St. Louis Just Not a Football Town?

[ness]

So, the Rams are gone. Does anyone care?

St. Louis has never really felt like a football town to me. There were the perennially mediocre Cardinals who up and left. Then after a few years without a team the Rams came to town. The relocated LA Rams managed a Super Bowl win in '99 (they have always felt out of place in StL to me). But I have really never heard much chatter here or elsewhere about the Rams. Never a Ram avatar; many more references to the Tigers, Cardinals, maybe even Blues here than the Rams, as far as I recall. Are there real live Rams fans that care about this?

The local sports radio guys were having fun with the fact that the Governor's Cup is ours (KC) forever. That came after a couple minutes of trying to remember if the Chiefs had won it.  

As much as I hate to admit it, StL is a great American city. And NFL football should be there -- forever. But if you got a team today, it would take a decade, with a competitive team, to build a true fan base.

[Flysmallie]

I care. I care that it took this long to get them out of St. Louis. I never cared for the Rams and it never seemed right that they were in STL. I did attend a few Rams games when they played the Chiefs or when my kids band played there. These were times before and after the Super Bowl win. Maybe I'm a little spoiled with the atmosphere in Arrowhead, but it never seemed that the Rams fans were into the game.

The governor's cup? Yep that is something to treasure. LOL

I don't think it would take much to create a fan base. You just need the right team in there. Stan Kroenke, who sure does go to great lengths to look a lot like Hitler, had no idea how to create a fanbase. He's in it for all the wrong reasons. I hope his life in LA sucks.

[Old plug]

I sure agree with that. There was a small minority  that supported the Rams. Everybody I knew up there was sure a year ago they would be gone. There was  a sort of odd comment made by the Raiders owner however when he said "were going to be looking for a home somewhere".  I personnaly do not support bringing anything into St luois. I have no idea the cost per year to have the  Rams in STL. I do not think anyof these  sports figures are worth what they are paid. 

[Terrierman]

The Jones Dome was horrid.  It's a miracle those carpetbaggers lasted as long in St. Louis as they did. 

[Al Agnew]

The greatest show on turf years were terrific, but other than that it was a poorly run franchise losing far more than winning and with seemingly little hope of improving, playing in a horrible stadium that was horrible from the day it was completed.  What the Rams experience showed was that a good team will get plenty of fan support, a perennially bad team will not.  It also showed that the whole political landscape in the St. Louis area is simply ridiculous.  You can blame this whole fiasco on the politicians.  The lack of cooperation between the city and the county and surrounding counties, the lack of cooperation between the city and the state government, the refusal (quite understandable) by the majority of people in the state to allocate tax dollars to paying for stadiums.  They went cheap and stupid with the Jones Dome, they signed an absolutely stupid lease agreement, . Kroenke is a convenient villain but he was only operating as a businessman trying to maximize profit and take advantage of opportunity.  Somehow, a lot of people thought he cared about the region.  They were delusional.

[Ham]

Professional Sports is a business that for whatever reason I care about. There is NO reason for me to care about a bunch of guys that get paid a bunch of money to play a game, but I do. I hate it for St louis that the Rams are running away. I know that I would hate it if the New Orleans Saints ever left

I love that the Green Bay Packers are tied to that community. I wish there was some way that all teams that have stadiums built for them with government money or tax breaks or whatever would be forever bound to the community that helped them be viable.

 

[marcus]

if the rams are gone guess i gotta be a chiefs fan now

[fishinwrench]

I'll show you how simple minded I am about it....

There was never any bighorn sheep residing in Missouri or Illinois, so it seemed stupid as hell to have the St.Louis football team named after them.     I've always thought Mizzou "Tigers" was stupid too.  A team based out of Columbia, Mo. should be called the Pitbulls, Cottontails, or Possums. There ain't no darn Tigers around there.

[ness]

24 minutes ago, marcus said:

if the rams are gone guess i gotta be a chiefs fan now

Welcome aboard!

They're cemented into this community is a way that's pretty special, but we've got tolerance for folks from 'back east' too :D.

[ness]

2 hours ago, Flysmallie said:

The governor's cup? Yep that is something to treasure. LOL

 

Yeah, I was getting a chuckle outta that and so were they. The biggest non-event of the preseason each year. The radio guys, who live and breathe sports, didn't even remember we'd won it this year. I knew we were undefeated in the preseason, and figured we always played the Rams, so I kinda slopped into knowing we won it.