Rams News

Rams' Little is searching for his niche
07/21 10:48 PM

By Jim Thomas
Of the Post-Dispatch

MACOMB, Ill. -- Wanda Little earns a living in Asheville, N.C., manufacturing dental chairs. Her son Leonard probably sent a quarterback or two into one of those chairs for dental work after one of his helmet-jarring sacks at the University of Tennessee.
Little registered 28 sacks in less than three full seasons at Tennessee, a total second only to Reggie White in the annals of Volunteer football. That alone was good enough to make Little a third-round draft pick by the Rams in April, and send Little's mother to a new town looking for a new job.
Little used a chunk of his $400,000 signing bonus to buy his mother a four-bedroom home near Knoxville, Tenn., where the Littles have relatives. Years ago, Little told his mother he'd buy her a home once he made the NFL.
He's now made good on that promise. Had things gone differently his senior season at Tennessee, Little may have bought her a mansion, if not small island nation. But Little took one for the team -- and ultimately -- took a hit in the pocketbook.
He entered his senior year regarded as one of the top pass-rush ends/outside linebackers in college football. But the coaching staff at Tennessee moved him to middle linebacker, with less-than-stellar results. Little's pass coverage skills were lacking, to put it mildly. At times, he looked lost in the middle. But he never complained.
``If I complained . . . people would say, `He's a selfish guy. He doesn't care about the team,' '' Little said. ``So I sat back and played the position, and did what they told me to do.''
But as Rams coach Dick Vermeil pointed out, middle linebacker, ``was not a fit for him. He didn't have that kind of instinct, and he'd never played there. It really fouled up his career, even though he had 8 sacks last year.''
The switch was perhaps the major reason Little tumbled from a potential first-rounder to the early third round. Even as a late first-rounder, Little would have averaged about $1 million a year in salary. Instead, his three-year deal with the Rams averages $358,000.
Financial concerns weren't the root of Little's draft-day blues. He just expected to go in the first round. While friends and family gathered outside the Little home in Asheville, he sat outside, too nervous to watch the draft on TV.
But the first round came and went. Nothing. Then the early part of the second round. No phone call. Little could take no more.
``I got frustrated and left,'' he said. ``I went for a drive by myself, trying to think about what I was going to do if I didn't get drafted.''
Then the Rams called, a team he knew absolutely nothing about.
``They didn't interview me at the (scouting) combine, or invite me up for a visit,'' Little said.
Now they were drafting him.
``We thought it was a steal when we got him,'' said Charley Armey, the Rams' vice president of player personnel. ``Probably without exception, every team I talked to had him rated higher (than a third-rounder). But he's one of those 'tweener guys, where half the coaching staff wants him to be a defensive end . . . and half the staff wants him as a linebacker. And nobody can make up their mind.''
The Rams have made up their mind. Little will break in as a pass-rusher and special-teams performer this season while they try to make him into an outside linebacker. Little's coverage skills need work. But there's a couple of things you need to know about him:
``No. 1, is his intensity,'' Armey said. ``When you watched him at Tennessee, his intensity level jumped out at you. He has a linebacker's mentality and disposition. He's tough. He's smart on the football field.''
Armey, who came to the Rams from New England, likens Little to a young Chris Slade.
``Only better,'' Armey said.
Slade played in the Pro Bowl last season.
And No. 2?
``He can run you down,'' Vermeil said. ``He can get after the passer. And if they flush the quarterback out of the pocket, there's no getting away from him. They're aren't many 4.48 pass rushers.''
That's Little's 40-yard dash time -- 4.48 seconds, an eye-opening time for a 6-foot-3, 240-pounder.
Little was born to run. The toughness, the intensity, the linebacker's mentality, came through life's experiences.
``I've been in a lot of situations in my life that made me tough, that made me really aggressive in certain situations,'' he said. ``And the only way I take it out is on the football field.''
His mother and father separated when Little was about 10.
``So I really didn't have any teen life,'' he said. While his mother was at work, Little stayed home in the summers taking care of his younger brother, Jermaine, and younger sister, Ieshia. ``I was the man of the house,'' he said.
After a stellar high school career, Little had nearly completed two-a-days in Knoxville before his freshman season of college when the NCAA called. His core grades weren't good enough to be eligible. Little was devastated.
``It just broke my heart that I had to go to junior college,'' he said.
After a 1-year stint at Coffeyville (Kan.) Community College, Little returned to Tennessee, where he overcame major knee surgery late in the 1996 season.
He views his draft day slide as just another hurdle to overcome.
``I've come here trying to prove myself, and trying to show people that I can play,'' Little said.

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