Know Your Enemy: St. Louis Rams

Constable Echelon celebrates the upcoming NFL season by previewing the hometown Seattle Seahawks’ opponents in the NFC West.

Welcome to the penultimate edition of the grueling yet necessary Know Your Enemy series. I do miniseries of columns because television miniseries always seem to perform well come Emmy time.

Rams? They suck. A-Rams. A-Suck. And they were met with some disastrous news in the first game of the season, and I’m not just talking about the two touchdown loss at home to the Delhommes. (Of men, in Sprench.)

Offense:

We’re a couple of years removed now from the waning days of the Greatest Show on Turf. Pity that. That was fun to watch. I remember watching that Monday Night game with the Broncos where Al Michaels had his, “This isn’t a football game, it’s a track meet!” call. Fond memories.

Now the Rams offense heavily features Steven Jackson. I remember when Jackson was a freshman at Oregon State and their coaches were saying that he was going to be better than Ken Simonton. “Yeah right!” I was wrong. Steven Jackson is a big old beast who touches the ball too much and will be out of the league in less than five years. For now though he is a very effective between the tackles runner and he was schooled on catching the ball out of the backfield by the greatest ever, Mr. Marshall Faulk. With that praise out of the way I will focus on what I think is most important about Jackson: He founded the club that T-Pain later joined of Dude* Looks Like Sheneneh.

*You follow me.

Is this the second excuse for me to talk about the career of Martin Lawrence in this three part series? I think it is! Here are a few favorite Martin moments of mine:

-The episode where all Sheneneh wanted was a date with Martin and they ended up dancing together in her apartment to Jodeci’s “Forever My Lady” with the words changed to “Forever Sheneneh”.

-The episode where Jerome came to Martin (via the window) with a business proposition, to sell bootleg Whitney Houston concert t-shirts. Upon observing the quality of said shirts Martin shrewdly observes, “Ain’t nobody tryin’ to buy a shirt that says Witty Hutton!”

-The catchphrase that I’ve always enjoyed but could never figure out how to implement in my regular patois: “It’s on like pop pop p-pop, p-pop pop popcorn!” The cadence of that is essential. Think of it as three bars in 4/4. beat 2 3 4 1 2 3 & & 1 2 3 4. Kudos to anyone who can work that out in their head. Save the music.

Rams? Oh yeah. Most unfortunately, the Rams appear to have lost the services of perennial pro bowl left tackle Orlando Pace for the season. I’m sure that this is bad news for them, I’m just not sure how bad. I think left tackles in the NFL are like renaissance painters: not appreciated in their time. The objective among us can agree that Walter Jones is not playing at the level right now that made him famous, no? He’s still great, but only now is he getting recognition as The Best Left Tackle In The NFL. That was probably true a few years ago but this is kind of a transition period for great left tackles with the retirement of Tarik Glenn, the retirement of Willie Roaf, Orlando Pace’s injury, and Jonathon Ogden’s accelerated transformation into a statue with the ability to walk. Walter Jones is the last man standing of that elite group. I just get the feeling that the next great tackles are out there right now, but won’t be recognized until after the fact. Whatever the case, I’m reasonably confident that they’re not Mike Williams or Robert Gallery.

Marc Bulger is the other half of the elite two QBs in the NFC West. Marc Bulger is a fun player to consider because it’s acknowledged he’s good, but no one knows what he does well. Me neither.

It’s exceedingly possible that what he does well is have Torry Holt and Isaac Bruce running routes for him. One of my favorite sports phrases is to call an aging athlete “The Ghost of” themself. Bruce has been fighting off ghost status like Marty McFly for a few years now. It kind of feels like this is the year that he’s marginalized, but who knows. Torry Holt has a few left, assuming that whoever takes Pace’s spot can provide the pass protection necessary for his immaculate deep route running. Vaguely sexual?

Defense:

The Rams were actually 8th into passing yards allowed last year. Tops of the division easy. They combined that with a less than stellar 31st in rushing defense. That inability to stop the run led the Rams to finish 28th in scoring defense. To recap the NFC West features last year’s 28th, 29th (Cardinals), and 32nd or dead last (49ers) scoring defenses. Is that the product of stellar offense or piss poor defense? You decide.

A quick look at the Rams’ depth on defense because I’m bored.

Oh yeah, they feature drunk driving enthusiast Leonard Little at LE, and Nebraska rookie Adam Carriker at one of the defensive tackles. You think they might have been turned off by Nebraska guys after the Eric Crouch debacle. Not so, apparently. They also feature Corey Chavous aka that guy who might have been good on those awful Minnesota defenses. No wonder these guys suck. They suck.

Intangibles:

Minor Ewing potential with the loss of Pace? I don’t know if that applies to football, especially linemen. It’s their second year in the post Martz era. I like teams with consistency in coaching, so that’s a positive but will be more so next year. Honestly, I liked these Rams a lot more before I broke them down. Now I’m thinking potential cellar dwellars for this year.

Let’s wrap the 2007 NFC West Know Your Enemy Series with projected standings:

Seahawks 11-5
Cardinals 8-8
49ers 8-8
Rams 6-10

I’m on record. Now on to better columns from me.