wv wrote:

i dream of a day
when cities build giant
Used Book Stores.

w
v

Oh, sure, you socialist commie. And, I bet they just let people borrow the books for free.

wv wrote:

Just my opinion but and I think you said this in a sense but, I think Grubman is in STL to rubber stamp this thing as concluded. and I think that the league is not going to kill an 80,000 seat stadium in LA to keep STL happy.

Stan is moving and the league knows it. Grubman even said the league was made aware of the City of Champions deal before it was announced.

Grits

Well if its a done deal, then why is the league telling St.Louis
to go ahead and build a New stadium?

w
v

Grits, I don’t agree with your perspective on this. I still think STL has a chance if it plays ball with the NFL, but who knows? The NFL has to follow through with its rules to avoid potential lawsuits, and maybe the major players are all just going through the motions in STL … only to have SK reject the plan and say he met all of the requirements of relocating, and the NFL to say, yeah, SK followed the rules. Anything’s possible. I just know that, no matter what, STL has to put together a doable deal by the end of this year in order to have any chance to keep the NFL here. Should be interesting for the next year or so.

• This reply was modified 9 years, 10 months ago by Dak.

Bottom line, from that Grubman story, is that the STL group has to put together all of the particulars NOW of how they plan to build an NFL stadium. If they can’t do that get their ducks in a row by the end of this year, it sure sounds like that leaves the door open for Stan to move whenever he pleases.

D’Marco Farr said on 101.1 that he was an assistant coach with Tomsula in NFL Europe. Says he really knows how to talk to players, and believes he will get the most out of San Fran’s talent.

Shrug. I don’t know. Just thought I’d pass along those comments.

That’s cool. When is the last time the Rams had that type of impact from rookies? Plus, Robinson should solidify at LT. And, Joyner showed some promise before he got hurt. That would be 5 really solid to great contributors from this draft class.

zn wrote:

<div class=”d4p-bbt-quote-title”>Agamemnon wrote:</div>

Completed catch origins

By Nick Wagoner

http://espn.go.com/blog/st-louis-rams/post/_/id/15382/morning-ram-blings-completed-catch-origins

Much of the discussion coming out of the NFL divisional playoff rounds this morning will center on the fourth-and-2 catch and subsequent non-catch by Dallas Cowboys receiver Dez Bryant in the closing moments of their loss to the Green Bay Packers.

For the few who might have missed it, the ruling on the field was that Bryant made the catch and was down at the 1-yard line. But Green Bay coach Mike McCarthy challenged the ruling with the idea that Bryant did not control the ball all the way through his landing on the ground. Indeed, the replay showed the ball hitting the ground as Bryant came down.

A huge play was overturned and the Packers ran out the clock to seal the win.

Of course, there was immediately plenty of outrage about the call and whether you agree with it or not, the debate isn’t so much about the call as it is the rule. Our resident officiating expert is NFL Nation columnist Kevin Seifert, who immediately filed some thoughts on the call.

No matter what side of the fence you fall on that debate, there’s no doubt that it will bring plenty of scrutiny to a rule that actually dates to the St. Louis Rams’ run to the Super Bowl XXXIV championship back in 1999-2000.

In that NFC Championship Game, the Rams were on the ropes against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. As Tampa tried to drive for the potential winning points, an apparent 13-yard completion to receiver Bert Emanuel would have given the Bucs a first down at the Rams’ 22. But a review came down from the replay booth and it was determined that the nose of the ball touched the ground.

The call was overturned and the Bucs never got closer to the end zone as the Rams advanced to the Super Bowl. After the season, the NFL took steps to clarify what constitutes a catch, which has since been deemed the “Bert Emanuel rule.”

There have been plenty of other questionable calls similar to that play since, namely the Calvin Johnson catch against Chicago that was changed to an incompletion in 2010.

Some will argue that the Cowboys were the victims of karma for benefiting from a call last week against Detroit. Either way, it’s probably wise to expect the debate on what constitutes a catch to begin anew.

I think Nick’s confused. I don’t think that ruling has anything to do with the Bert Emmanuel incompletion. That play led to a rule that the ball could touch the ground as long as the receiver had control of the ball, as well. That’s not this rule.

Do we even know that Kroenke would end up paying a relocation fee? He seems immune to the rules.

Agamemnon wrote:

The hardest part of all, said Neil deMause, editor of the stadium subsidies website Field of Schemes, is figuring out what Kroenke’s really up to. Either he’s planning a billion-dollar bet on Los Angeles with one foot already out the door, or he just got St. Louis to cough up $400 million by issuing a news release about a stadium in L.A.

“And the thing is,” DeMause said, “If [Kroenke] goes for this plan, we’ll never know if it was a bluff or not.”

Times Staff Writer Sam Farmer contributed to this report.

http://www.latimes.com/business/realestate/la-sp-sn-st-louis-pitches-stadium-plan-20150109-story.html

If the L.A. proposal was just a negotiating tactic, that would likely be the cruelest joke of all … on St. Louis and Los Angeles.

But, I tend to think that Kroenke likes having options, and while having a site in L.A. doesn’t guarantee a move, it makes it quite possible, and either SK has a more valuable franchise in L.A. or a sweetheart deal in St. Louis. Or, he has a sweetheart deal in St. Louis AND offers the NFL an attractive option to move a franchise to L.A.

You now have interpretations of “good faith efforts” to find a stadium solution to stay in St. Louis. I think the consensus here is that the NFL could decide that SK gave it a good faith effort. Maybe not right now … but after going through more of this negotiating process. I’m not saying it’s a good case that there was a good faith effort, but when did fairness stop the NFL from doing what’s best for “The League”?

Kroenke’s response (or, rather his team’s response, since we won’t see SK or hear directly from him during negotiations) will tell us a lot. If there’s a response asking St. Louis to do a lot more to keep the Rams here, I’d say we’ll know SK’s true intentions. Because the stadium plan put forth is more than fair. It’s not the 80,000-seat stadium and surrounding development in the L.A. plan, but SK could easily do something like that here if he ponied up more money — since the L.A. plan is all privately financed.

It’s a joke, really. We see that it’s possible to privately finance the entire L.A. project. But, in St. Louis, where the franchise admittedly isn’t worth nearly as much, we’re to accept that SK could only afford a $200M portion. Pshaw.

wv wrote:

Dak wrote:
I felt bad for the diehards in L.A., I’m sure.

Again, this is nothing against the L.A. fans.

They do deserve to have the Rams back, really, if I’m being honest.

Well ‘that’ is what makes you an awesome poster,
Dak. The ability to do ‘that.’

I dunno if that is ‘true’ though. I have
no idea who deserves what.
Maybe deserve’s got nuthin ta do with it.
Maybe we all got it comin in the end

w
v

I’ve mellowed over the years. 🙂

I love those lines from Unforgiven. Probably my favorite western.

“It’s a hell of a thing, killing a man. Take away all he’s got and all he’s ever gonna have.”

What in the what? The University of Georgia? Is that even a lateral move?

Here’s another viewpoint looking at this:

http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-nfl-in-la-20150106-story.html#page=1

I think it’s possible that the stadium in L.A. could be the home of the Chargers or Raiders in the future. We don’t know how much of the partnership for that land belongs to Kroenke. He stands to make money on the deal even if the Rams stay in St. Louis, and he collects rent in L.A. while getting a sweetheart deal in St. Louis.

I don’t know if I buy any of that. But, there’s the possibility.

wv wrote:

<div class=”d4p-bbt-quote-title”>Dak wrote:</div>
I don’t see anyone attacking any cities in this thread.

This really is all about what Kroenke wants. And, I’m not surprised by the Florio article where SK says he can move if he wants, whether he gets NFL approval or not.

If that’s the case, it’s the worst-case scenario for St. Louis, because the NFL isn’t part of this deal, and the NFL can’t even consider plans for a team in St. Louis as a contingency if the Rams are to move.

I don’t want the Jaguars, btw. I mean, I’d rather wait another decade or so and see what else becomes available than accept another crappy franchise moving here. The Rams were bad enough, but at the time, we fans in STL were just hungry for any type of NFL football. Let’s face it, this franchise was horrible back then, and caught lightning in a bottle with DV and the GSOT. Now that the franchise seems to be heading in the right direction, SK wants to take off for L.A. And, there wasn’t anything that L.A. did or didn’t do to get this team. And, it sure wasn’t anything that St. Louis fans did (other than put up with complete futility since the GSOT). It was a Stan Kroenke strong-arm move that will make it happen. It will move Kroenke up the Fortune 400 list and make him the wealthiest owner in the NFL, and it will leave heartache behind him … both in St. Louis, and maybe the NFL in general. I mean, if Kroenke can move over the NFL’s objections, anyone can move, and what power do the NFL owners really have, then? But, honestly, I think the NFL owners all know this already, and they’re not likely to get into a big spat about this. They’re going to get richer with a team in the L.A. market, aren’t they? And, why not make Stan pay the relocation fee and avoid a court battle? No, there will be no heartache or even heartburn at NFL Inc. There will just be a team in L.A., and none in St. Louis, same as before the Rams moved here in ’95 — but more money in everybody’s pockets outside St. Louis. The best we can hope for in St. Louis is a vague promise from the NFL that St. Louis will get a replacement team if we can put together a stadium deal. I hope that’s not the Jaguars, but probably that’s the best we can hope for. In that case, I might just follow the Rams, and root for SK to contract gout or something.

Well, ok…and not to be an instigator….but…how did you feel
when Georgia and shaw took the team away from the Los Angeles fans?
Know what i mean. We fans love the players and the game, etc — the
owners though….ya know.

Corporate-Fandom is easier as a Nomad.

w
v

I felt bad for the diehards in L.A., I’m sure.

Again, this is nothing against the L.A. fans. They do deserve to have the Rams back, really, if I’m being honest.

• This reply was modified 9 years, 10 months ago by Dak.

wv wrote:

zn wrote:
Carrol tore up his team and started over.
Harbaugh just plain inherited a good team…vets…
Fisher intended to build around a core of inherited players. They were young.

So to me that’s 3 different situations
combined with 3 different approaches.

So Harbaugh “Loaded Up.”
Carrol “Rebuilt”
Fisher “Built around a young core”

A reasonable view, imho.
Some posters obviously label the Fisher
approach/situation differently. Mostly
its semantics, probly. I can certainly see
how some posters would call what Fisher did
a ‘rebuild.’ I can also see how it could
be viewed as a “build-around-young-core” when
compared to what Carrol did.

w
v

How about “reimagine” … that’s what Fisher did.

This crossed my mind, as well.

Usually, Demoff is out there talking to media after a report like this. The silence is deafening.

I’m pretty sure that Demoff has not been closely involved in the L.A. development talks. I wonder if he learned something this week, too. Maybe not, but I wouldn’t put it past SK to play this extremely close to the vest, so that his mouthpiece doesn’t have to know all the dirty details until necessary.

wv wrote:

<div class=”d4p-bbt-quote-title”>zn wrote:</div>
Rams’ Kroenke has made his LA play, but it’s not time for St. Louis to panic — yet

Howard Balzer
FOX Sports Midwest

Not time for panic eh.
Ok, but What about hysteria?
Is it time for consternation?
Foreboding?

w
v

I wouldn’t call it panic as much as resignation. I think it’s good that we know where Kroenke stands — behind STL fans, wielding a knife at our backs.