Rachel Phelps now wears a mustache and Toupee

Rachel Phelps now wears a mustache and Toupee

You remember Rachel Phelps, the ex-vegas show girl character, from the movie major league?  She inherited the Cleveland Indians when her wealthy husband passed away during the honeymoon.  She then decided to move the team to Miami, but first needed to create enough fan apathy to allow her to escape her lease with the city of Cleveland and move the team to Florida.  Franchise relocations in real life professional sports are typically about money and usually involve an incompetent owner or ownership group.  If the current rumors are true and all indications are that they are, the city of St Louis is about to become a two time loser in the National Football League.  Is it possible that the nations best baseball city is also its worst football city, or is something else going on in the gateway city? 

As it turns out the National Football League version of Rachel Phelps also married his money, although he has parlayed it quite well.  Stan Kroenke the St Louis Rams owner who married into the Walton (Wal-Mart) family and has built a commercial real estate empire anchored by Wal Mart stores, amongst other empires he has built on the back of his wifes fortune, appears to be playing out the role in a real life scenario.  While Kroenke will not need to hit an attendance clause to leave St Louis, creating apathy among the fans and local politicians (speaking of incompetent) will sure grease the skids for the rumored move back to Los Angeles. 

As you recall after struggling for years in Anaheim the Rams moved to St Louis in 1995, where the struggle continued until Dick Vermeil brought in Mike Martz, Marshall Faulk, stumbled into Kurt Warner and The Greatest Show on Turf was born.  For a few years it was a three ring high flying circus in the Edwards Jones Dome, in fact you could say that team revolutionized the league and changed the way the game is played.  Unfortunately for football fans in St. Louis all good things must come to an end, and when owner Georgia Frontierre passed away, there was a period of instability which allowed Kroenke to swoop in and increase his minority ownership stake into a majority position. 

Since Kroenke has taken majority ownership, the Rams rank among the worst franchises in the league in both on the field and off the field performance.  As would be typical of ANY city with such a long streak of futility, fan interest has moved from frustration to indifference.  With the lease at the Edward Jones Dome becoming year to year agreement after the 2014 season a perfect storm is forming for the Missouri native to pack up the Wal-Mart Vans and head to tinsel town.  But just to make sure one of the local politicians doesn’t try to make a name for himself with a grandstand play, (like any of those clowns would be a match for Kroenke in a game of wits) or some extreme fan group decides to try class action to block the move, or just to make sure there isn’t a state wide boycott of Wal-Mart. (didn’t they recently burn one in the suburbs). Kroenke has decided to play out the lease and create as much fan apathy as possible in the process. 

In the face of poor performance and dwindling attendance, wouldn’t  a pep talk press conference from the owner help create some goodwill, Stan….Silence.    With all of the bickering between local politicians and residents regarding stadium renovations and possible new stadium sites going on for the past 3 years wouldn’t  a word from the owner regarding the progress of the discussions be helpful, Stan…..Nothing.  Now, with all of the new rumors that the decision has been made and the team is headed west despite 12 games remaining in this season would some reassurance from Kroenke help calm some nerves and put focus back on the season, Stan….Crickets.  Osama Bin Laden addressed the public more than this guy.  This is not Jerry Jones who enjoys being a rich guy flying around on private Jets, living in Mansions and owning an NFL team. Stan Kroenke is an assassin deal maker, a financial hit man if you will, and he sees the Rams as nothing more than another business deal.

Forbes ranks the Value of the Rams last in the league at 930 million dollars,  nationally respected sports analyst Patrick Rishe recently stated that if the Rams moved to LA, that value would immediately double.  That is not the kind of a deal that a financial hit man walks away from.  Perhaps the strangest part of this whole drama is the role that Rams head coach Jeff Fisher has played in it.  Unlike Lou Brown, the irascible Indians manager in Major Leage, Fisher a native of Southern California seems to be a willing pawn in Kroenke’s game of “Tank for the Coast”.   As an example the Rams start 2 guys on their offensive line named Davin Joseph and Joe Barksdale, not exactly striking fear into the hearts of defensive coordinators around the league.  They also start two crippled guys Jake Long and Scott Wells.  As you might expect this offensive line and Long in particular is getting the team killed – LITERALLY. They are on their 3^rd quarterback of the season and he is taking a beating from opposing defenses.  The strange thing about this is that the Rams drafted Greg Robinson from Auburn with the second overall pick in the college draft last spring.  Most draft observers labled Robinson the best O-line prospect since Orlando Pace, yet Fisher does not deem him good enough to help a rag tag bunch of misfits and cripples protect his quarterbacks.  And yes Fisher plays a major role in the Rams decisions on draft Day. The Rams also had a second first round pick this spring which they used on Aaron Donald, a mauler defensive lineman from Pittsburgh.  Donald has recorded the teams only sack on the season and leads the team in tackles for loss, despite playing only about 20% of the teams defensive snaps.  It seems a team in need of help everywhere could find a few more snaps for a young man with those kind of results.  In the first minute of play of todays game the Eagles scored a touchdown by blocking a Rams punt, the same Eagles punt block scheme employed successfully against the 49ers last week, when the Rams were off and should have been able to get a good look at those  kind of things.   Since Fisher arrived in St Louis, the Rams have been the most penalized team in the NFL, this is a direct reflection on the coach, and could be fixed if the coach wanted to but remarkably he seems unfazed by it.  When the league suspended new Rams defensive co-ordinator Gregg Williams for his role in the New Orleans bounty program,  Fisher promptly terminated his contract and promoted Williams son to the role, a little strange but not unheard of.  Fisher then fired Blake Williams after one season and then after a season of revolving co-ordinators hires Greg Williams back, you cant make this stuff up.   Even stranger has been the handling of the quarterback situation.  Austin Davis was in camp with the Rams last season but was cut by Fisher in a move that surprised many, since he has shown potential.  He was invited back to camp this season as a camp arm but listed 4^th on the depth chart.  When it became obvious that Greg Gilbert was not going to work out he moved up to 3^rd , which would keep him with the team.  When starter Sam Bradford was injured in Pre-Season week 3 (ahem, Jake Long) Davis suddenly found himself as the backup to Sean Hill and then quickly the starter as Hill lasted one half of the opener before being injured.  All the while Fisher has insisted that Hill was his starter as soon as he is healthy, Davis took advantage, winning his first start and playing well in his second prior to the bye week, Hill was proclaimed healthy after the bye to which Fisher then replied that not only was Davis starting this week in Philly, he was the starter for the rest of the season.  Uhhh OK Coach.  Many of the other coaching decisions are highly questionable (would James Laurinaitis start for any other team?) The free agent signings which have Fishers signature all over them are just as laugahable.  The past 3 seasons have seen the arrival of Jake Long, Scott Wells and Jared Cook, 3 huge contracts that are killing the team on the salary cap and on the field.  In fact in week 3 after dropping a TD pass, a common occurrence, Jared Cook was seen on the sideline slapping the QB Austin Davis, if the coach wanted to send a message to the team that enough is enough, you cut Cook the next day, its not like his contribution would be missed.  But Fisher seems very laid back with the status quo, almost California Cool if you will.  Could it be that Kroenke has assured him that his job is not in jeopardy this season and that next season in LA things will be different?  If that is the case then Kroenke will have an easier time with his scheme than Rachel Phelps. 

Most readers will attack this piece saying this would never happen, but I ask you to consider this:

·       The team is playing poorly

·       The Fan base is frustrated

·       The owner is ignoring everyone

·       The stadium lease is expiring

·       The owner is acquiring land in LA

·       The owner is ignoring everyone

·       Player personnel decisions seem illogical

·       Team seems unprepared

·       The owner is ignoring everyone

·       Team Value Doubles in LA

·       Owner is a business shark

·       Fan Apathy continues to grow

·       The owner is ignoring everyone

Yes I believe that Rachel Phelps is now wearing a m

ustache and toupee.