Did anyone happen to catch the Worldwide Leader’s two-hour NFL schedule unveiling extravaganza? Thankfully, I didn’t. NFL fans everywhere, it’s time we take a stand.
We love this league. We love this league so much that we pretend to be interested in what happens at the scouting combine. We love this league so much that one of our favorite days of the year is draft day, a day, mind you, where nothing even remotely athletic (well save the person who’s job it is to make sure that what little hair Chris Berman has left stays spackled to his pumpkin head) happens. But this is where I draw the line.
I draw the line on dedicating two hours of airtime to the unveiling of schedules. I don’t care about the schedule in April. In fact, even though The Worldwide Leader and NFL Network pre-empted their regularly scheduled program as if news was actually breaking, I still won’t even glance at the schedule until August.
I think NFL fans everywhere need to let the league, its network and the Worldwide Leader know that we love our teams and we love this league but you can have too much of a good thing.
ESPN is just absolutely killing me. My Rams will appear in 0. ZERO. That’s right, ZILCH Monday Night Football games this year. Completely ridiculous if you ask me, considering that we will be a fun team to watch with the new offense we have adding Drew Bennett and Randy McMichael to the Torry Holt, Isaac Bruce, Steven Jackson, and Joe Klopfenstein show. It’s just absurd on how ESPN thinks up their schedules.
I don’t know about fun. I think they could be an interesting offensive team. Defensively, they’re going to be awful. I’m not sure I’d be that jazzed about Drew Bennett, given his spotty track record in Tennessee. I think the Rams could be interesting but personally, I’m not clamoring to see the Rams/Seahawks on Monday night.
If we can get ahold of Amobi Okoye in the draft, that could really change everything. Hell, John Madden could have ran for at least 80 yards against that Rams team last season. The defensive tackle is our money position right now, as La’Roi Glover isn’t what he use to be, and Jimmy Kennedy is nothing other than a bust thus far in his career. Right now, our line looks like this: DE (James) Hall, DT (Victor) Adeyanju, DT (Questionable spot) (La’Roi) Glover/(Claude) Wroten/DE (Leonard) Little. If we do in fact, get Okoye, the Rams’ front office will not be vindicated for a while due to our past of drafting defensive tackles (Kennedy/Lewis/Pickett). The rest of the defense is more decent, yet the players need some upgrading to do. Our linebacker core is pretty solid with Will Witherspoon and Pisa Tinoisamoa. However, fighting for an OLB spot is Chris Draft and Brandon Chillar. Chillar has shown spouts of talent, and we just acquired Chris Draft from the Panthers, and he just had the best season of his career. However, Draft worries me with covering the tight end, the big tight ends. He’s only 5’8″ and we’ll more than likely use him on mostly plays that utilize him blitzing. As for Drew Bennett, I’ve watched some tapes of the guy playing, and noticed he doesn’t slant over the middle of the field all too much. However, I’m not worried about that because we have Torry “Big Game” Holt and Isaac “the Rev.” Bruce receiving passes as well. Not to mention that Randy McMichael can get vertical as well. However, I think our red zone offense should be clearly dominating this year. We were already 6th last year in red zone, and adding 6’5″ Bennett should help. The guy is 28, and will be entering his 7th year in the NFL. I think he’s a big upgrade over Kevin Curtis, because for 1.) Curtis was only 5’8″ compared to Bennett’s 6’5″, 2.) Curtis worked better in Martz’s system seeing more passes, 3.) Drew Bennett is one mouth younger than Curtis, BUT has two more years of NFL experience than KC. The 1 and 3 facts really stick out in my mind, and I think Bennett will/could have a lot to do with our offense this upcoming year. However, questions still surround our offensive line (even though they did come together at the end of the season in 2006), defensive line, defensive backs, and the 3rd spot of the linebackers. Of course, I’m a big Rams homer anyhow, but what can I say?