Favorite Rams 10-1
10. Fritz Shurmur. This pick involves at least two damn shames. One is that Fritz died too young and the other, at least for Rams’ fans, is that he won a Super Bowl ring with the Green Bay Packers’ coaching staff. Fritz was one of the underrated defensive minds of the 1980s even though his “soft” zone concepts ran counter to the macho “46” Buddy Ryan made famous. Buddy didn’t care much for passive ideas but Fritz got the last laugh when the Rams’ sissy zone stopped the Philadelphia Eagles cold, 21-7, in the 1989 NFC Wild Card game. The Eagles were coached by…Buddy Ryan. The name of Shurmur’s defense, which featured two down linemen and five linebackers? It was called “Eagle.” It remains one of the best game plans ever implemented by a coordinator.
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Favorite Rams: 20 – 16
Rankman tried his best to act like he didn’t care when the Rams bolted for St. Louis in 1995. It was the journalist in me, feigning indifference to another money-grubbing owner ripping a local institution from its historical moorings. But of course I was pissed off and could not even stomach watching Georgia Frontiere lift the Lombardi Trophy after winning a Super Bowl for St. Louis. The LOS ANGELES Rams came on to my radar as a boy around 1966, when lip-licking coach George Allen raised my NFL consciousness in leading our heroes to the pinnacle of greatness. It was a period of thrilling highs and gut-wrenching heartbreak and all my memories are in black-and-white. Rankman was lucky to end up covering the Rams, for the L.A. Times, in the period roughly from 1983 until 1990. With the Rams coming home after all these years, I thought it would be fun to roll out my top-25 list of all-time favorite Rams. Your list should be different.
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