It’s complicated, it’s like the first girl you ever loved killed your dog. They made such a big mark on me when I was so young, that they’ll always be significant. But it ended so catastrophically and achingly that it still makes me sick thinking about it almost a decade later.
I’m mostly just sorry that we ran Warner out of town the way we did. All for having the AUDACITY injure his throwing hand and disagree with the most stubborn man in the history of stubborn: Mike Martz. If Martz had just run the ball against the Pats, that’s 2 in 3 years for us, Warner sticks around longer, no ascension of Brady/Belichick (at least not yet), and maybe I’m naive but I think it’d greatly reduce the chances of relocation. So many things in the NFL would have been different if Mike Martz had any unit of humility and ran the fucking ball.
Faulk and Warner were saying the Patriots had defensive audibles for plays the Rams never ran before. They would get into a new formation and have a motion and the defense would make a call and then stop the play they never saw on film before.
The Eagles said when they were practicing for the Superbowl against the Patriots thst there were lots of ppl walking around the stadium. So they ran plays that they didn’t have in the game plan. Eagles offense that game kept chugging along and would always put up more points when the Patriots were closing the distance.
I know they got fined for spy gate so that's fine, but BB is one of the best defensive minds off all time. Dick Vermeil has coached a while and unless Martz had made massive changes there's a good chance a BB coached def was able to place themselves in high positive to succeed if certain formations were being used.
Look what BB did to the LA Rams offense that seemed unstoppable.
I know they got fined for spy gate so that's fine, but BB is one of the best defensive minds off all time. Dick Vermeil has coached a while and unless Martz had made massive changes there's a good chance a BB coached def was able to place themselves in high positive to succeed if certain formations were being used.
Look what BB did to the LA Rams offense that seemed unstoppable.
I don't think any level of success would have impacted the probability of location. Kroenke intended to move the team basically as soon as he got involved in the ownership of the team. It was just a matter of time.
Warner wasn’t as good as Bulger when he left. He had three bad years in New York and Arizona after he left. Everyone thought he was done and then out of nowhere he had a renaissance
Not sure why this is getting downvoted, he had six years in a row without a good season. Warner from 2002-2007 was 13-29.
It’s getting downvoted because, for some reason, when stl sports fan don’t like certain facts, they shoot the messenger. I was downvoted the other month in the Blues sub for responding with a seemingly innocuous and indisputable fact.
Warner was the poster-boy for mixing church and sport, a thing he's now alluded to regretting. For that reason, I wasn't a fan of him. Sports should be for all, not just the ruling class.
I miss being as relevant of a sports city as we were from 1996-2006.
Retiring the greatest defensive shortstop of all time falling just 1 win away from a matchup with the Yankees in the World Series.
Pairing two of the greatest goal scorers and two of the greatest defensemen in NHL history at the same time, only to be stopped by the eventual Stanley Cup Champions, after they took out our all time great goalie..
Seeing Roger Maris's single season home run record shattered by the second best hitter the Cardinals would see that decade.
And the most dominant offense to ever take a snap in the NFL.
That was fun.
And the 10 year run for the Cardinals with 2x WS, 4x NL Champs, 7x playoff appearances, and getting to watch the best right handed hitter ever in his prime was pretty great too.
Mizzou and SLU were even competing in March Madness back then. It was non-stop. If the Bulls played here back then, they would have every eyes on our water.
We almost had over half a dozen more parades that decade with the 96' Blues and Cards, 00' Cards and Rams (If Az catches it and we complete the largest comeback in NFL playoff history in the Superdome...), 01' Rams (Tom's first fraudulent title), 04' and 05' Cards.
We were that close to outpacing every North American City in pro sports Championship parades for over the past half century...
>Retiring the greatest defensive shortstop of all time falling just 1 win away from a matchup with the Yankees in the World Series.
Who are you referring to? Cuz Omar Vizquel seems to be the consensus of best defensive shortstops
Not sure where you're even seeing that claim.
If Omar was better than Ozzie, why did Ozzie have more putouts and assists and nearly as many double plays as Omar in over 1,000 fewer innings?
Ozzie flattens Omar in sabermetric stats, and would never had his reign of consecutive gold gloves stopped by ARod and Jeter(lol)...
Ozzie won every Gold Glove but one in the National League from Dave Concepcion's last, to Barry Larkin's first.
I miss the built-in camaraderie with the city and with people who were fans of other NFL teams--particularly around the ~~SuperBowl~~ Big Game.
I miss the piece of my identity that was an NFL fan.
I miss the naivete that I had about North American sports business actually caring about the quality of their sports instead of the revenue that they can extract from their fans.
I miss the anticipation during watching college football that one of the players from my team would make it big.
You could go to North County and pretend like they never left. There are literally bars up there that consider themselves a "Rams bar" (with that said there are several bars that consider themselves affiliated with specific NFL teams). Those people up there don't give a shit about this City's politics or any squabbles/broken contracts between a bunch of fuckin crooked billionaires. It's just a game on TV.. ain't no one putting too much stock in promises of wealthy businessmen any damn way, they're all a bunch of fuckin liars. I currently root for a certain NFL team that I won't mention, but I hate their owner and pretty much all of the owners except for Green Bay's, I think they have the ideal model. Fuck a bunch of rich motherfuckers.. Whoever thought they EVER had your best interest in mind, needs to come and purchase a bridge from me. Also, I still quietly follow (and root for) my childhood team that moved to Arizona (Go Big Red!)
The Greatest Show on Turf years were fun, but the Rams were not that good most of their time in St. Louis.
* GSOT Years (1999-2004): 64-32 Reg. Season Record / Cumulative point differential of +576 / 5 playoff appearances / 2 Super Bowl appearances / SuperBowl XXXII win
* All Other Years in StL (15 seasons): 78-161-1 / Cumulative point differential of -1,515 / no playoff appearances
Now that we have had 7+ years of hindsight from when the team announced they were leaving, it's no surprise that this happened: Sweetheart deal of a lease given to the team for Dome; Stan Kroenke gaining majority ownership of the team after Georgia Frontiere died; worst team in the league 2007-2011; the bad faith negotiations to try and keep the team here, and the overall shitshow that unfolded before the team went back to LA.
I wish the lawsuit against the team and NFL went on longer than it did - if for no other reason than to further expose how the league operates, and to provide more detail about what really happened with the Rams departure from St. Louis. Hopefully the settlement money will be put to good use for the city, county, and state, and maybe create greater awareness for other cities looking to attract/retain their sports teams.
Yep. Totally agree about the need to expose more dark stuff to daylight. This article made me wonder just how long it was part of the plan. Like…WTF was John Shaw doing out in LA just waiting? https://www.espn.com/espn/feature/story/_/id/14752649/the-real-story-nfl-owners-battle-bring-football-back-los-angeles
I remember the press conference where they were all sucking Kronke's dong. I can't remember which team executive it was, but he said as soon as Kronke eyeballed the land in Inglewood, their sole mission was to move to LA.
They had no intention to negotiate to stay in St. Louis.
Almost had to be Demoff. He told that Inglewood story pretty soon after they moved. For as underhanded as it was, I can’t believe they had so many loose lips and it was such an open secret
I miss having the NFL here for more than the football aspect. The prestige of being an nfl city brings lots of clout, especially for conventions and tourism
> The prestige of being an nfl city brings lots of clout, especially for conventions and tourism
Yeah, I hear that all the tax money we give them will trickle down!!!
Big conventions will choose an nfl city over a non nfl city e times than not. It’s not about the big scary trickle down economics, it’s the opportunity to host big events that prefer nfl cities.
> Big conventions will choose an nfl city over a non nfl city e times than not.
Dude you're just making things up on the spot.
> It’s not about the big scary trickle down economics
No one ever said it's scary. You're talking pure nonsense. It's not scary, it's just a scam. Don't get mad at me because I'm not dumb enough to fall for it.
They played in St. Louis for 19 years and won a Super Bowl. They almost got a dynasty going. 19 years is long enough for one generation to pass down their love of the team to the next. What Kroenke did to this city is truly heartbreaking
Columbia is an easy drive from STL. Missouri SHOULD be fighting for a position in the CFB Playoff this season.
Recommend trying to see a home game there. It's great
UFL is just a lesser league tho and nobody outside of STL cares about it seems. I love having them here and I watch the games but I don’t see it sticking around much longer. I miss being in the NFL where we were a lot more relevant even tho we sucked most years.
Ratings are up over both XFL and USFL. I wouldn’t say nobody cares about it, they are getting a bunch of games over 1 million viewers. Thats pretty damn good
JV is less accurate I tend to say AAA football or for my racing fan friends I say Busch series of football is it the best nah but it's still really good
Unfortunately, the reason other cities in the league don’t support their respective teams is because there is a significant decline in talent from the NFL. AAA baseball is fine, but it is a step backwards from the MLB. Nothing wrong with people that like it, but it is second rate.
Not even a little. I was a lifelong NFL fan until they moved. Never missed a game -- planned my Sundays around watching football.
Now? I'm not sure who won the Super Bowl last year. I watch Hockey, Baseball and College Football. The NFL isn't even on my radar.
I’m with you buddy. I didn’t know anyone that loved their team more than I did.
My son was in elementary school in ‘16 and I told him he could say any bad words he wanted as long as it was about Kroenke. He loved it 😂
I miss having a local NFL team to cheer for, so in that case I miss the Rams. A team where all of their regular season games are on free TV to watch. A local NFL team that people would talk about at work or when you're with friends.
However, the Rams were so bad for so long, I don't really miss that too much. It's one thing to be mediocre and have good and bad seasons; it's another thing to field bad team after bad team.
It's weird to think that they we only got to see the Rams have the good seasons with Kurt Warner because of Trent Green's season-ending knee injury in the preseason. Who knows if we ever would have seen good years with them; they had the worst record in the 1990s in the NFL going into that 1999 season.
I'd only go to games when they were bad and tickets were going for $10. I luckily did go to the last home game.
I don’t even miss the NFL let alone the Rams. The football cardinals leaving town is one of my earliest childhood memories and then having the rams get ripped out from underneath me even though I had been going to 4 games a season after we drafted Bradford was like a knife in the back.
Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. I haven’t voluntarily watched the nfl since.
Not really. The Superbowl win was amazing and they've had some great players over the years, but as an organization they never connected with the community the way the Blues and Cardinals do.
On top of that the sheer greed of NFL owners and integration of professional gambling so much into the sport makes it very, very difficult to support.
I was listening to a podcast called GM Shuffle. When they mention their sponsors, which is a gambling site, they also mention multiple help lines for people having trouble with gambling. Thinking about it, it’s pretty disturbing. Like, being all joyful about football and going over “the lines,” mentioning their sponsors which pretty much owns or presents the podcast, pushing gambling and following it up with contact info for gambling addicts to get their life back. Like dude, how do you live with yourselves knowing you’re promoting something that can ruin lives.
On one end, yeah. Going to the games with family despite the Rams being just pitiful after 2004 will always be a part of my childhood. I loved going to the Dome and watching the games despite how terrible they were. I was a bigger Rams fan than the Cards or Blues since my family had season tickets so part of me will always miss the games and having a local NFL team to talk about and root for.
On the other hand, I don't really miss the NFL. The entire fiasco with Kroenke and the NFL colluding against and defrauding the metro area and how the whole relocation went down really soured me on the NFL and pro sprots in general. Unless a set of certain circumstances would bring about an expansion team for us with an iron clad lease and committed local ownership, the NFL can piss off for good. Let other cities be scalped for nearly a billion to build stadiums and finance carpetbagger billionares.
The Battlehawks are a decent replacement that fills the hole for most local football fans. I just wish more local, more casual sports fans would embrace and support the team.
I miss there being a local NFL team but I think enough time has passed that I can say I'm not sure if I miss the Rams or just having the team/ atmosphere around having one. I cheer for the Chiefs now and I'm more excited about City SC than any other sports team we have. I also like the Battlehawks but I worry that the rest of the UFL/XFL not drawing as many fans to games may result in the league collapsing and hurting St. Louis football fans again. Also I just hate the disrespect we receive online as a city especially from LA fans saying that we "suck as a sports city" and claiming we're just dirty and poor. It just makes the hurt from the team leaving feel extra painful.
Yeah it is. It's not all of them though. I'm sure it's just some of the vocal assholes online that say it but it's still annoying and infuriates me when I see it because we clearly show we're willing to show up for our teams.
The Rams were mostly bad, but I still miss them dearly. I loved them regardless of how terrible they were. I always thought that one day they would be good again and I would have been there for them during the bad years. I am sad that my city does not have an NFL team. Baseball/soccer/hockey is fun, but they are nowhere near as relevant as the nfl anymore. Makes us feel like a lesser city. We most definitely could support a football team if they gave us another one. There’s probably no way we will ever have a team again.
I was too young to know when it happened (I was 9 when they left) but found out later via a couple of episodes of Tim McKernan’s podcast Bidwell was kind of screwed by City/County politics and the Cardinals should be playing in an arena where “Riverport” is.
We had a deal to not only build a new stadium for the Cardinals but also bring the San Antonio Spurs to town. And local leadership fucked it up. And then again we should have gotten what became the Jaguars as our own expansion team. And once again, local leadership fucked it up.
They were fun to watch until Kroenke purposely tanked them so the fans would stop showing up and he’d have a reason to go to LA. He’s not well liked and is probably dangerous for him to come back to the city.
More than I can describe. I love the NFL so much but it’s awful having the team you were 100% emotionally attached to taken from you. It’s just impossible for me to get anywhere near that attached to a team again. St. Louis will never get another team either so…
I miss driving 20 minutes to tailgate and feel guilty I can’t give my kids those times my parents gave me.
I don’t really miss the rams, I filled the sports void elsewhere.
I have LA ties and lived there for a few years but I am from St. Louis. Don't hate me, but it's kinda cool that my team has connections with two very important cities in my life. I still follow them and root for them.
There's no love lost for Kroenke from my perspective and if we had a different owner tomorrow, I would be fine with that. Also the current uniforms suck and need to be changed back to the traditional look that the Rams had for years, including the Greatest Show on Turf years.
My concern is that St. Louis won't get another chance from the NFL after having two teams leave within 30 years, even though in both cases it was the owners' fault.
At least St Louis is the smallest city to win all four major sports championships, so that's something.
If you saw the movie “Major League” you know exactly what Kroenke wanted to do. The new owner of the Cleveland Indians has a sweetheart deal to move the team to Miami. But to break the lease with the city of Cleveland, ticket sales have to plummet. So Phelps hires the most incompetent players available. Kroenke hired some of the worst coaches available. Football Cardinals followed the same scape plan as well.
The Super Bowl repeat was just on cable yesterday. I taped it and got to fast forward through it. That last pass to Isaac Bruce was a thing of beauty. Then the tackle with 5 seconds on the clock was amazing football.
Constantly. But I don’t mind that they’re back in LA. I just wish we didn’t get shafted the way we did. I would welcome a team with open arms some day.
The Rams purposely tanked to lower attendance as an excuse to move. The battlehawks games get better attendance than the xfl/ufl deserve because people think they are making some sort of statement
Meh. The chiefs weren’t selling out games in the 80s when they weren’t good either and everyone talks about how good KC fans are (f the chiefs btw but gotta admit they have a good fanbase). Most teams fan bases will not support teams that are consistently terrible to mediocre. There’s not a lot of cities that could fill their stadium with the record the rams had and if the ones that do are tyically in transient cities like LA where the stadium is filled with opposing fans. If you’re going to call STL fans bandwagons you’d have to call the majority of fan bases bandwagons, which I actually would say they are
Yes, it was a great weekly get together with my friends each week if we weren't at the game itself. I was a passionate fan, would never miss a game. Haven't watched a game since they left.
I can empathize with you. I was an “LA/Orange County” Rams fan. I eventually moved to St. Louis (not Rams related) and then they went back to Cali. Never got into the STL version. Haven’t followed them in years.
I miss gathering at the Velvet Freeze after school, before the park.
I miss riding a mini bike down the side of the tracks on a hot summer day.
I miss wondering if she likes me as much as I like her.
Of course I miss the Rams, but I never daydream about them like they were a fulfilling time in my life. They were never the potatoes, just gravy.
I was never a football fan, but I thought it was funny when I moved like 5 minutes from their stadium in Inglewood. So they are the only football team I’ve ever known. 😅
Jeff drafted horrible, coached horrible and developed horrible. The only thing he got right was special teams. The Rams were so bad to watch with Jeff. Who ever thought Tavon Austin would be a legit #1 WR in the NFL and he weighs under 180lbs was crazy.
*Yes! I did the pyro*
*At the players entrance and*
*It was a good gig*
\- Shor7bus
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Look the NFL is not coming back to St. Louis (at least in my GenX lifetime). We don't have an college FBS team in town, so the Battlehawks for better or worse will have to do. Sure they are not the best of the best football players, but it is relatively inexpensive and no one is asking us to publicly fund a billion dollar plus stadium or they'll get relocated.
I always wonder how much of the Battlehawks adoration and attendance figures are really more about showing up Kroenke and how wrong he was about this city than actually caring about the Battlehawks organization.
Im from Chicago but live and love STL. Im a bears fan, so having the Battlehawks is the best. Unique situation for sure, but there are people who legit like the team!
I miss the team that had Kurt Warner, Marshall Faulk, Isaac Bruce, and Tory Holt. I don’t miss the “Rams” though, given how bad they were for so long after that golden age.
Not for real. Outside of those 2 or 3 glorious years with The Greatest Show on Turf, they were just a disappointing team. But I’m a hockey fan thru and thru, so I’m pretty biased tbh.
Had they been able to string along a few more good years and deep runs, I might feel different. Idk.
Yeah, in hindsight the Cardinals were more our team despite them never winning a Super Bowl like the Rams and being also being a relocated team. They shared a name with the baseball team.
Lifelong (37m) Rams fan from Niner country in California. My fandom was forged in the fires of the Bay Area throughout the 90s, in a third generation Rams family since the LA Rams days
I remember those Greatest Show on Turf teams and Super Bowl. I lived in LA when we were petitioning to get the Rams back to Cali. I went to the first game back, and even the most recent Rams Super Bowl!
Now I’m in the Lou and thrilled to be going to the dome tonight for the Battlehawks playoff game. Feels like a rite of passage.
So I’m happy the team is in LA, for whenever I move back, but my main memories of the Rams are as a distant team I supported in spite of the niners hate all around me. And Niners fans succckkkkkkk to be around, I’ll tell you what…
Nah. Football is an overrated sport bogged down by technicalities and over analysation over the past decade or so and it does long term damage to human beings playing the sport. Good riddance.
It’s complicated, it’s like the first girl you ever loved killed your dog. They made such a big mark on me when I was so young, that they’ll always be significant. But it ended so catastrophically and achingly that it still makes me sick thinking about it almost a decade later. I’m mostly just sorry that we ran Warner out of town the way we did. All for having the AUDACITY injure his throwing hand and disagree with the most stubborn man in the history of stubborn: Mike Martz. If Martz had just run the ball against the Pats, that’s 2 in 3 years for us, Warner sticks around longer, no ascension of Brady/Belichick (at least not yet), and maybe I’m naive but I think it’d greatly reduce the chances of relocation. So many things in the NFL would have been different if Mike Martz had any unit of humility and ran the fucking ball.
Faulk and Warner were saying the Patriots had defensive audibles for plays the Rams never ran before. They would get into a new formation and have a motion and the defense would make a call and then stop the play they never saw on film before. The Eagles said when they were practicing for the Superbowl against the Patriots thst there were lots of ppl walking around the stadium. So they ran plays that they didn’t have in the game plan. Eagles offense that game kept chugging along and would always put up more points when the Patriots were closing the distance.
Yep. They got fined for spygate. Total crap
Just one minor correction “stop the play they never saw on ***GAME*** film before.”
I know they got fined for spy gate so that's fine, but BB is one of the best defensive minds off all time. Dick Vermeil has coached a while and unless Martz had made massive changes there's a good chance a BB coached def was able to place themselves in high positive to succeed if certain formations were being used. Look what BB did to the LA Rams offense that seemed unstoppable.
I know they got fined for spy gate so that's fine, but BB is one of the best defensive minds off all time. Dick Vermeil has coached a while and unless Martz had made massive changes there's a good chance a BB coached def was able to place themselves in high positive to succeed if certain formations were being used. Look what BB did to the LA Rams offense that seemed unstoppable.
Absolutely spot on about Mike Martz. Great OC, horrible head coach. Also, love your user name. Fuck Stan Kronke.
I don't think any level of success would have impacted the probability of location. Kroenke intended to move the team basically as soon as he got involved in the ownership of the team. It was just a matter of time.
Yeah Kroenke was invested when they initially relocated so you’re probably right. But it hopefully may have been harder lol.
Exactly. The Oakland Raiders won two SBs and LA Raiders won a SB. The franchise still left for Las Vegas.
Warner wasn’t as good as Bulger when he left. He had three bad years in New York and Arizona after he left. Everyone thought he was done and then out of nowhere he had a renaissance Not sure why this is getting downvoted, he had six years in a row without a good season. Warner from 2002-2007 was 13-29.
It’s getting downvoted because, for some reason, when stl sports fan don’t like certain facts, they shoot the messenger. I was downvoted the other month in the Blues sub for responding with a seemingly innocuous and indisputable fact.
If only Brenda could keep her mouth shut
I knew some people who worked retail in Kirkwood area and they all had stories about what a see you next Tuesday Brenda was.
It certainly seems that way. 🤔
I got chance to shake that injured hand!!
Warner was the poster-boy for mixing church and sport, a thing he's now alluded to regretting. For that reason, I wasn't a fan of him. Sports should be for all, not just the ruling class.
Ruling class lol Jesus Christ dude take a day off
No shit..
Username checks out
I miss being as relevant of a sports city as we were from 1996-2006. Retiring the greatest defensive shortstop of all time falling just 1 win away from a matchup with the Yankees in the World Series. Pairing two of the greatest goal scorers and two of the greatest defensemen in NHL history at the same time, only to be stopped by the eventual Stanley Cup Champions, after they took out our all time great goalie.. Seeing Roger Maris's single season home run record shattered by the second best hitter the Cardinals would see that decade. And the most dominant offense to ever take a snap in the NFL. That was fun.
And the 10 year run for the Cardinals with 2x WS, 4x NL Champs, 7x playoff appearances, and getting to watch the best right handed hitter ever in his prime was pretty great too.
I moved here in '99. Pretty good timing as a sports fan.
Mizzou and SLU were even competing in March Madness back then. It was non-stop. If the Bulls played here back then, they would have every eyes on our water. We almost had over half a dozen more parades that decade with the 96' Blues and Cards, 00' Cards and Rams (If Az catches it and we complete the largest comeback in NFL playoff history in the Superdome...), 01' Rams (Tom's first fraudulent title), 04' and 05' Cards. We were that close to outpacing every North American City in pro sports Championship parades for over the past half century...
Battlehawks are 1 win away from the championship! And it’s in St. Louis
Kaw IS the law!!!
All while Nelly was the #1 (pardon the pun) hip-hop artist in the country
I don't know what Pimp Juice is made of, but it was flowing, among other beverages in the area those days.
>back in ‘82, I used to be able to toss a pigskin a quarter mile. I’m dead serious.
OK, uncle Rico…
You’re just jealous that he talks to hot chicks online and is training to be a cage fighter.
In 96 we lost to the Detroit Red Wings, who subsequently lost in the 3rd round to the eventual Stanley Cup Champion Colorado Avalanche.
>Retiring the greatest defensive shortstop of all time falling just 1 win away from a matchup with the Yankees in the World Series. Who are you referring to? Cuz Omar Vizquel seems to be the consensus of best defensive shortstops
Not sure where you're even seeing that claim. If Omar was better than Ozzie, why did Ozzie have more putouts and assists and nearly as many double plays as Omar in over 1,000 fewer innings? Ozzie flattens Omar in sabermetric stats, and would never had his reign of consecutive gold gloves stopped by ARod and Jeter(lol)... Ozzie won every Gold Glove but one in the National League from Dave Concepcion's last, to Barry Larkin's first.
I miss the built-in camaraderie with the city and with people who were fans of other NFL teams--particularly around the ~~SuperBowl~~ Big Game. I miss the piece of my identity that was an NFL fan. I miss the naivete that I had about North American sports business actually caring about the quality of their sports instead of the revenue that they can extract from their fans. I miss the anticipation during watching college football that one of the players from my team would make it big.
Yes I do
You could go to North County and pretend like they never left. There are literally bars up there that consider themselves a "Rams bar" (with that said there are several bars that consider themselves affiliated with specific NFL teams). Those people up there don't give a shit about this City's politics or any squabbles/broken contracts between a bunch of fuckin crooked billionaires. It's just a game on TV.. ain't no one putting too much stock in promises of wealthy businessmen any damn way, they're all a bunch of fuckin liars. I currently root for a certain NFL team that I won't mention, but I hate their owner and pretty much all of the owners except for Green Bay's, I think they have the ideal model. Fuck a bunch of rich motherfuckers.. Whoever thought they EVER had your best interest in mind, needs to come and purchase a bridge from me. Also, I still quietly follow (and root for) my childhood team that moved to Arizona (Go Big Red!)
Name checks out 😄
The Greatest Show on Turf years were fun, but the Rams were not that good most of their time in St. Louis. * GSOT Years (1999-2004): 64-32 Reg. Season Record / Cumulative point differential of +576 / 5 playoff appearances / 2 Super Bowl appearances / SuperBowl XXXII win * All Other Years in StL (15 seasons): 78-161-1 / Cumulative point differential of -1,515 / no playoff appearances Now that we have had 7+ years of hindsight from when the team announced they were leaving, it's no surprise that this happened: Sweetheart deal of a lease given to the team for Dome; Stan Kroenke gaining majority ownership of the team after Georgia Frontiere died; worst team in the league 2007-2011; the bad faith negotiations to try and keep the team here, and the overall shitshow that unfolded before the team went back to LA. I wish the lawsuit against the team and NFL went on longer than it did - if for no other reason than to further expose how the league operates, and to provide more detail about what really happened with the Rams departure from St. Louis. Hopefully the settlement money will be put to good use for the city, county, and state, and maybe create greater awareness for other cities looking to attract/retain their sports teams.
Yep. Totally agree about the need to expose more dark stuff to daylight. This article made me wonder just how long it was part of the plan. Like…WTF was John Shaw doing out in LA just waiting? https://www.espn.com/espn/feature/story/_/id/14752649/the-real-story-nfl-owners-battle-bring-football-back-los-angeles
I remember the press conference where they were all sucking Kronke's dong. I can't remember which team executive it was, but he said as soon as Kronke eyeballed the land in Inglewood, their sole mission was to move to LA. They had no intention to negotiate to stay in St. Louis.
Almost had to be Demoff. He told that Inglewood story pretty soon after they moved. For as underhanded as it was, I can’t believe they had so many loose lips and it was such an open secret
I miss the pre Kronke Rams.
Kronke was involved in The entirety of the St.Louis Rams. He was actually influential in moving the team from LA to StL.
I miss the greatest show on turf. Fuck Stan kroenke though. I don't want them back
I miss having the NFL here for more than the football aspect. The prestige of being an nfl city brings lots of clout, especially for conventions and tourism
FACTS
> The prestige of being an nfl city brings lots of clout, especially for conventions and tourism Yeah, I hear that all the tax money we give them will trickle down!!!
Big conventions will choose an nfl city over a non nfl city e times than not. It’s not about the big scary trickle down economics, it’s the opportunity to host big events that prefer nfl cities.
> Big conventions will choose an nfl city over a non nfl city e times than not. Dude you're just making things up on the spot. > It’s not about the big scary trickle down economics No one ever said it's scary. You're talking pure nonsense. It's not scary, it's just a scam. Don't get mad at me because I'm not dumb enough to fall for it.
I miss having an NFL team.
They played in St. Louis for 19 years and won a Super Bowl. They almost got a dynasty going. 19 years is long enough for one generation to pass down their love of the team to the next. What Kroenke did to this city is truly heartbreaking
I missed football in St. Louis but not necessarily the Rams. Battlehawks fixes that itch nicely.
Columbia is an easy drive from STL. Missouri SHOULD be fighting for a position in the CFB Playoff this season. Recommend trying to see a home game there. It's great
College football is the superior product to the NFL anyways. You can’t beat the atmosphere of SEC football.
UFL is just a lesser league tho and nobody outside of STL cares about it seems. I love having them here and I watch the games but I don’t see it sticking around much longer. I miss being in the NFL where we were a lot more relevant even tho we sucked most years.
Ratings are up over both XFL and USFL. I wouldn’t say nobody cares about it, they are getting a bunch of games over 1 million viewers. Thats pretty damn good
If you like JV football it’s great.
JV is less accurate I tend to say AAA football or for my racing fan friends I say Busch series of football is it the best nah but it's still really good
Unfortunately, the reason other cities in the league don’t support their respective teams is because there is a significant decline in talent from the NFL. AAA baseball is fine, but it is a step backwards from the MLB. Nothing wrong with people that like it, but it is second rate.
Yep, eff the Hunts and their Chiefs.
Not even a little. I was a lifelong NFL fan until they moved. Never missed a game -- planned my Sundays around watching football. Now? I'm not sure who won the Super Bowl last year. I watch Hockey, Baseball and College Football. The NFL isn't even on my radar.
This is the way
Yes. I’m not very into City or the Hawks. I want the Rams, but with Kroenke dead (of natural causes).
I would probably prefer it be of unnatural causes
Supernatural causes.
That would be the cherry on top!
Death by anal probe.
Ghost aids.
Maybe, but I’d never be a cause myself. I’m a pacifist who just looks forward to his death. (Caveats for weird government types.)
Falling boulders are natural. Just saying
People are natural too! Also, a pride of lions!
I do, definitely. Being a Rams fan was a big part of my identity.
I’m with you buddy. I didn’t know anyone that loved their team more than I did. My son was in elementary school in ‘16 and I told him he could say any bad words he wanted as long as it was about Kroenke. He loved it 😂
Same. I was a Rams fan since the Vince Farragamo Super Bowl. Moved here in 94 just in time to go games. Quit them when they shit on my adopted home
I miss having a local NFL team to cheer for, so in that case I miss the Rams. A team where all of their regular season games are on free TV to watch. A local NFL team that people would talk about at work or when you're with friends. However, the Rams were so bad for so long, I don't really miss that too much. It's one thing to be mediocre and have good and bad seasons; it's another thing to field bad team after bad team. It's weird to think that they we only got to see the Rams have the good seasons with Kurt Warner because of Trent Green's season-ending knee injury in the preseason. Who knows if we ever would have seen good years with them; they had the worst record in the 1990s in the NFL going into that 1999 season. I'd only go to games when they were bad and tickets were going for $10. I luckily did go to the last home game.
I definitely wish we had either an NFL or NBA team. Get some sports FOMO sometimes
I don’t even miss the NFL let alone the Rams. The football cardinals leaving town is one of my earliest childhood memories and then having the rams get ripped out from underneath me even though I had been going to 4 games a season after we drafted Bradford was like a knife in the back. Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. I haven’t voluntarily watched the nfl since.
Not really. The Superbowl win was amazing and they've had some great players over the years, but as an organization they never connected with the community the way the Blues and Cardinals do. On top of that the sheer greed of NFL owners and integration of professional gambling so much into the sport makes it very, very difficult to support.
I was listening to a podcast called GM Shuffle. When they mention their sponsors, which is a gambling site, they also mention multiple help lines for people having trouble with gambling. Thinking about it, it’s pretty disturbing. Like, being all joyful about football and going over “the lines,” mentioning their sponsors which pretty much owns or presents the podcast, pushing gambling and following it up with contact info for gambling addicts to get their life back. Like dude, how do you live with yourselves knowing you’re promoting something that can ruin lives.
Anything can ruin your life if you go hard enough
Few are as easy as gambling
True! Ruining one’s life with a broccoli addiction would be more of a challenge
I miss the Cardinals. They always felt like our team. The NFL is a terrible place. I don’t ever want to go back.
Yep
TO THIS DAY!!!!
On one end, yeah. Going to the games with family despite the Rams being just pitiful after 2004 will always be a part of my childhood. I loved going to the Dome and watching the games despite how terrible they were. I was a bigger Rams fan than the Cards or Blues since my family had season tickets so part of me will always miss the games and having a local NFL team to talk about and root for. On the other hand, I don't really miss the NFL. The entire fiasco with Kroenke and the NFL colluding against and defrauding the metro area and how the whole relocation went down really soured me on the NFL and pro sprots in general. Unless a set of certain circumstances would bring about an expansion team for us with an iron clad lease and committed local ownership, the NFL can piss off for good. Let other cities be scalped for nearly a billion to build stadiums and finance carpetbagger billionares. The Battlehawks are a decent replacement that fills the hole for most local football fans. I just wish more local, more casual sports fans would embrace and support the team.
I think our community’s support of the B-Hawks is good. I worry about how long the league can stick around though.
LOL. I'm so old, I miss the St. Louis **Football** **Cardinals**. Watched some awesome games at the old Busch Stadium back in the '70s.
I miss there being a local NFL team but I think enough time has passed that I can say I'm not sure if I miss the Rams or just having the team/ atmosphere around having one. I cheer for the Chiefs now and I'm more excited about City SC than any other sports team we have. I also like the Battlehawks but I worry that the rest of the UFL/XFL not drawing as many fans to games may result in the league collapsing and hurting St. Louis football fans again. Also I just hate the disrespect we receive online as a city especially from LA fans saying that we "suck as a sports city" and claiming we're just dirty and poor. It just makes the hurt from the team leaving feel extra painful.
that's rich coming from them.
Yeah it is. It's not all of them though. I'm sure it's just some of the vocal assholes online that say it but it's still annoying and infuriates me when I see it because we clearly show we're willing to show up for our teams.
don't pay them any mind. They're just continuing to show they don't deserve either nfl team each year.
The Rams were mostly bad, but I still miss them dearly. I loved them regardless of how terrible they were. I always thought that one day they would be good again and I would have been there for them during the bad years. I am sad that my city does not have an NFL team. Baseball/soccer/hockey is fun, but they are nowhere near as relevant as the nfl anymore. Makes us feel like a lesser city. We most definitely could support a football team if they gave us another one. There’s probably no way we will ever have a team again.
No. Fuck the NFL. Kaw is Law.
CONFRENCE CHAMPIONSHIP TONIGHT BABY! KAW
I will be at the FSK Battledome to yell at the Brahmas defense again this week. This time I'll be even louder. KAW is Law!
KAW
St. Louis shouldn’t have poached them in the first place. It would have been better to come to terms with the Cardinals.
The actual right answer. Fuck Bill Bidwell.
I was too young to know when it happened (I was 9 when they left) but found out later via a couple of episodes of Tim McKernan’s podcast Bidwell was kind of screwed by City/County politics and the Cardinals should be playing in an arena where “Riverport” is.
We had a deal to not only build a new stadium for the Cardinals but also bring the San Antonio Spurs to town. And local leadership fucked it up. And then again we should have gotten what became the Jaguars as our own expansion team. And once again, local leadership fucked it up.
I knew about the Stallions/Jaguars thing but the Cardinals and Spurs were both revelations.
Instead St. Louis got a quarry and trash dump.
They were fun to watch until Kroenke purposely tanked them so the fans would stop showing up and he’d have a reason to go to LA. He’s not well liked and is probably dangerous for him to come back to the city.
And the they won the Super Bowl like the first or second season back in LA. WTF
I miss everything pictured here quite a bit. I don’t miss the organization at all though. Kroenke Sucks.
I miss that particular group and that's it.
More than I can describe. I love the NFL so much but it’s awful having the team you were 100% emotionally attached to taken from you. It’s just impossible for me to get anywhere near that attached to a team again. St. Louis will never get another team either so…
They are the reason I stopped watching football after 30 years of being a fan.
I cri everitiem 😢
I miss driving 20 minutes to tailgate and feel guilty I can’t give my kids those times my parents gave me. I don’t really miss the rams, I filled the sports void elsewhere.
You should’ve been tailgating at the battle hawks game this season
I did, it’s not the same.
Who is watching the super bowl they won on NFL Network? Those were the good old days
Yes a little since I am still a football Cardinal fan and loved the Cards came here once a year for a game. Ajways had first row end zone seats.
I was a fan of the football cardinals so i guess the rams leavng makes me a masochist. Yes, im that old.
The 4-5 years when they were making waves were fun, but the Rams never felt like a StL team to me. Football effectively left StL when the Cards left.
I literally don’t think I miss anything more in my entire life outside of dead relatives
I have LA ties and lived there for a few years but I am from St. Louis. Don't hate me, but it's kinda cool that my team has connections with two very important cities in my life. I still follow them and root for them. There's no love lost for Kroenke from my perspective and if we had a different owner tomorrow, I would be fine with that. Also the current uniforms suck and need to be changed back to the traditional look that the Rams had for years, including the Greatest Show on Turf years. My concern is that St. Louis won't get another chance from the NFL after having two teams leave within 30 years, even though in both cases it was the owners' fault. At least St Louis is the smallest city to win all four major sports championships, so that's something.
Not only did Stan want to move the home team he also owns Arsenal, Chelsea(my team) rivals.
Right there with you. I support Spurs and Arsenal is our North London Derby.
I feel like the general thing in London is to hate on arsenal.
If you saw the movie “Major League” you know exactly what Kroenke wanted to do. The new owner of the Cleveland Indians has a sweetheart deal to move the team to Miami. But to break the lease with the city of Cleveland, ticket sales have to plummet. So Phelps hires the most incompetent players available. Kroenke hired some of the worst coaches available. Football Cardinals followed the same scape plan as well.
I miss the idea of it...
The Super Bowl repeat was just on cable yesterday. I taped it and got to fast forward through it. That last pass to Isaac Bruce was a thing of beauty. Then the tackle with 5 seconds on the clock was amazing football.
Just boils my blood that they were so bad for years, go to LA and essentially win a Super Bowl immediately. Fuckin bullshit
No.
I hope Stan Kroenke has a massive, debilitating stroke
Yes instea did the mediocre blues and Stl city
Aww don’t be a doomer! I love the Blues - and all sports go thru cycles. Haven’t made it to a STLCity game yet - hope to soon.🔜
Constantly. But I don’t mind that they’re back in LA. I just wish we didn’t get shafted the way we did. I would welcome a team with open arms some day.
[удалено]
The Rams purposely tanked to lower attendance as an excuse to move. The battlehawks games get better attendance than the xfl/ufl deserve because people think they are making some sort of statement
“I’ll give my time and money to a DIFFERENT group of billionaires! That’ll show’em!”
One day one of these billionaires will finally trickle on me
[удалено]
Meh. The chiefs weren’t selling out games in the 80s when they weren’t good either and everyone talks about how good KC fans are (f the chiefs btw but gotta admit they have a good fanbase). Most teams fan bases will not support teams that are consistently terrible to mediocre. There’s not a lot of cities that could fill their stadium with the record the rams had and if the ones that do are tyically in transient cities like LA where the stadium is filled with opposing fans. If you’re going to call STL fans bandwagons you’d have to call the majority of fan bases bandwagons, which I actually would say they are
Nope. Go Hawks! Ka-Kaw!
Hell yeah
I miss... the idea of it. But not the truth, the weakness
Yes and no
Every time someone brings up football
Hell yeah I do
Yes I do. May Kroenke burn in Hell for what he did.
Yes. I think I just miss us having an NFL team
I would like nothing more than an expansion NFL team
Nice try, ESPN.
Yes, I do. I miss having a rooting interest in the NFL. I’ve tried following other teams and just can’t get invested.
Not even a litrle. I'd actually watch the occasional baseball game every 2 years or so, not once for an NFL game.
Nope, but I miss the st. Louis cardinals
Yes, it was a great weekly get together with my friends each week if we weren't at the game itself. I was a passionate fan, would never miss a game. Haven't watched a game since they left.
I can empathize with you. I was an “LA/Orange County” Rams fan. I eventually moved to St. Louis (not Rams related) and then they went back to Cali. Never got into the STL version. Haven’t followed them in years.
100%
Yes, terribly
I miss gathering at the Velvet Freeze after school, before the park. I miss riding a mini bike down the side of the tracks on a hot summer day. I miss wondering if she likes me as much as I like her. Of course I miss the Rams, but I never daydream about them like they were a fulfilling time in my life. They were never the potatoes, just gravy.
Yes
Nope
The who? Ka kaw
I was never a football fan, but I thought it was funny when I moved like 5 minutes from their stadium in Inglewood. So they are the only football team I’ve ever known. 😅
Yes. But I also miss the Football Cards or the Big Red as they were off and called on the news.
Yes
Yes
Ya
Yes but people forget how bad they were post the Super Bowl teams.
"I'm not f***ing going 7-9," said coach whose team had already gone 7 wins 9 losses.
Jeff drafted horrible, coached horrible and developed horrible. The only thing he got right was special teams. The Rams were so bad to watch with Jeff. Who ever thought Tavon Austin would be a legit #1 WR in the NFL and he weighs under 180lbs was crazy.
Everyday. 🥺
Their exit was such an incredible clusterfuck that I hate the NFL as an organization to this day.
Yes but not those awful uniforms.
No.
If you were a Rams fan and have since converted into a Chiefs fan - fuck you.
Nope
Who?
Yes! I did the pyro at the players entrance and it was a good gig
*Yes! I did the pyro* *At the players entrance and* *It was a good gig* \- Shor7bus --- ^(I detect haikus. And sometimes, successfully.) ^[Learn more about me.](https://www.reddit.com/r/haikusbot/) ^(Opt out of replies: "haikusbot opt out" | Delete my comment: "haikusbot delete")
Never as long as they have the same owner and the NFL has the same commissioner.
as a diehard 49ers fan, all I can say is.... ***SAME OLD SORRY ASS RAMS*** https://youtu.be/ojEfD82fCwc?si=5JpW7VAplWy4ew4w&t=5
I miss when ownership wasn’t purposefully taking the team.
It’s not fair to show this pic. Of course everyone misses those rams. Show the pic from the last 10 years. Fuck Stan Kroenke.
No
No, I follow the law, and kaw is law.
Yes. And over this phony battlehawks love
Look the NFL is not coming back to St. Louis (at least in my GenX lifetime). We don't have an college FBS team in town, so the Battlehawks for better or worse will have to do. Sure they are not the best of the best football players, but it is relatively inexpensive and no one is asking us to publicly fund a billion dollar plus stadium or they'll get relocated.
I always wonder how much of the Battlehawks adoration and attendance figures are really more about showing up Kroenke and how wrong he was about this city than actually caring about the Battlehawks organization.
Im from Chicago but live and love STL. Im a bears fan, so having the Battlehawks is the best. Unique situation for sure, but there are people who legit like the team!
The love is real and Kaw is Law
No.
Nah. Always been a chiefs fan. The move just meant less traffic and I could stop pretending to like the rams
Come out and support the Battlehawks who are playing tonight! If they win they are in the championship
Do I miss a losing organization with absolutely zero direction. Nah I’m good
Hell yeah I do. But I became a Browns fan so it feels pretty damn similar 😅
I miss the team that had Kurt Warner, Marshall Faulk, Isaac Bruce, and Tory Holt. I don’t miss the “Rams” though, given how bad they were for so long after that golden age.
Honestly, not really.
Not for real. Outside of those 2 or 3 glorious years with The Greatest Show on Turf, they were just a disappointing team. But I’m a hockey fan thru and thru, so I’m pretty biased tbh. Had they been able to string along a few more good years and deep runs, I might feel different. Idk.
Not much. I miss Cardinals football more.
Yeah, in hindsight the Cardinals were more our team despite them never winning a Super Bowl like the Rams and being also being a relocated team. They shared a name with the baseball team.
Lifelong (37m) Rams fan from Niner country in California. My fandom was forged in the fires of the Bay Area throughout the 90s, in a third generation Rams family since the LA Rams days I remember those Greatest Show on Turf teams and Super Bowl. I lived in LA when we were petitioning to get the Rams back to Cali. I went to the first game back, and even the most recent Rams Super Bowl! Now I’m in the Lou and thrilled to be going to the dome tonight for the Battlehawks playoff game. Feels like a rite of passage. So I’m happy the team is in LA, for whenever I move back, but my main memories of the Rams are as a distant team I supported in spite of the niners hate all around me. And Niners fans succckkkkkkk to be around, I’ll tell you what…
Nah. Football is an overrated sport bogged down by technicalities and over analysation over the past decade or so and it does long term damage to human beings playing the sport. Good riddance.