Rams Have No Doubt Who's No. 1

By T.J. SIMERS

Jan. 18, 2000 12 AM PT

ST. LOUIS —

A Ram fan for as long as I can remember, I knew this was coming.

You can’t keep a good organization down.

Restrained by a duty to remain objective, I have found it difficult, traveling the land, writing positively about the other wretched souls doomed to finish behind our team, but that’s the dirty job.

Now that it has become obvious to everyone else that the Rams have already won Super Bowl XXXIV, there is no longer any reason to hold back.

“The only thing that can beat the Rams is the Rams,” said ESPN analyst Ron Jaworski, who once was a Ram.

The Rams playing the Rams, what a great game that would be, the two best teams competing against each other. They could play it the week after the Super Bowl--the Coliseum is available.

“There has never been anything like this in the NFL,” Jaworski said. “You start expecting every play to go for six.”

Oddsmakers have already posted the best team in football as the 2-5 favorite to win it all, and for Ram fans not used to seeing those kinds of numbers, that means you bet $5 to win $2. It’s the lock of the century. A sure bet. The Tampa Bay Buccaneers, after reviewing video, might just surrender.

“Hopefully, we painted a glaring picture that we really don’t have any obvious weaknesses,” said our coach, Dick Vermeil, after the guys blasted the Vikings on Sunday, 49-37.

No weaknesses whatever.

“On Saturday, quarterback Kurt Warner baked a yellow cake with chocolate icing for his daughter,” the St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported, and according to his wife, Brenda, “He did a great job. The cake was very good.”

He can bake, he can throw, he can do it all, and after winning the biggest game of his life, our hero went home and watched a Disney movie with his kids.

So you know what he’s going to say while running off the field after winning the Super Bowl.

It’s all over now, save for the trophy ceremony.

“We have too many guys,” running back Marshall Faulk said. “Our kickoff returner [who went 95 yards for a touchdown] is our fifth receiver, and we know he can run. . . . We not only win, but win big.”

These people in St. Louis know their football too, and by all accounts here, this might be the best football team ever assembled.

Wrote Post-Dispatch columnist Bernie Miklasz:

“Vermeil’s St. Louis Rams can knock you down, bloody your mouth and then dissect you with surgical, almost scientific precision. . . . [They] can beat you with finesse, they can beat you in the clinches. They dazzle and confuse you with sorcery; they wear you down with strength and stamina. . . . The Xs and O’s are so sensational as to be cruel.”

Name one other team in NFL history that could do all that.

Jerry Magee, long-time San Union-Tribune sports scribe who covered “Air Coryell,” was so moved by our team’s brilliance that he said he’s not so sure that Warner isn’t better than Hall of Famer Dan Fouts. And our Ram guy has played in only 17 games. Just wait until he gets some experience. They may waive that five-year waiting rule for Hall of Fame induction.

“Twice [previously] in my time with the Rams, we played in conference championship games--in 1985 and in 1989,” said John Shaw, president of our team. “But I don’t ever remember one of our teams dominating games as much as we dominate teams now and winning by the margins that we do now.”

The Buccaneers scored 284 points in the 17 games they played this season--291 shy of what our guys scored. Domination, baby. Oops, sorry, that’s our other team.

“There’s no getting around it,” said Jack Snow, an 11-year wide receiver with our team and now broadcasting its games. “This is a great football team.”

It’s also a cocky football team.

“So what,” replied Mike Martz, offensive coordinator, who reached an agreement Monday with management to coach our team once Vermeil leaves.

I might be a little more humble, but that’s just me. As for our team, well, it knows it’s good and it wants you to know it too.

“We’re the hot team, and we’re the team to beat, and I don’t think that’s going to happen,” cornerback Todd Lyght said.

If anyone should know what it takes to get beat, it’s Lyght, who was 40-88 with the Rams before this turnaround season.

“I think we answered all the doubters,” Lyght added, “and if they still doubt us, they obviously don’t have much knowledge of the game of football.”

Frankly, it’s hard to imagine anyone doubting our guys, or questioning the incredible alignment of the stars that has allowed everything--that’s everything--to fall in place to win a Super Bowl.

But there’s probably somebody out there who’s going to write about the preseason injury to quarterback Trent Green that put Warner into the starting lineup, or the schedule that had the Rams losing to the only team they played with a winning record--the Tennessee Titans--or the artificial turf and home-field advantage that complement the team’s speed, or the luck of the draw that has them matched against the Buccaneers, a team so inept on offense that even if by some kind of miracle they held the Rams to 17 points they would probably still fall short on the scoreboard, or the fact the Super Bowl this year will be played indoors on artificial turf.

If the naysayers would just check their facts, there wouldn’t be any of this nonsense.

“We don’t lose in the dome,” said defensive end Kevin Carter, and with two games remaining under domes, that kind of settles that.

Come on, what more could anyone want? When our team got the ball in the first half against the Minnesota Vikings it scored on the first play. When it got it in the second half, it scored on the first play.

“We feel like we can outscore anybody in the league,” Lyght said, and if I understand the rules of the game properly, that should make them Super Bowl champions.

It’s probably not too early to start placing orders for the Super Bowl XXXIV highlight tape, a nice (parting) gift for anyone in the Los Angeles area.

As for a ticker-tape parade through downtown Anaheim, I’ll suggest it. After all, our team might have moved to St. Louis, but for some reason Shaw and owner Georgia Frontiere still have homes in the Los Angeles area, and they may want to share the good times with their old friends.

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

Revisionist History

Funny, but we recall that Simers had a different view of the NFL before the season started (Sept. 2, 1999). It’s worth noting his preseason pick still has a shot to make him right after all.

NFL PLAYOFFS

AFC CHAMPIONSHIP

Tennessee

at Jacksonville

Sunday

9:30 a.m.

Channel 2

NFC CHAMPIONSHIP

Tampa Bay

at St. Louis

Sunday

1:15 p.m.