A happy guy... Rams owner E. Stan Kroenke.

Why wouldn’t he be smiling.  Rams owner Stan Kroenke is doing what he does best – being a savvy businessman.  Look what SI’s Peter King found out for us curious Rams fans. – SI MMQB

One league office source told me a major selling point to the teams playing overseas is if you give up a home game, the league will compensate the team with a payment above and beyond what it made for a regular home game. That payment, I’m told, will be at least $5 million per home game lost.

So if the Rams can pocket an extra $15 million to $25 million over the three years of the deal, they shouldn’t have any excuses about paying out the kind of guaranteed money that some teams in the bottom quartile of NFL revenue — which the Rams are in — have to pay to attract and pay legit free agents.

Now the big question many fans should have is whether that extra revenue will be directly channeled back into the Rams organization.  Whether that goes to coaching salaries, player salaries, etc. is yet to be seen.

The other noise about town is about the money lost by the local businesses.  Hotels, restaurants, and other small businesses will not see any of the alleged $15 – $25 million dollars.  The fans will get over the three games lost to London eventually.  It’s the locals that are the real losers in this deal.

Let’s hope the Rams rise from the NFC West cellar and bring playoff games to St. Louis to make up for those games and more.

» Continue reading “Pigskin Cover 3: Stan Kroenke In The News”

Well, that didn’t take very long.  The kids have only been in school for one week, actually 5 days, and the little one is already sick with a cold.  Fever, sniffles, and general lethargy which is very uncharacteristic for my youngest.  Here I thought I was being diligent with their hand washing practices – guess not.

Alas, all the wonderful grown up stuff I had planned for today (and quite possibly tomorrow) is out the window.  Couple that with the dreary Seattle-esque weather and it’s the perfect excuse to make some strong coffee and cuddle up with my laptop.

Random question: Did I ever mention that I’m SO glad football is back?  No?  Well, I’m SO GLAD football is back!

All right, back to our regularly scheduled program…  Let’s check out our headlines for this Monday morning, shall we?

1) SI’s Peter King graced us with his presence at Earth City last Tuesday morning.  Check out his comments in today’s MMQB from those few hours at Rams Camp.  He talks about a Boy Wonder but it’s not who you’d think it is.  He certainly had be fooled.

2) If you had to rate the Rams performance against the Titans how would they fair?  Ramsherd’s writer Tim Shields handed out his letter grades and from the looks of it the Rams barely passed despite the W.

3) Ever wonder what an NFL scout sees during a game?  Wonder no longer because Tony Softli from 101ESPN gives you a detailed breakdown of the defense and the things he looks for in a player.  It is a good fundamentals review if you haven’t had much exposure to it.

4) Here’s an extra article to catch you up on the Rams injuries to think about for this week from Howard Balzer.

This is the last week of Rams training camp that’s open to the public.

Rams Camp schedule for this week

I’m tentatively planning to be there Tuesday and Wednesday.  Hope to see some of you guys there.

Good morning!

It’s another Monday morning and another day of football news.  To start it off right let’s take a look at Rams headlines from over the weekend.

1) Here are notes from a national football writer’s perspective on what he saw during the Rams scrimmage at Lindenwood yesterday.  Pete Prisco, the Social Assassin, graced the Lou for the weekend.

2) For a more local view of the scrimmage check out Tony Softli’s take on the practice.

3) There’s a familiar face back on the O-line for the Rams.  Fresh off his duties as the Rams player representative Adam Goldberg is happy to be back and playing.

4) Is Isaac Bruce shopping around for a coaching job?  According to Peter King’s MMQB this morning Bruce was expected to be at Jets camp to lend his WR services.  What gives?

Wednesday: New York Jets, Florham Park, N.J.

The Jets don’t sit still. Look out on the field: Old-timer assistant coaches Tom Moore and Jim McNally were out at practice; Isaac Bruce, of all people, was due in camp in a few days to give pointers to the wideouts.

a) Does anyone know why the Rams won’t hire him?  I know he’s made his desire to coach here very well known.

b) Would you be upset if another team hired him as their WR coach?

Seems like a shame to me if he doesn’t coach for the Rams where he made history.

5) And if you didn’t get enough of Marshall Faulk’s HOF weekend, here’s a link to my most recent post about him.

Here’s the most up-to-date Rams practice schedule for this week:

Woke up at 5am or so.  For no good reason.  And I as I usually do, I reached over for my phone so I could check… you guessed it, Twitter.  I love that I don’t even have to get out of bed to check the daily news.  Sign of the times – technology gets more portable and people are getting more lazy.  I’m definitely attached to my phone.  Can’t imagine my life without it.

Jay Glazer broke the story of the both sides finally coming to an agreement at 3:52am this morning.  Check my previous Jump post for the actual tweet.  Since then a flurry of follow up articles have surfaced.  I’ll just point out the best stuff here.

1) To get the most comprehensive breakdown of the agreed upon CBA go no further than Albert Breer’s column just posted.

2) And of course, you can’t have Monday without MMQB.  Welcome back, Mr. King.  Hope you have a nice vacation.

3) Here’s a more Rams specific post by Aaron Hooks on what needs to get done now that it looks like the league year will finally begin.

The next two weeks will be an absolute madhouse.  Looking forward to it, aren’t you?

Good morning everyone!

What an insane and busy weekend.  How did you guys spend it?  It happened to be a event packed weekend in our household:

Two little league games, a 7 hour long dress rehearsal, and a 3 hour dance recital.  And those were just for two of my kids!

I wish I could have been  online more to chat it up with you guys about what took place on Friday here downtown.  Hope you all got a chance to read my summary about the NFL lockout hearing.  If you missed it here’s the link to my Friday piece.  It was so exciting!

But let’s all try and catch up, shall we?

1) Plaxico Burress becomes a free man today.  His sentence started almost 20 months ago on September 22, 2009.  Does anyone else feel like he got made an example of?  20 months in prison for shooting himself?  Just sayin’…

I would like to think Rams GM Billy Devaney has already has plans in place for at least talking to Plaxico about coming to St. Louis.  Do you guys think he can still make a difference in the NFL?  To the Rams?

Plaxico is free!

2) Peter King’s MMQB: Mr. King brings up a point I was also thinking about on Friday.  Owners counsel, Paul Clement, takes jabs at how the players are taking part in negotiations despite the players saying they are not a union anymore.

Is this statement just a function of him being a legal mouth?  If he really wanted the best thing for his client wouldn’t he refrain from driving another wedge between the two sides?  Why give the players more reason to distrust the owners?

3) What does Cortland Finnegan think of the new rules changes? He aspires to be the dirtiest player in the NFL.  The new rules certainly put a damper in his playing strategy.  I haven’t heard any Rams players speak out about this, have you?

It’s another heat wave this week in the Lou.  Stay cool and hydrated tweeps!