Rams News

Schedule-maker gives Rams
a break in '98: No 49ers early
04/01 05:56 PM

By Jim Thomas
Of the Post-Dispatch Staff

If the Rams are going to absorb their 16th and 17th consecutive defeats to the San Francisco 49ers, at least it won't happen before the first frost in 1998.
For the first time since 1995, the NFL schedule-makers have given the Rams some breathing room when it comes to their NFC West ``rivals.'' Last year, the Rams faced San Francisco twice in the first six weeks of the season. In 1996, they played the 'Niners twice in the first five weeks.
And as Rams fans have painfully learned, nothing takes the steam out of a football season like a couple of early games with San Francisco. But in '98, the Rams won't play San Francisco until Oct. 25 at the Trans World Dome. The second meeting doesn't take place until the season finale, Dec. 27 at 3Com Park.
``I think that's better distribution,'' coach Dick Vermeil said.
The Rams' '98 schedule, announced Thursday along with the rest of the NFL schedule, gives the team a better chance to build momentum and confidence because the early-season opposition isn't as daunting. In addition, four of the first five games are at home.
For the second year in a row, the Rams open at home against New Orleans, a 6-10 team in '97 that the Rams swept. In the first month of the season, St. Louis also gets Buffalo, 6-10 in '97 and in a post-Jim Kelly rebuilding phase, and Bill Bidwill's Arizona Cardinals, 4-12 a year ago and trying to avoid a 14th consecutive season without a winning record.
The Cardinals game, Sept. 27 at the dome, marks their first regular-season appearance here since leaving for Arizona in 1988. Three other teams will be making their first appearances in St. Louis since the Rams moved to town in '95: the New York Jets, the New England Patriots and the Minnesota Vikings.
By the end of the '98 season, the Rams will have played every NFL team since moving here except Dallas, Detroit, San Diego, Tampa Bay and the Houston/Tennessee Oilers in a regular-season game.
The Rams will pay for all those early-season home games in November and December, because six of their final nine games are on the road.
``I'm not really excited about having as many games on the road the second half of the season as we have,'' Vermeil said. ``But I'm not going to complain about it. First off, it doesn't do any good anyway.''
For the seventh consecutive season, the Rams have been shut out of a ``Monday Night Football'' appearance. But the team's only prime-time exposure in '98 should be memorable. In a Thursday night game on ESPN, Vermeil returns to Philadelphia to play his former club -- the Eagles.
``It'll be something special,'' Vermeil said. ``I have a tremendous attachment to Philadelphia and the people there, and some very, very close lifelong friends. To go back there and to get the opportunity to play on national television on Thursday night -- hey, that's exciting.
``But it won't be very exciting if we're not very good by the time we play them.''
Vermeil still has his permanent home in the Philadelphia area. He coached the Eagles from 1976 to '82, leading the franchise to its only Super Bowl appearance after the 1980 season.

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