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wvParticipantMerlin, Deacon, Rosey, Lamar –Quickest off the ball?
“…Both units had gifted pass rushers who also knew that job number
one was stopping the run. The key player for the Rams was Olsen.
At 6’5”, 265, he had a devastating bull rush and a fine talent
for mayhem, but he soon became the coordinator on the field, an
athlete whose instincts gave him a near-perfect read on
everything going on around him. “We took great pride in the fact
that every year the Foursome was together we improved against
the run,” Olsen says. “Everyone knew his role on that unit. A
guy like Deacon [who played end], well, you just turned him
loose. To ask him to play a reading defense would have been
insane. Rosey, who played next to me, was perhaps the quickest
off the ball, but if he saw that I was hung up, he’d just cover
for me. Lamar, on the other side, was 6’7″; he could worry a
quarterback, but he could also play traffic cop. It was very
pretty, the way we worked together.”wvParticipantThe four man line came into being on October 1, 1950
according to Paul Zimmerman
w
vBy Paul Zimmerman
Oct. 06, 1995
View Cover
Oct. 06, 1995THEY RULED the National Football League like ancient war gods.
They bent the game to their will, and finally they were brought
under control through legislation. But for two decades the great
defensive front fours set the tone for professional football.The four-man line came into being on Oct. 1, 1950, in Cleveland.
Two weeks earlier, New York Giant coach Steve Owen had driven to
Philadelphia to scout his next opponent, the Cleveland Browns,
the last champions of the defunct All America Football
Conference. The Browns were making their NFL debut in
Philadelphia against the league’s reigning champions, the
Eagles, and what Owen saw that Saturday night terrified him. The
upstart Browns shredded Greasy Neale’s vaunted 5-2-4 Eagle
defense 35-10.By the time Owen gathered his Giants for their next practice, he
had divined the answer. He would line up his defense in a 6-1-4
and then drop, or “flex,” his ends back into linebacker
positions, creating a pure 4-3. He drew it up on the blackboard
and then handed the chalk to his smartest player, Tom Landry,
the defensive left halfback (they were not yet called
cornerbacks), so that Landry might explain the thing to his
teammates.“I remember it to this day,” says Landry, who would later win
two Super Bowls as the coach of the Dallas Cowboys. “It’s where
my coaching career started. I was 26 years old.”The Giants beat the Browns 6-0, the first time in coach Paul
Brown’s career that his team had been shut out, and the papers
were full of stories about Owen’s fabulous defense. But purists
were aghast. Only four people up front? Unheard of. Many teams
in the NFL were still using a six-man defensive front. How could
four people hold up against six, or even seven, blockers?Well, they did. Owen had a pair of tackles, Al DeRogatis and
Arnie Weinmeister, who had exceptional quickness and range, and
that was the key to the Giants’ success with the formation. By
1957 practically everyone was playing it.Fans ate it up, especially in New York. “Dee-fense!” they
hollered, a chant never before heard in professional football.
There was something dramatic about four big guys holding off the
rampaging hordes. The formation produced some memorable
pictures–the four warriors taking a blow between plays, waiting
for the next assault; Dick Modzelewski taking a knee; big Rosey
Grier getting a word or two from the middle linebacker, Sam
Huff; Andy Robustelli and Jim Katcavage, the ends, leaning
forward to see if they could pick up something from the
offensive huddle. Forget the fancy stuff; this was real football.It seemed so obvious: Put a group on the field that could put
pressure on the passer and still play the run well, and you
could drop your linebackers into coverage. Which in turn would
help the defensive backs gather more interceptions. Ultimately
the appeal of the front four would show itself at the box
office, too.The Giants started it all, but it was the Baltimore Colts who
assembled the best front four of the ’50s. That quartet featured
two future Hall of Famers, end Gino Marchetti and tackle Art
Donovan, and the line helped Baltimore win back-to-back titles
in 1958 and ’59. Marchetti was a stylist who first perfected the
grab-and-throw pass-rush technique. Donovan was a nimble-footed
270-pounder with a great instinctive feel. Tackle Eugene (Big
Daddy) Lipscomb was a 6’6″, 288-pound destroyer. And the other
end, Don Joyce, was just ugly to play against.The dominant team of the ’60s, the Green Bay Packers, fielded a
front four of ends Lionel Aldridge and Willie Davis and tackles
Henry Jordan and Ron Kostelnik. Davis and Jordan also have been
enshrined in Canton.No one bothered to think up catchy nicknames for offenses, but
by the ’60s front fours were collecting their share. The first
unit to be dubbed the Fearsome Foursome was the 1961 San Diego
Charger line of Ron Nery and Earl Faison at the ends and Ernie
Ladd and Dick Hudson at the tackles. But the moniker soon stuck
to the Darris McCord-Alex Karras-Roger Brown-Sam Williams line
of the early ’60s Detroit Lions and then, most famously, to the
Deacon Jones-Merlin Olsen-Rosey Grier-Lamar Lundy unit assembled
by the Los Angeles Rams in the latter part of the decade.The Minnesota Vikings had their Purple People Eaters–ends Carl
Eller and Jim Marshall and tackles Alan Page and Gary Larsen–and
the Dallas Cowboys their Doomsday Defense of ends Harvey Martin
and Ed (Too Tall) Jones and tackles Jethro Pugh and Randy White.Then there was the Steel Curtain of the Pittsburgh Steelers–ends
L.C. Greenwood and Dwight White and tackles Joe Greene and Ernie
Holmes–and as the game opened up for the speed rushers,
defensive line coach Floyd Peters built the Gold Rush and the
Silver Rush for the San Francisco 49ers and the Lions,
respectively.Defensive linemen became the most-prized commodity in the
college draft. They were more agile than the people blocking
them; the outside rushers, the defensive ends, had more speed
than big guys were ever meant to have. Greenwood was especially
devastating in Super Bowl IX, chasing Viking quarterback Fran
Tarkenton all over Tulane Stadium.Before 1978 the rules still allowed defensive linemen to avail
themselves of the ultimate weapon, the head slap. Deacon Jones
and Rich (Tombstone) Jackson in his heyday with the Denver
Broncos became masters of the technique. It doesn’t sound like
much, a slap to the side of the helmet, but, says former
Cincinnati Bengal tight end Bob Trumpy, “On a cold day, with a
forearm taped and then soaked and left to harden, that thing can
take chips out of your helmet.”In the late 1970s, with defenses knocking offensive statistics
back into the 1940s, the rule makers finally stepped in: no more
head slaps; passing lanes were opened up; holding rules were
liberalized; quarterbacks were protected from late hits.And gradually the great front fours began to disappear as
defenses went to situation substitution and to the 3-4, with
linebackers such as the Giants’ Lawrence Taylor lining up as
ends in passing situations. Defensive coordinators began to
employ multiple replacements in an effort to keep the linemen
fresh.“It’s unusual to see a front four go the whole way now, because
of the fatigue factor,” says Olsen, the Hall of Fame left tackle
who played for the Rams from 1962 to ’73. “The most efficient
way to do it is to keep rolling fresh bodies in and out. It
destroys some of the great matchups you used to have in my day,
but it’s a different game now.”The famous front fours of the past, units that would go a whole
game without relief, are almost museum pieces. And in the wake
of their disappearance comes the inevitable debate: Which one
was the best?The consensus among some 100 NFL coaches, players and
administrators, past and present: the Fearsome Foursome of the
’60s Rams and the Steel Curtain of the ’70s.Both units had gifted pass rushers who also knew that job number
one was stopping the run. The key player for the Rams was Olsen.
At 6’5″, 265, he had a devastating bull rush and a fine talent
for mayhem, but he soon became the coordinator on the field, an
athlete whose instincts gave him a near-perfect read on
everything going on around him. “We took great pride in the fact
that every year the Foursome was together we improved against
the run,” Olsen says. “Everyone knew his role on that unit. A
guy like Deacon [who played end], well, you just turned him
loose. To ask him to play a reading defense would have been
insane. Rosey, who played next to me, was perhaps the quickest
off the ball, but if he saw that I was hung up, he’d just cover
for me. Lamar, on the other side, was 6’7″; he could worry a
quarterback, but he could also play traffic cop. It was very
pretty, the way we worked together.”In five years under coach George Allen (1966 to ’70), the Rams
won a pair of division titles, ran up three consecutive seasons
of 50 or more sacks, and four times finished either first or
second in lowest rushing yards per carry allowed.The Steel Curtain, with a relentless, punishing style, believed
in total control, in annihilation. “Offensive coordinators
worried not just about trying to game-plan them,” says former
Eagle offensive tackle Stan Walters, “but about how not to lose
a player. You worried about losing a quarterback or a running
back. Those guys played you life and death. The Steelers would
demoralize you.”The Steel Curtain was about intimidation: Greene, coming out of
a tilted (or “cocked”) alignment on the center faster and
quicker than any 275-pounder had ever moved; Greenwood, steaming
around the end with his 4.7 speed; Mad Dog White, relentless,
screaming obscenities as he charged from the right outside; and
in the middle, collapsing the pocket, cleaning up on the run,
was the strong man, 280-pound Fats Holmes.As good as they were, Steeler sack totals would have been even
higher during the six-year period (1974 to ’79) that produced
Pittsburgh’s four Super Bowl wins, except that enemy
quarterbacks learned early not to stick around and let the
Curtain come down on them. Passers unloaded early–so early, in
fact, that there was no season out of the six in which
quarterbacks completed better than 50% of their throws against
Pittsburgh. The six-year cumulative completion percentage
allowed by the Steelers, 44.85, was appreciably lower than the
rest of league.And, of course, the Steel Curtain’s run-stopping was legendary.
In the 1974 postseason the Steelers held Buffalo runners,
including O.J. Simpson, to 100 yards. The following week the
Pittsburgh defense gave up a mere 29 yards rushing to the
Oakland Raiders in the AFC Championship Game. In the Super Bowl
they allowed the Vikings all of 17 yards on the ground.Some fans might wonder why the Purple People Eaters of Minnesota
would not be chosen as the best line ever. Yes, they were dogged
in their determination, and they were ferocious pass rushers,
but every time they got into the big one, they came up short.They held the Kansas City Chiefs to only 273 total yards in
Super IV, but the Chiefs made them look foolish on traps and
reverses and misdirection plays in a 23-7 Kansas City victory.
Four Super Bowls later the Miami Dolphins rushed for 196 yards
against them in a 24-7 Miami win, and Pittsburgh piled up 249
yards rushing the following year. In 1977, Oakland eviscerated
the Viking defense with 266 rushing yards.The Fearsome Foursome, the Purple People Eaters, the great
unnamed quartets of the old Raiders and Chiefs–who could ever
forget Oakland’s mustachioed Ben Davidson and Kansas City’s
giant Buck Buchanan–are all gone now, and we will never see
their like again in a game that no longer thrives on one-on-one
matchups that lasted a whole afternoon.Situation substitution has made defenses more efficient now, to
cope with the speed and razzle-dazzle of modern offenses. But
wouldn’t it be fun, just for one game, to put a great front four
on the field and leave it there? It would sure bring back some
memories.wvParticipantIn a nutshell, would it be fairly reasonable to put
it this way — Kronky/Demoff/(probly Fisher) knew for a long time
that LA was the real goal. And that plans were in the works
to Move to LA — but they also knew it was not a done-deal
because they could not be 100 percent certain that Kronky
would get enuff Votes. (though going rogue was always
a possibility too).So, for the corporate-twins Kronky/Demoff — the St.Louis
plan was always “Plan C” or an emergency back-up plan, so
they let the fans/city go ahead and continue their efforts
to keep the team in St.Louis.Is that about it?
w
vwvParticipantI dunno if this has been posted. Peter King.
The Six Hours That Will Shape NFL’s Second Century
By Peter King
mmqb.si.com
The owners’ decision to approve the Rams’ move to Los Angeles changed the current course of NFL history. Here’s the inside story of how and why the vote swung in favor of Stan Kroenke. Plus answers to reader email
It’s been a week since the NFL’s biggest post-season upset happened inside a Houston hotel: NFL owners voted to approve the move of the Rams from St. Louis to Los Angeles immediately, while giving the Chargers a one-year option to join the Rams or get a stadium deal done in San Diego.
But the strangest aspect of it is still being debated in some league circles: Six hours after an influential league committee handling the Los Angeles negotiations voted 5-1 to recommend to ownership that the league allow the Chargers and Raiders to move to a site in suburban Carson, the owners rebuked their own committee and voted 30-2 to allow the Rams and owner Stan Kroenke to move to Inglewood, scuttling the Carson site forever and ruining the hopes of two teams looking to Carson for long-term franchise salvation.
Those are the six hours that changed the current course of NFL history. What happened, exactly? How did so many owners who professed their love for San Diego chairman Dean Spanos turn on him—and the committee of heretofore trusted veteran owners—in the matter of one Texas afternoon?
Three answers:
1. A secret ballot, so owners who favored the Inglewood project could turn their backs on Spanos without him being sure who they were.
2. Kroenke’s jillions.
3. History repeating itself, with a rebuke of a powerful owner conjuring memories of another powerful owner slapped down a quarter-century ago by new-guard owners with different ideals.
This is not quite a tale fit for the Coen Brothers and the big screen, but if you like stories detailing the reasons why rich people make the decisions they make, it’s a fun ride.
* *
At 1:30 p.m. on Jan. 12, in the Azalea Ballroom at the Westin Houston-Memorial City, the 32 owners (or owners’ proxies) returned from lunch to hear from the six-man Committee on Los Angeles Opportunities. One of the key members, Carolina owner Jerry Richardson, had already come out strong for Spanos and the Carson project, so it was no real surprise when the full body heard the results: five votes for the Chargers and Raiders to move to Carson, one vote for the Rams only to move to Inglewood, closer to downtown L.A.
There were murmurs in the room, but the committee vote shocked no one. Art Rooney II of the Steelers gave his reasons for the majority—solving the Charger/Raider stadium problems, fixing the California stadium conundrum, helping two tradition-rich California franchises—and Kansas City’s Clark Hunt spoke for the minority. He was the minority.
“I dissented,” Hunt told The MMQB, “because I felt the NFL would be best served by having less realignment. Moving one team would be less disruptive to our fan base. And, also, having just one team in Los Angeles would give the league the best chance to be successful.”
“Clark was artful,” said someone in the room. “But it was clear what he wanted and what he thought was best.”
Right. Hunt wanted just one team in Los Angeles. And that seems most logical. Though it’s become fashionable to say two teams is the best idea and will eventually both build strong fan bases, the NFL would be asking two teams to become instantly loved when the region hasn’t had pro football for 21 years. It might happen. But it’s no lock. Hunt realized that. Privately, several owners applauded his bold stance, because they felt Richardson was trying to ramrod the Carson project through.
One point to make before moving on: During the morning meeting, when the final details of both projects were laid on the table for the owners, two owners not known for their loquacious leadership stood up to give ideas. Seattle’s Paul Allen—an E.F. Hutton type who rarely attends such meetings and more rarely speaks at them—said the owners needed to consider the project more than anything else. And Eagles owner Jeffrey Lurie spoke stridently for Kroenke. Those two men influenced the room, and quite possibly portended what was to happen in the afternoon.
“Carson never had the ‘wow’ factor,” one top club official said. “The Rams’ project did. Sentiment for that project became a tsunami.”
Once the membership heard the 5-1 vote, the next step was voting on the project, with a three-quarters majority (24 votes) being required for one side to win. Commissioner Roger Goodell, who proponents of both projects told The MMQB played each proposal down the middle, nonetheless was about to do something that he knew could tangibly affect the outcome. He’d been asked by “six to eight” owners, a source said, over the previous month about the feasibility of this vote being by secret ballot. “Roger knew we had a serious split in the membership,” the source said. “He knew neither side had the votes to win. But he also felt owners needed to vote their consciences, so proposing the secret ballot was something he felt he had to propose, and it was a no-brainer after several owners asked him to do it.”
Goodell proposed it, and asked for a show of hands. A majority would rule. Asked how many favored a secret ballot, more than 17 raised their hands. (The Los Angeles Times reported the vote was 19-13.)
Why was the secret ballot so significant? The Chargers/Raiders faction felt it had between 18 and 20 votes solid entering the meeting—something the Kroenke side felt was fiction. But there was something about the Rams/Inglewood project that, while inconvenient for those who wanted the Chargers and Raiders stadium issues fixed in one fell swoop, many owners knew was better for the NFL long-term. Instantly, the 298-acre Inglewood site would be the best NFL property in the league … with $2.7-billion worth of buildings and development including a 70,240-seat stadium with translucent cover that would join the regular Super Bowl rotation; an underrated campus for a so-called “NFL West,” including a new building for NFL Network and new home for NFL Media; and a 6,000-seat theater that one day one owner said “we hope will host The Oscars.” Carson was a nice project, but it couldn’t compete with all those bells and whistles.
Ballots were printed and distributed to the 32 owners/proxies in the room. A vote was taken. It has been widely reported that the first vote was 20-12 in favor of the Kroenke/Inglewood project, then 21-11 on the next one. But one source in the room said the vote was actually 21-11 the first time, then 20-12 the second time—inexplicably. Whatever the vote was, one owner said Dean Spanos “was utterly shocked—white as a sheet” at the first vote. And he realized that it would be nearly impossible to overturn the will of the silent but overwhelming majority.
In talking to three owners in the wake of the vote, it became apparent that they were convinced Kroenke’s project, the most ambitious stadium/development project in American sports history (likely to end up costing more than $3 billion by the time it’s fully operational in 2019), was the best thing for the NFL’s second century. (The league’s 100th anniversary is in 2020.) To succeed in Los Angeles requires what one league source said was a complex akin to “L.A. Live on steroids,” referring to the Staples Center complex where the Lakers and Kings play. In other words, NFL-big. Kroenke, with his fortune in the billions, had agreed to put $1 billion into the project—money Charger and Raider owners just didn’t have.
But the vote wasn’t at 24, and there was some discussion about a potential compromise. Owners could vote for Carson. Owners could vote for Inglewood. Or owners could vote for Inglewood plus one other team, as Dallas owner Jerry Jones had suggested. Now Baltimore owner Steve Bisciotti said why not just combine B and C, Inglewood and the extra team. And because it was obvious the ownership felt Spanos and the Chargers deserved first shot, why not make “B” the Rams and Chargers in Inglewood? Bisciotti’s idea was embraced by the league.
So Goodell, trying to form a proposal that could get 24 votes, adjourned with the six-man L.A. committee. They were gone about an hour. During that meeting, each of the three owners rotated through to be apprised of the compromises the leagues and committee were considering. They threw around several ideas and settled on this one: Because it was clear San Diego was the franchise favored over Oakland for relocation, the committee would propose giving the Chargers a one-year option to join the Rams in the Inglewood project; construction would start immediately regardless of whether a second team joined. Then, if the Chargers didn’t exercise their option to join in one year, the option would then belong to the Raiders. In addition, the league would throw in $100 million if the Chargers or Raiders reached agreement in their existing markets to build a new stadium.
Goodell and the committee returned to the room and explained the compromise. The membership knew Inglewood was going to pass muster; it was just a matter of time. And this proposal—which potentially motivated the politicos in San Diego to take another shot with $100 million more from the league as a spur—seemed the fairest to both Spanos and the Rams. The Rams were willing to take a partner in Inglewood, but Kroenke would prefer to go it alone. But if it meant the league would give the project its blessing, it was a deal Kroenke was fine with.
The previous Friday, in New York, Kroenke had agreed to a revenue-split if it turned out he eventually would take on a partner. All along, Spanos did not want to be Kroenke’s tenant—or anyone’s tenant, for that matter. But if Kroenke did a deal to take all the financial risk for potential cost overruns and other financial liability, and motivated a second team with a profitable stick-and-carrot, might that tempt the Chargers? In the end, on Friday, Kroenke agreed to let a second team keep all gameday revenue in and around the stadium. And he told the league he would agree to a formula that gave the second team 18.75 percent of other lucrative deals associated with the new stadium—such as signage and stadium naming rights. When the deal was relayed to owners on Tuesday, one owner exclaimed, “Sign me up! We’ll be the Los Angeles Wolverines!” (Writer’s note: The team name is changed, because the owner told the story with the agreement that he not be identified.)
The vote was anticlimactic: 30-2. There was light applause. No owner wanted to show up Spanos. They were clapping, one said, for Kroenke, and for this long ordeal being over.
Kroenke rose. “Thank you for your trust,” he said. “I won’t disappoint you.”
* * *
A few things to know:
• St. Louis is the jilted party here, obviously, losing its team. But the lease signed by St. Louis officials to get the Rams to come was such a team-favored deal that the only way it wasn’t going to end ugly for St. Louis was if the Rams’ owner—Georgia Frontiere first, then Kroenke after she died in 2008—agreed to re-write the terms of the lease. Kroenke wouldn’t do that. Those terms said the locals had to keep the Edward Jones Dome a top-tier stadium, which in NFL parlance is taken to mean “top quartile,” or top eight. That would have meant St. Louis would have had to inject $700 million into the Edward Jones Dome by 2015 to keep up with the Joneses (Jerry, and other owners) throughout the league. St. Louis was never going to do that, and pledged about a quarter of that amount. Kroenke said no. Now, you can nail Kroenke for disingenuous negotiating, for never stridently pleading his case publicly and disappearing and never engaging with the fans or politicians to try to get a deal done. All fair criticisms. Nail him too for being a local guy who never seemed earnestly interested in the Rams staying in St. Louis. But to Kroenke, a deal’s a deal. He wasn’t going to let the locals break a binding lease.
• Jones, according to one top club official who got a call from him urging this team to vote for the Rams’ project, was a major salesman for Kroenke. “Jerry thought Jerry Richardson went overboard trying to push Carson,” the official said. In the end, Jones spent hours pushing Kroenke’s deal, and as another club official said, it had nothing to do with the relationship between Jones and Kroenke. They’re not particularly close. Jones just felt this deal had to be about the owner who had the deepest pockets and the most invested in making Los Angeles work.
• Said one top club official I trust: “Carson never had the ‘wow’ factor. The Rams’ project did. Sentiment for that project became a tsunami.”
• Maybe it won’t matter in the end, but I get no great sentiment favoring the Chargers to move to Los Angeles. If they win, that’ll change. But the Rams were in Los Angeles and Anaheim for 49 years, so there’s a natural sentiment to be loyal to them when they return. Spanos is likely loathe to return to San Diego because of years failing to make a deal there, and it makes sense to move to a place that is going to take away every financial woe. But San Diego is such a loyal and vibrant market, it’s the only place in southern California that loves the Chargers. Could the $100 million spur by the league be the impetus to get a deal done with the city on a new stadium? So many in the league hope so.
• Now for the allegory 25 years in the making …
Once upon a time in the NFL, the establishment told the new kids what was best for everyone, and the kids rebelled. This was in the early nineties, when the league, in the midst of a multi-billion-dollar network TV deal (four years, $3.6 billion), proposed to rebate its TV partners because they were taking a financial bath. Some new-guard owners, including Jerry Jones, nixed it. The new guard worked to get nine votes so they could block the give-back. And they found nine owners, and there was no give-back. Old guard leader Art Modell, the Browns owner and chairman of the Broadcast Committee and the biggest advocate of relief for the networks, subsequently resigned his prestigious TV post.
In 2016, Richardson pushed hard for Carson, and thought he had a majority of owners supporting the Chargers/Raiders project. But when the secret ballot came, it was clear the majority was for the project, not for Spanos. “Classic case of Jerry [Richardson] misreading the field, of overplaying his hand,” one owner said. Richardson, essentially, became the Modell of 2016. He’s still a well-respected owner, but he’s not the power broker some thought when the Los Angeles process started.
A few days after the Rams got their deal, one longtime team and league official mulled the meaning of what just happened. He said: “I sense a shift in the geological plate of the NFL.” A few people were reaching for that conclusion in the wake of a Richie Rich owner getting his way, and the new breed celebrating the shiny new football palace set to open in America’s second-largest city in 2019.
I get it, but I’m not so sure. A shift toward the new breed is exactly what people said in the early nineties, when the owners pushed out Modell and ushered in the new TV model (in favor of FOX using the NFL to build a prime-time network, which has worked).
The NFL isn’t changing so much. It already has changed.
wvParticipantBut did the NFL really mislead St.Louis about
the reality of the situation?I dunno. I mean remember, at one point
there was a vote among the 6-owner committee
and they recommended Carson 5-1.To me, that means there was a very real
possibility, that St.Louis would indeed
keep the team. It just doesnt seem like
it was all a ‘done deal’. I mean if it was
why would there be a 5-1 vote in favor of
leaving the Rams in St.louis?Seems more likely to me, the owners just
weren’t sure ‘what’ was going to happen.
It was still up in the air until the final
climactic moments of the big meeting.Seems that way to me. Seems to me
St.Louis really was still in the game
up until the 2-minute warning or so.Now, again I’m talking about “The NFL” —
whether Kronky and Demoff mislead St.Louis is a whole
separate question.w
vwvParticipantI can’t even imagine what a complex like that would bring in on a yearly basis.
Anyone?No idea. I think the owners are pretty squirrelly about
releasing that kind of info.w
vwvParticipantUnfortunately, I know a little about this subject. I lost my wife to breast cancer in September of 2014 and my sister in law is terminal.
The article and PA have a few things right. We are making advances. Some cancers can be cured, even metastatic- testicular, for example. The problem is, it’s not going to be a one-size-fits-all cure. That’s impossible. Seven billion unique examples of the species is another obstacle. Cancer presents and kills in so many different ways. And each patient is unique. Some can fight stage 4 for years. Others last weeks or even days. My wife died 28 days after her metastases was diagnosed.
I was happy to hear this news- I hope a “moonshot” approach is carried through to cures. Or at least bring it to the chronic level, just as we have accomplished with HIV\AIDS. I have visceral hatred this disease. For what it has robbed me and my family, as well as just about everyone one else.
I’m sorry about your wife,
and the situation with your sister-in-law, Ozone.Seems like all the middle-aged folks
on these boards have been touched
by death or disease.w
v
“The reality is that you will grieve forever. You will not ‘get over’ the loss of a loved one; you will learn to live with it. You will heal and you will rebuild yourself around the loss you have suffered. You will be whole again but you will never be the same. Nor should you be the same nor would you want to.”
― Elizabeth Kubler-Ross and John KesslerwvParticipant
audio book excerptwvParticipantJust a couple of non-spoiler facts about Hugh Glass (DiCaprio)
w
vhttp://www.amazon.com/Revenant-Novel-Revenge-Michael-Punke/dp/1250072689/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1453220544&sr=1-1&keywords=Revenant
Editorial Reviews
From Publishers Weekly
Based on a true incident of heroism in the history of the American West, this debut by a Washington, D.C., international trade attorney and former bureaucrat in the Clinton administration is an almost painfully gripping drama. A Philadelphia-born adventurer, frontiersman Hugh Glass goes to sea at age 16 and enjoys a charmed life, including several years under the flag of the pirate Jean Lafitte and almost a year as a prisoner of the Loup Pawnee Indians on the plains between the Platte and the Arkansas rivers. In 1822, at age 36, Glass escapes, finds his way to St. Louis and enters the employ of Capt. Andrew Henry, trapping along tributaries of the Missouri River…wvParticipantExcerpt of Spoiler article down below.
It says though that Christian Bale was in line to make the movie
at one point. I think he woulda been better, myself.Btw i did not know who the “Ree” were exactly. I guess they were the “Arikara” tribe. Not that I’ve ever heard of them.
“…In Montana and South Dakota, there’s an odd variety of players in the zone, notwithstanding Pawnee Indians, and Arikara, with this tribe alluded to as the “Ree,” a slang term…”
http://www.theminjo.com/movie-review-the-revenant-2015/w
v——————–
April 15 2014
http://www.slashfilm.com/leonardo-dicaprio-revenant/
…Deadline broke the news of DiCaprio’s full committal to the film. (He’d been loosely attached for some time.) Mark L. Smith wrote the latest adaptation and this’ll now be DiCaprio’s next movie.Before Inarritu came onboard in 2011, John Hillcoat and Christian Bale were close to making the movie; before them the team was Park Chan-wook and Samuel L. Jackson. Those are all very different versions of the same story, but demonstrate it’s something that someone in Hollywood is passionate about.
So what’s the story of The Revenant? Here’s the Amazon description of the non-fiction book by Michael Punke:
“A startling novel, all the more compelling because its tale of unimaginable human endurance is true, The Revenant unfolds the toll of envy and betrayal as well as the powers of obsession and vengeance in the battle of fur trapper Hugh Glass, first for his life and then for justice. It is 1823, two decades after the famous expedition of Lewis and Clark into the American wilderness, when thirty-six-year-old Hugh Glass joins the Rocky Mountain Fur Company in a speculative venture that takes him and ten other men up the Missouri River into perilous, unexplored territory. Not least among the dangers that await the trapping party is a natural killer, the grizzly bear, as Glass disastrously discovers. Attacked and savagely mauled—his scalp nearly torn off, his back deeply lacerated, his throat clawed open—Glass is lying unconscious when his fellow trappers find him. Against all odds, he is still drawing breath three days later. Anxious to proceed unencumbered by the portage of Glass’s mortally wounded body, the captain of the expedition pays two volunteers—John Fitzgerald, a mercenary, and young Jim Bridger (the future legendary mountain man)—to stay behind and bury Glass when his time comes. Fitzgerald soon loses patience and leaves, taking Glass’s rifle. Horrified by Fitzgerald’s thievery but more terrified of being left behind with a dying man, Bridger also leaves, with Glass’s knife. Deserted and defenseless, the profoundly angry Glass vows his own survival. Miraculously trekking his way through two thousand miles of uncharted wilderness, Glass indeed becomes a revenant—a man who has returned vengefully from death to balance the scales of justice. His quest will leave readers breathless. This amazing true story of frontiersman Hugh Glass is a powerful debut novel — and soon-to-be Warner Bros. film — of survival and vengeance in America’s West.
That last part about Warner Bros. is not true anymore (New Recency will now produce with Fox distributing), but the rest is and you can obviously imagine the incredible cinematic possibilities in this story.
wvParticipantSaw the Rev tonight.
Cinematography and music are oscar-worthy.
Reminded me a lot of Cormac McCarthy’s “The Road.”
With maybe some Jeremiah Johnson thrown in.The visuals of the harsh-but-beautiful landscapes are memorable.
Everything is Harsh-but-Beautiful.The camera constantly pans up into the sky and asks
“is there any God at all up there?” – and the drama
on earth seems to answer, F### No!I thought Dicaprio was ok, but I could never quite
buy into him being that tough. Seemed a bit of a stretch to me.
I’da cast someone like Tom Waits or someone more beastly.w
vwvParticipantI thought progress was made this year. But I am always the optimist. Snead and Fisher have built a team that can go into Arizona and Seattle and beat those teams. Not fluke wins, but really beat those teams. That is progress. But the losses to Baltimore and Chicago were also signs that they are not ready to compete on the big stage until they get real QB play. We all know this, and we all demand this, but the realization is that there is no obvious answer to the obvious problem. When we scored 20 points, we were 7 – 0. Its not that high of a bar.
I am optimistic that the Rams are on an upward progression, but I understand those that disagree. The Rams played 9 games against playoff teams this past year. That is a lot. The Redskins played 2 games against playoff teams. But everyone can point to excuses, etc. when evaluating a team. For me personally, I like the progression and the improvement over where they were. I hope that the defense can improve even more when E.J. Gaines and Alec Ogletree and Robert Quinn are healthy, and I think the O-line had to cut their teeth this year but getting back Saffold and Brown back healthy will make this running game even better next year. We all know what they need on O – reliable pass catchers and a guy who can get them the ball. Here’s hoping they can get it done this year.
Isiah 58
————————
Yup. Agreed.
w
vwvParticipantI believe he left it behind,
up the ass of St. Louis.True. But this is Still Amerika.
In this land we brag about our conquests.
I would think the Kronk-atorium would
have a giant statue of a golden horn
up the ass of St.Louis.And if you dont want that kind of statue
maybe you should just go back to
green bay or some other socialist country.w
vwvParticipantWhile it seems counter intuitive for the Chargers to move in with the Rams knowing that Mark Davis is ready to pounce on their former market, there are also rumors that there is no shortage of investors who are willing to go in with Spanos to split the megatropolis that is the new stadium in LA. They believe that they are going to be printing money, and if that is the case who cares if you have no real fan base? Vinnie B also believes that if Spanos declines, the Raiders absolutely would move to LA. Thus, the Rams will almost certainly be sharing with someone.
The moratorium on beginning their marketing initiatives is kind of a big deal for the Rams, too. We have heard that they will be heavily into promoting the Rams here in Southern California, but none of that can begin until the second team is situated. So while there is a buzz in Southern California about the NFL returning to LA, until they can really start to promote the team there may be a dead period after the initial excitement. By the way, the web site goes online in an hour to put your name on the waitlist for tix. I am going to be the first person on the list! : )
Isiah 58What do you have to say about this
past season, I58 ?w
vJanuary 18, 2016 at 12:26 pm in reply to: LA Times starts Rams coverage + LA press conferences #37616wvParticipantAlso being widely discussed is the possibility that if the Chargers move in with the Rams the Raiders will then move to San Diego. One problem: Chargers fans HATE the Raiders and I can’t see any of them converting into Raider fans. Charger fans will drive up to Inglewood to cheer on the L.A. Chargers before they will ever support the San Diego Raiders (which doesn’t sound right at all). True, there are a lot of Raider fans in the L.A. area who would drive down to attend games in San Diego, but…really? 95% of San Diego football fans are Charger fans who, I repeat, HATE the Raiders. I can’t imagine how you can have a “home team” that is utterly despised by the “home fans”.
That kind of strikes me as obvious now that he says it. I never thought of that.
Yup. Never thot of it,
but sure, Charger fans hate
Oakland. I cant imagine that area
supporting the Raiders.w
vwvParticipantSeems like it’ll be the Raiders.
Sure looks like Spanos would be better off
in San DiegoRams and Raiders — room-mates.
Gee, i wonder which one will
be the messy one.w
vwvParticipantGrits, Grits, Grits. I heard you’ve been banned from so many places, I was beginning to worry you had been banned from the 21st century altogether.
QB, DE, and (gawd help me), a TE.
Now, where the heck is RFL? We haven’t heard from him in all this.
I think the Rams wore RFL down to the point he couldn’t take it anymore.
Every man has a breaking point, you know.
He may be following rugby now.
Yeah, i think about ole RFL every time
I post on this board. I assume
he’ll be back when he’s damn good
and ready.The season turned out just about the way
he thought it would. But weirdly, or
stubbornly I still think the optimists
and “ten win” predictors were right.
I think the Rams really ought to have
won ten wins — if Quinn had stayed
healthy, and the Oline had stayed
healthy. The Oline disaster lead to
the QB implosion, i assume.Anyway, this team still looks
dangerous to me.
1. Keep the D together.
2 Pray that Quinn heals
3 Add a WR
4 Upgrade from Keenumw
vwvParticipantDamn. You guys are making my mouth water.
We dont have many ethnic, authentic restaurants
in WV, as you might guess.We did have a new Denny’s open up last week.
I actually went there cause i really wanted
to try some corporate-food. I ordered a
“super veggie omelet” (i do eat eggs,
though i feel guilty about it).
They brought me my super-veggie-omelet
after about 55 minutes and — it had bacon
on it.Portland sounds great to me. Always has.
LA? St.Louis? — not so much. Just
too many damn humans. I do not think
its possible to have a good quality of life
with so many damn humans crammed (with their cars)
in a small area.If i were king, right after a disappeared
6.6 billion humans, i’d make a proclamation
decreeing that humans are not allowed to
create mega-hives. Nothing bigger than…oh…
i dunno…lets say 200,000. Thats plenty
big enough. Thats like two whole Coliseums
full of humans.Go rams.
w
vwvParticipantyeah. i remember reading at the time that the conversation had come up but no concerns were raised at the time.
as far as cost of living. yes it’s way more expensive and it continues to get worse by the year.
Well, i’m not sure i understand humans.
Why would humans ‘want’ to live in LA ?
The smog? The traffic? The murder rate?
The earth quakes?w
v
“New York is something awful, something monstrous.
I like to walk the streets, lost, but I recognize that New York is the world’s greatest lie. New York is Senegal with machines.”
Federico G LorcawvParticipantI…dont…want..to SHARE,
a stadium.w
vwvParticipantWow, 31 to zip, i see.
Is Carolina that good?w
vwvParticipantIt’ll end up going down to the wire,
i would think.Frankly, I think I like the Seahawks
more than the Panthers.Wouldnt mind seeing Ariz vs Seattle.
w
vwvParticipantCuz I’m gonna guess that now is a real good time to pack up and resettle for everybody.
Welcome to LA. The first thing you are going to experience is Sticker Shock.
I got no idea about big-city-life.
Is LA any more expensive than St.Louis?w
vwvParticipantApparently there is some incentive for Stan by having a second team–with advertisers or some such thing, can’t remember what I read.
It has to do with PSL sales. I forget the details but they’re findable.
In terms of Spanos screwing himself, I don’t see it that way at all. So we have this situation where 2 teams need help with their stadium situation, and one where the local city IS making efforts to build a stadium. Who won the right to LA? The team whose local city was working on a stadium plan.
Why did they win?
Because the owners chose glitz, “product growth,” and glitter over community.
That’s a choice.
We may naturalize the idea that you choose “product growth” and act like it’s normal, but it’s still a choice.
So oddly again, most of us would be VICTIMS in situations where pure abstract “product growth” counts over community values. For example, paycuts.
But strangely we don’t do the math, and tend to favor “product growth.”
It’s like we’re peasants and we’re happy the Baron has new shiny clothes. Even though we would be better off with no Baron at all, let alone a Baron using the fruits of our labor to improve his wardrobe.
And Grits, I can say all that and still be glad that diehard longtime LA fans got their team. It’s contradictory, but, sometimes on complex issues, one is contradictory.
It’s because there are competing values and ideas and feelings at stake. So I take nothing away from LA fans. I feel for St. Louis fans. And as a nomad I don’t care where they play. It really is all those things at once. …
Well said, dude.
I think.
I dunno.w
vwvParticipantWell, wv–that’s cause we are the lucky ones who have Case Keenum. If those guys want him they’d better be willing to give a lot up. I mean–a LOT.
Well they need a qb, and either Mannion is that guy or they need to get one.
But I don’t give Case a hard time. In fact, as #2 Rams qbs forced to start go, I like him better than Hill, Davis, Clemens, Feeley, and Boller. Just to go back 7 years.
Sure, i like little Case,
as a nice weak-armed, fiesty, bright,
no2 qb. The little scamp.I keep sayin it — Offseason will be fascinating.
Can they keep the D together?
Can they build an offense?
w
vwvParticipantRams may not deserve it, but L.A. fan loyalty still runs deep
BY DAVID WHITE
The Los Angeles Rams are back, not that Chris Leon acted as if they had ever left.
“I’ve been a Rams fan all of my life,” the Porterville city employee said. “I remember going to games in the late ’60s and ’70s when I was just a kid, wearing my white and blue jersey, those plastic helmets with the horns on them … it was pretty much ingrained in me.”
Leon is like the 10s and 20s in these parts who never gave up on their Rams, even when their Rams gave up on them and shipped it to St. Louis in 1995.
Leon is That Guy who still watched the Rams play when they were on local TV, and wore a Steven Jackson No. 39 jersey to Wal-Mart, and traded one worn-out horned ball cap for a newer mint.
Remember that when the Rams play at home for the first time next season. Every ticket should go to people like Leon, who can verify they stayed loyal to their disloyal prodigal team over all these years.
Show us your Kurt Warner poster. Tell us who made the winning tackle to win Super Bowl XXXIV – and no, you can’t use Google. Pick out former center Mike Gruttadauria in a police lineup.
Then, you can tell everyone you’re a Rams fan. Exemptions go to children under the age of 13.
NFL OWNERS DON’T LOVE CITIES OR TRADITION. OWNERS LOVE NEW STADIUMS AND STEADY CASH FLOW.
“Well, there was a time there I was heated about it,” Leon said. “But a Minnesota Vikings fan told me something I never forgot. ‘Your team is your team. You stick with them no matter what.’ So they’re my team.”
Too bad the feeling isn’t mutual. It’s never mutual. NFL owners don’t love cities or tradition. Owners love new stadiums and steady cash flow.
It’s why the Raiders left Oakland for Los Angeles, and left Los Angeles for Oakland, and are spooning a tunnel route to escape Oakland again as we speak.
This is what NFL overlords do. They are why Bekins Van Lines is still in business.
St. Louis lost its football Cardinals? They stole Los Angeles’ Rams, and the only reason Los Angeles had the Rams is because they swiped them away from Cleveland, and now Cleveland wishes it had an actual NFL team, too.
YOU ONLY HAVE A HOME TEAM BECAUSE YOU STOLE IT BACK FROM SOMEONE ELSE’S HOME, SO WHAT DO YOU EXPECT?
Remember that, Raiders fans, when Little Al Davis U-Hauls your eye patch back to Los Angeles or San Antonio. You only have a home team because you stole it back from someone else’s home, so what do you expect?
Do what most Rams fans did. Bail on the team when they decide it’s time to start seeing other cities.
That, or be among the few who kept the porch light on all night, hoping the Rams would come back when everyone said it was time to move on.
Give it enough time, and you’ll end up like Leon, and everyone else like him, riding the team bus when everyone else is jumping the bandwagon.
You finally won’t have to explain why you’re rocking the Vince Ferragamo throwback jersey at the neighborhood Super Bowl party. No more having to drive to a 49ers game once a year to see your home team in person. Guys like Leon can be public Rams fans without needing a childhood disclaimer.
The Rams are back. Here’s to Stan Kroenke until he moves them again.
“You’d be surprised how many people come up to me and say, ‘Nice jersey. I’m a fan, too,’ ” Leon said. “It’s just nice to have them back.”
wvParticipantTwo great QBs in yesterday’s games,
one very good QB,
and one good QB.Rogers, Brady,
Palmer,
Smith.No Keenums.
w
vJanuary 17, 2016 at 9:32 am in reply to: 12 former Rams to coach Stub Hubb Collegiate bowl Jan 23rd. #37499wvParticipantLarry Brooks? Haven’t heard that name in
while.w
vwvParticipantWV my old friend,
Rams need consistent play from the quarterback position. If they had at least received decent QB play this season they would have been a wild card team. As you recall all we needed was on TD against the Steelers and that game was ours. A missed field goal against Vikings cost us that game and the Ravens game. Rams win those three games and they’d be in the playoffs because they would have the tie breakers vs the Seahawks.
I would say, lets draft the kid QB out of Memphis and lets sign a good veteran QB (Brees) and lets get a go to big play wide receiver.
Grits
Well, if by some miracle, they could pull off a deal for
Brees, they would be a threat to win the division for sure.The offseason will be fun.
I still think a lot depends on Quinn.
If he cant recover from back surgery
then the D is not the same.w
vwvParticipantWell, i ‘hope’ the Raiders stay in Oakland
and the Chargers stay in San Diego.
And i hope the league expands some day
and St.Louis gets a new team.Time to start thinking about the team
again, Grits. How can they win
without a QB ?w
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