, St. Louis Rams owner, McDonald’s Player of the Day for leaving Southern California.

“Even a crummy team is better than none,” said talk show host Bob Ramsey to his listeners.

St. Louis, which lost the Cardinals to Phoenix after the 1987 season, began Day 1 with their new heroes with a news conference in a nearby suburb at the Ritz-Carlton.

“Let me introduce to you the first lady of St. Louis football,” said former Sen. Thomas Eagleton, prompting city leaders, influential businessmen and local reporters to give Frontiere a standing ovation.

Frontiere read a letter that had been intended earlier for publication in the Post-Dispatch assuring the fans of St. Louis that the Rams were coming there no matter what it took.

“We had declared war,” Frontiere said. “This was a time where you couldn’t be emotional; this was a fight. I knew the fans were behind us and part of this army, such a gigantic army, there was no way we could be beaten.

“Like a lot of other people I couldn’t believe it when it happened. I’ve had many more ups and downs than you people had because I would think it was going to happen, and then it didn’t. So when it finally happened . . . I woke up this morning at five o’clock and I looked out: ‘We’re here, we’re really here.’ I’m so happy I really could cry.”

Frontiere said that since becoming involved in football in 1957, “this is the finest group of coaches I have ever been around. For the first time I really feel like we got it together.”

Frontiere concluded her formal remarks by saying the last time she had visited St. Louis she had picked up the Bible on her bedside table, and it had flipped open to the 23rd Psalm.

“ ‘The Lord is my shepherd and I shall not want,’ ” Frontiere said. “It never left my mind, and in this Easter season I think God had his way.”

Frontiere said she will go house-hunting today and then attend a “Welcome Rams Pep Rally” at Kiener Plaza near Busch Stadium on Saturday along with Ram coaches and selected players.

“I’m excited about the Rams; they’ve been to a Super Bowl,” said Jerry Sommer, general manager of Sportsman’s Park. “I already have a Rams tie.

“Look at all the people that wanted to buy personal seat licenses. This is a team on the rebound; maybe they just need a change of atmosphere.”

So what about the Rams new coach?

“The guy from Washington State,” Sommer said. “Shoot, I can’t remember his name. The guy from Washington State. The Gophers, I know that.”

Close. Oregon, and Rich Brooks coached the Ducks.

No matter, fans were lining up late Wednesday night at Sports Print in nearby Ferguson to buy the first officially NFL licensed “St. Louis Rams” T-shirts at $12.99 apiece. TV reporters, who were assigned to interview Frontiere, were wearing blue and yellow “St. Louis Rams” buttons.

“My brother-in-law lives by Anaheim and he hates them and hates her,” said Mark Mann, who has already put down money for a pair of $500 personal seat licenses in the unfinished domed stadium near downtown St. Louis. “I’m excited and think they will do great, but he laughed when he heard they were coming here. He said, ‘You can have them.’ ”

Notices will go out shortly to 10,000 personal seat license applicants informing them they lost out in their purchase bid. The 69,000-seat domed stadium, which is being built for $260 million, is scheduled to open Oct. 22.

“I could care less about the Rams coming to St. Louis,” said Mel Roberts, a local resident. “If a guy with a gun does the same thing, they call it a robbery. There was just too much damn money floating around.”

Harold Dielmann, a former mayor of Creve Coeur, said it has been a real letdown for St. Louis since Bill Bidwill took his team to Phoenix.

“We’re looking forward to a great venture with the St. Louis Rams,” Dielmann said. “L.A. had an opportunity, but didn’t do anything with it. Maybe the same thing happened to us, but we had a pretty tough guy (Bidwill) to deal with.”

The same might be said of Frontiere and John Shaw, Ram president.

“They seem great to work with,” Dielmann said. “The press conferences and everything has been very nice. And you know Stan Kroenke is a great guy to work with.”

Kroenke, the new 30% owner of the Rams, is considered by many here as the team’s great hope for on-field success and one day maybe even its majority owner.

“Frontiere and Shaw are going to be in L.A. and Stan’s just 100 miles down the road (in Columbia),” said Bob Rowe, a player for the Cardinals from 1967-76. “Stan makes no bones that he would eventually like to own the team. I think that constant input (from Kroenke), and if Frontiere and Shaw are to be believed, there will be a serious effort to put a winner on the field. My gut feeling is they are going to put a challenger on the field because of that St. Louis (Kroenke) connection.”

The Rams, 23-67 since 1989, are talking about leaving Southern California after conducting May and June mini-camps at Rams Park. They will look for a training camp site in St. Louis this year, but probably will conduct future camps in Wisconsin.

“I think there is a tremendous resolve on the part of the organization to improve this product,” Shaw said. “I think this team will improve significantly over a short period of time.”

Jack Buck, a longtime St. Louis resident and baseball and football announcer, said a number of NFL owners he spoke with were furious with the Rams for not trying to produce a winner in Anaheim, thereby creating the climate to move.

Frontiere and Shaw, however, were greeted like conquering heroes in St. Louis, although they probably will be scorned in Anaheim much as Bidwill still is here.

“I think the fact there is NFL football again in St. Louis will heal any bitterness toward Bill Bidwill, or it should,” Shaw said. “And likewise, I hope there is not much bitterness toward Georgia and myself in Anaheim. The league has made it a high priority to bring NFC football back to Anaheim, so in time I think any bitterness there will be healed too.”

Frontiere, who also will maintain a residence in L.A., said, “To say I don’t care would be not true. I do care, and I always have cared. I never wanted to leave Los Angeles for Anaheim, but I didn’t have any choice. I always thought if we had stayed we might have had a better fan base.

“But it’s a fresh start now, and I feel like I’ve fallen into a honey pot.”

As part of that fresh start, Frontiere said the team is talking about changing its colors and logo. She said she would like to see more gold than yellow, and a brighter blue. She said the helmet logo will never change.

“I lived in Cleveland in 1946 when the Rams left and here I am today--gone full circle,” said Buck, who expects the Rams to draw a Monday night game this year. “I think this thing will fly here, but it behooves these people to spend some money and build a winner. I can tell you, the euphoria here will last only so long.”

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