Bernie: NFL ramps up efforts for LA team

Bernie: NFL ramps up efforts for LA team
• Bernie Miklasz

http://www.stltoday.com/sports/columns/bernie-miklasz/bernie-nfl-ramps-up-efforts-for-la-team/article_c440d364-55d2-5bb9-9117-57804a9f1d3a.html

The timing of Sam Bradford’s season-ending knee injury was especially hurtful. Not only for Bradford, who worked tenaciously to put himself in position for a strong comeback after shredding the same knee last fall.

This isn’t to say that Bradford would have come through with a long-anticipated breakout season. Nothing in Bradford’s hard-bitten career suggests he was about to morph into Drew Brees. But if we’re talking about Bradford becoming a better QB, recent signs were encouraging. And now we’ll never know.

Moreover, the damage comes at a time when the Rams are in need of their own breakthrough season. The Rams haven’t had a winning record since 2003 and possess the NFL’s worst winning percentage (.302) over the past eight seasons.

Owner Stan Kroenke is free to attempt to pull the Rams out of the Edward Jones Dome after the 2014 season, and the NFL appears to be ramping up its efforts to put a team back in Los Angeles.

Sam Farmer of the Los Angeles Times reported on the NFL’s decision to put a high-ranking official in charge of the LA project.

According to a memo obtained by the LA Times, NFL executive vice president Eric Grubman has been assigned to “stadium development, the return of a team presence to the Los Angeles area, the league’s strategic investment fund, and other key strategic initiatives.”

This is an unprecedented step by the NFL, which has kept watch on LA from a distance since the Raiders and Rams bolted after the 1994 season.

When asked by Farmer if the new job signifies a more significant focus on the Los Angeles market, Grubman said, “We think it does.” Grubman added: “The building blocks are there. There remain multiple sites available. So the focus is demanded.”

This has my attention.

This goes beyond the usual shrieking from Chicken Littles who already have moved the Rams to Los Angeles 129 times already. As a high-level NFL source told me earlier this year: There’s nothing going on, nothing to see, unless the league actually takes a step that signals a clear desire to get LA’s football terrain in order.

I believe we’ve reached that stage.

And with at least three NFL franchises eyeing the Los Angeles market — San Diego, Oakland and St. Louis — the NFL now has installed a prominent aide to Commissioner Roger Goodell to directly supervise the activity.

I don’t think it’s a horse race to get to Los Angeles just yet, and the NFL remains dogged about protecting the market from a mad-rush money grab by a soulless carpetbagger. But the NFL’s move to put Grubman on the job warrants notice. With the NFL pulling the LA gate open — even just a little — the intrigue can now begin in earnest.

Fan interest already was being choked off by the team’s 43-100-1 record since 2005. On top of that, the Missouri native Kroenke has seemingly enjoyed tormenting his own fan base with his cold, calculated aloofness.

St. Louis already had one NFL team hauled away when the Cardinals moved to Arizona in 1988. So how can you expect fans to be loyal and fully invested in the Rams — financially and emotionally — when Kroenke won’t commit to St. Louis?

Bradford’s knee pain is the latest sore spot. I’m not saying the Rams would have won 11 games and made the playoffs with a healthy Bradford. But Bradford would have enhanced the Rams’ chances of having a winning season.

A winning season would generate at least some momentum for — pardon the expression — a “Save the Rams” movement. Everybody loves a winner. It’s easy to sit back and dismissively declare “who cares” when an awful team is mired in a chronic state of failure and futility.

And among the region’s most urgent and meaningful concerns, I’d estimate that a deal to further enrich Kroenke would rank last on the list.

A 4-12 season by the Rams in 2014 could all but kill off the remaining fan interest. I’m probably guilty of overstating that; of course the diehards will continue to support the Rams. But of this I’m certain: Another bad season won’t grow fan interest in Kroenke’s business.

None of this means the Rams are moving after 2014. The LA scene is complicated. It’s still a tangled web. Chargers owner Dean Spanos, who has his own stadium mess, has made it known that he’ll resist another team’s attempt to take over the Los Angeles market. And the Raiders’ stadium situation is far worse than anything the Rams have in St. Louis. Kroenke still has one of the more lucrative stadium leases in the NFL.

My belief all along has been that the Rams will stay here, and I still feel that way. But despite having my views misrepresented by others in the media, I have always made it clear that there are no guarantees.

Please allow me to repeat something I wrote earlier this summer in an online column for premium subscribers: A Rams move is possible if there’s no local effort to find a solution to the long-term stadium problem.

Ambivalence works in Kroenke’s favor; he can cite the inertia to begin building a case for moving. And if there’s no action on the stadium front here, the NFL would be inclined to take a more sympathetic view of Kroenke.

The NFL would like to see a genuine local effort to engage the Rams to work together on a stadium solution. If local officials and leaders take a proactive approach, Kroenke would have a difficult time getting the votes he’d need to green-light a move.

If our region’s influential and powerful figures would like to convey an interest in making sure the Rams stay in St. Louis, this would be a good time to act.

The best place to start is Missouri Gov. Jay Nixon appointing a chairman to lead the initiative.

We can always punt. A city doesn’t need an NFL team. This city needs better schools and more jobs and a lot less racial polarization.

All I’m saying is we’re getting to the point where it’s time to make a decision, one way or another. This isn’t a two-minute warning. But if we’re going to run a play that’s designed to keep the Rams here, it’s advisable to open a playbook and come up with one.

With the Cardinals and Rams combined, we’ve had 47 seasons of NFL football in St. Louis. The 47 years have brought 15 winning seasons, participation in eight NFL postseason tournaments, and one league championship.

Going back to 1960, when the Bidwill family moved the Chicago Cardinals here, it’s been a hard road for fans of the local NFL team. It isn’t getting any easier.