View: https://bleacherreport.com/articles/10044413-nfl-rumors-rams-qb-matthew-stafford-had-surgery-on-elbow-injury-in-offseason



If true then Stafford's tendinitis could have been caused by small tears in his elbow ligaments. It's the only reason I can think of for surgery obviously microscopic in nature. IMO this could be good news. If his soreness was caused by these tears and they have been repaired, his elbow could be fine and this time next year it won't even be an issue. He might need occasional cortisone-type injections, but in the long run, Matt should be fine.

IMO this is great news for the fans and wondering why most news isn't covering that aspect. They simply want to ignore reality and cause worry about something that should be rectified.

In The latest athletic article J Rodrigue details the rams pivot from Von to Robinson and Wagner. There’s a line about Stafford’s propensity for “fuck it” throws. Two of them came to mind for me, the almost pick against the niners and the end zone pick in the super bowl.

The Tartt drop was such a bad throw it was unbelievable, and maybe Van was so shocked by it that he couldn’t respond but I watched one of the SB highlight shows and it seemed Van could’ve done more to help his qb out on that interception in the end zone, it was an awful throw that should’ve gone to the outside, but could Van have contested it? Maybe.
The point is this is what Robinson is known for, going up and getting balls in traffic. Some guys are natural at it and some aren’t. In that split second you realize the ball’s off target you have to do whatever’s necessary to catch it or at least keep someone else from catching it. It’s not easy but so many times you see guys just give up on balls that are off target.
Let’s hope that, A: Stafford’s arm issues have resolved and he can throw it as far as he needs to, and B: we got a guy who can erase his qb’s mistakes.

McVay not afraid to go after young but passionate, smart talent.



Rams RBs coach Ra’Shaad Samples is the youngest position coach in the NFL. His goal: Create lanes
Jori Epstein, USA TODAY
Thu, September 8, 2022, 8:34 AM


IRVINE, Calif.— Ra’Shaad Samples hoped the sauna would clear his mind.
Instead, the Los Angeles Rams running backs coach encountered there the source of his frustration: Bobby Wagner.

Wagner, the eight-time Pro Bowl linebacker, had been “beating the dog out of” Samples’ running backs in one-on-one pass protection drills at training camp. Samples yearned to understand.
“I’m a big fan of going to ask the person who whooped your (expletive): ‘How did you whoop my (expletive)?’” Samples told USA TODAY Sports. “I rage for answers.”
After 45 minutes of scheme and steam later, Samples could explain: Wagner saw young Rams backs shifting weight to an inside foot before the snap. The 11th-year defender jabbed toward that center of gravity to shake them loose, then sought to beat them inside on some snaps and around the edge others. Physicality was not enough to triumph – player and coach alike must seek out every mental edge.
“Hard work,” Rams head coach Sean McVay said, “expedites experience.”
When the Rams host the Buffalo Bills Thursday night for the NFL season opener, Samples will take the sideline as the youngest position coach not just in the game but across the entire league this year, a USA TODAY Sports analysis confirmed. The 27-year-old was born 506 days after New England Patriots cornerbacks coach Mike Pellegrino, the next youngest.
More than 100 coaches — roughly 14% of the league — were coaching full-time in the NFL or college football before he was born, the analysis found.

Rams running backs coach Ra'Shaad Samples at training camp at University of California Irvine.

Since 2015, Samples has climbed rapidly from college receiver to college assistant coach and recruiting force, to now position coach for the defending Super Bowl champions. He relishes the opportunity. But this meteoric rise is not enough.
“It’s what you do when you get here, succeeding,” Samples said. “Because there’s going to be another 26-year-old coach, 25-year-old coach who gets to interview for a job. I’m the youngest one in a job now so the next that’s going to come up – I’ve got to do a good job for him.
“Create lanes for people.”

'You're going to be a damn good coach'​

Samples never expected to become an NFL coach in his lifetime, much less before his 28th birthday. He wasn’t a running back growing up; concussions forced him into medical retirement before he could pursue an NFL career; and he resented how his father, Reginald — a legendary Texas high school football coach named USA TODAY’s 2019-20 national coach of the year — coached his son as hard at home as he did on the football field.
What would Ra’Shaad have said if he was told three years ago the Rams would hire him to this role?
“I’d say, ‘Wake up from that [expletive] dream,’” Samples laughs.
But he values the work ethic and insatiable hunger for knowledge that guided this path.
He was football-savvy from a young age, more crafty than athletic. Former Texas Longhorns head coach Tom Herman ranks Samples as one of the two best high school route runners he ever recruited. The other: 13-year NFL player Danny Amendola.
“Could cut on a dime, double moves, releases vs. press,” Herman described the teenage Samples to USA TODAY Sports. “I was just like, ‘Man, this is stuff upper-level college guys, if not NFL guys, are doing.”
Samples committed to Oklahoma State, where he played just one game, and then transferred to Houston, where concussions abruptly ended his career. Herman, then Houston’s head coach, implored his team captain to stay on.
“Tom dragged me out there and said, ‘You’re going to be a damn good coach.’”
Samples was soon distributing weekly quarterback tests and charting defensive coverages from the game booth alongside offensive coordinator Brian Johnson. They remember the learning curve — Samples charting a series of defensive formations as simply “Drop 8,” without specifying the specific coverage within a coverage family — and the exciting moments, like when Johnson first empowered Samples to choose a play.
The young assistant chose 50-T-Fly-Panther, giving his quarterback a decision to run a draw or throw to the fly.
“I was terrified,” Samples said, “like this (expletive) is going to get pick-sixed.”
But he learned.
Samples soon migrated north to Herman’s Texas staff in 2018, to Sonny Dykes’ SMU staff in 2019, and then with Dykes to TCU last December. Before his 27th birthday, he was named TCU’s assistant head coach, run game coordinator and recruiting coordinator. But within three months, a Rams shift began: Super Bowl running backs coach Thomas Brown shifted to tight ends coach to further immerse in the pass game, and McVay trusted Brown to guide the search for his replacement. Brown says Samples was the youngest, least experienced and least personally familiar candidate he contacted. But Brown saw the coaching material Samples wished his narrative had more centered on and even was “irritated” that Samples was labeled firstly as a recruiting weapon — Samples believes that stemmed in part from stereotypes of the young, dynamic Black coach — and only then touted as a football coach.
“Having the opportunity to listen to him detail up the running back position, which I’ve known my entire life from playing and coaching it, you can’t B.S. me on that,” said Brown, whose 10 years coaching running backs at the college and pro levels also included a stint as Miami offensive coordinator. “His detail and his communication skills were like a no-brainer to me.”
Within 15 minutes of a group Zoom interview, McVay agreed.

‘Give people opportunities’​

McVay, who became a position coach at 24, has advised Samples: Don’t be afraid to admit what you don’t know. Young position coaches can achieve more success, the league’s youngest-ever head coach said, with an open mind and transparent knowledge basis.
“He’s got a refreshing security in himself to be able to ask questions,” McVay told USA TODAY Sports, adding Samples “knocked it out of the park” explaining run concepts in his interview.
Samples has created a similar collaborative ethos with his players, they say, leading meetings with conversation that “doesn’t feel like a lecture,” 2021 seventh-rounder Jake Funk said.
Darrell Henderson, who has rushed for a team-high 1,312 yards and 10 touchdowns the last two seasons, credited Samples’ tutorials helping him sharpen footwork and more effectively press in phase with blockers during camp.
“He corrected me, and the next day I came out and got my steps down better and saw bigger gashes,” Henderson told USA TODAY Sports. “He keeps us on our toes.”

Samples regales his players with wisdom from the nine-and-a-half personal growth books he has read and noted in depth since April, reminding them to be vulnerable to growth and to automate their habits toward success. Entering Thursday’s game vs. the AFC runner-up Buffalo Bills, his motivation focuses less on individual production goals and more on building toward efficiency, consistency and well-executed assignments that best contribute to team success. Samples considers his own goals through the same communal lens.
Sure, Samples aspires to rise, aiming to earn jobs as coordinator and then NFL head coach — ideally within the next five years. But he frames his own advancement as a means rather than end.
“Give people opportunities they may not necessarily have had,” Samples said. “That’s why I want to be a head coach.”
He embraces the chance to represent coaches of color in a league in which they constitute just 18.3% of head coach hires and 10.5% of offensive coordinator appointments in the last 10 years, according to an NFL diversity and inclusion report released in February. Only six of the league’s current 32 head coaches are of color.
“My definition of leadership is the hunger to attain knowledge but the drive to give it away,” Samples said. “When I stop finding information to fill my cup to pour into yours, I’m no longer serving my purpose.”

THURSDAY SEPTEMBER 08, 2022

Game Day Thread

The GDT is a live thread tradition here at ROD.

While we all get fired up watching the game, please remember our core principles;we always show respect for our team and each other.

Despite the emotional highs and lows watching a game, we will moderate this thread with that in mind, however please refrain from name calling. This applies to players, the Rams organization, and others.

This is the core rule of the GDT. Moderators are tasked to issue thread bans, at a minimum, to maintain this standard.

This is our team. Win or lose. Good days and bad. We are here for FUN, not to be dragged down.

A more loosely moderated atmosphere can be found in the chat room.

Go Rams!

———

ROD Chat Room;

Game Day Room

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I think this video will change everyone's perspective on Desean Jackson. I have the clip starting when he addresses his situation with the team last year. According to his story, he was tight with McVay since Washington, and McVay recruited him, promising snaps as a deep threat. Apparently, McVay felt bad that he couldn't find the plays he promised and encouraged him to seek a trade if he could find a team that would play him more. It sounds like he wasn't raising hell in the locker room and McVay was looking out for him as a friend.

Also, I encourage everyone to watch the whole thing if you have time. Desean is a really good dude. There are players that the media portrays as hard-headed thugs that only care about being a good parent and helping their community.

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@Loyal just because it'll end up with it's own thread eventually we can get it started discussing now.

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What is one specific prediction you think will happen this year? (BE SPECIFIC)

Mine is ... I think we'll be a top 3 defense.
I feel like our defense is going to surprise us and be MUCH better than the 'average Joe' Ram fan is expecting.
There will be lots of talk about how ... wow ... that Rams defense is insanely difficult to move the ball on. With all the talk about our great offense, I don't think people see it coming. (see a monster defense that is)

Yes, he can!! I just saw him on NFL Network-America’s Game, on last year’s team saying he hates the niners!!

The Legend is still growing!!!!

I'm predicting he spies Allen and absolutely blows him up.

Back by popular demand ( well 1 person requested it) is the weekly PTS thread


rules are simple..come closest to predicting the final score and win 5k RoD sportsbook credits... pick the exact final score and win 10k sportsbook credits.

First poster to post a score gets credit for that score unless they change it before kickoff. If 2 or more people are are the closest ( i.e. 3 points off the actual total) then tie breaker will be whomever posted first.

So the advantage is posting your prediction early.

So get your thinking caps on and let's see those predictions

F them picks is a diversion. The draft is actually important to the Rams.

Look at tomorrow's game and the role that will be played by the Sophomore class of Rams' draftees.

Ernest Jones - starting ILB and a player who could be poised for stardom as he tries to combine his young athleticism with wisdom gleaned from playing with Bobby Wagner.

Tutu Atwell - with Van Jefferson out and coming off a strong camp, he may never have a better chance of establishing himself.

Ben Skowronek - after an uneven rookie year, he'll also get opportunities to show his worth.

Robert Rochell - the guy we hope emerges as the CB2, as he's one of the best athletes on the team.

Okay, guys... you're not rookies anymore. Let's see what you've got!

Watched the condensed replay of the 2020 bills game, and man Robert woods is just a great guy to have on a team. I hope the rams know something we don’t about his diminished capacity going forward, because otherwise, still not sure why they cut him.

also, that last bills drive was ridiculous (2 conversions after 3rd and over 20 and fake pass interference), but josh Allen is silly in how he just doesn’t go down and rams defenders thought they had him and he’s just like, nah. Not worried about Donald, but hope everyone else is super dialed in on finishing tackles with that guy. Everyone knows, obviously, so it’s about execution, and that could be the difference.

It seems this year our running game is more important than ever. we know you have to have a running game for balance, and we know we have a qb who can sling it all over the field. But because of Stafford's injury status this year it seems we really need to rely on our running game and defense this year so Stafford can sling it all over at the end of the year through the playoffs and hopefully the Superbowl. we need to be a team that teams are afraid of our run game. let's hope this year we get that running game we need, and coach realizes that he is only going to win as well as Stafford elbow holds up. go rams.

Rams LB Ernest Jones ready to surge with Bobby Wagner by his side

THOUSAND OAKS — Ernest Jones understands the days of NFL teams consistently playing two or more inside linebackers are fading, but the Rams’ second-year linebacker wants to bring back the smashmouth approach that Ray Lewis and other legends played with before defenses evolved to keep pace in today’s pass-heavy league.

“I want to make the game for the linebackers back to how it used to be,” Jones said. “Allow us to go run around, hit, make the plays that come to us and the ones that don’t come to us. That’s the big thing to me, to show that we can still do it all. We don’t just need DB (defensive back) bodies. You can still go freaking tackle, run, go cover passes, do it all.”

Doing it all is what keeps inside linebackers on the field nowadays and why middle linebacker Bobby Wagner built a Hall of Fame-quality career with the Seattle Seahawks for 10 seasons before joining Jones and the Rams this season.

Wagner will likely stay on the field when the Rams go into their dime package, a formation with six defensive backs and one inside linebacker. That will probably take snaps from Jones, but the Rams will search for ways to ensure their young linebacker is heavily involved with the defense.

Jones stepped up in Super Bowl LVI against the Cincinnati Bengals after Rams defensive coordinator Raheem Morris made the second-half adjustment to blitz Jones a handful of times, creating constant pressure on quarterback Joe Burrow and leading to seven team sacks, including one from Jones.

“That was something that I had been doing throughout the season, was blitzing,” Jones said. “Just throughout the Super Bowl, we felt there was a need and there was a really big mismatch as far as them blocking me. … Coaches started sending me more in the second half.”

Jones’ old-school physical play style helped the Rams become Super Bowl champions, but he wants to continue developing as an all-around linebacker, and having Wagner by his side has helped with that.

“In a sense, I think my role has gotten bigger with him coming in,” Jones said. “I think we both established that there are two good linebackers on the team that they want to keep out here on the field. But in a sense, I don’t feel like my role has lessened. I feel like for me it’s just getting better, just continuing to grow. And when I’m out there with him, let’s go dominate.”

The Rams could opt to keep Jones and Wagner on the field often to offset their lack of pass rushers. The team is hoping the combination of Justin Hollins and Terrell Lewis will be enough to aid top outside linebacker Leonard Floyd and fill the void of Von Miller, who joined the Buffalo Bills in free agency. Wagner and Jones often rushed the passer in training camp, and will likely do the same Thursday to start the season against quarterback Josh Allen and his talented Bills offense.

“I think me and Bobby have done a great job coming in, doing the things necessary to rush the passer, just create mismatches and allow us to go out there and win,” Jones said. “Effect the game in not only run defense and pass coverage, but also rushing the passer from outside position to rushing versus running backs.”

The game has changed, but the Rams have a blend of smashmouth and versatility from their duo at inside linebacker. Jones refers to Wagner as the Ray Lewis of this generation and he still smiles every time he’s reminded of being Wagner’s teammate.

“For me, this is crazy, he is the Ray Lewis of our generation,” Jones said. “There’s nobody who’s been better in the last 10, 11 years.”

STAFFORD GOOD TO GO

Rams quarterback Matthew Stafford reiterated that he will have no limitations for Thursday night’s season opener against the Buffalo Bills despite experiencing elbow soreness in his throwing arm.

“I feel good,” Stafford said Sunday. “I’m ready to go, no limitations. I feel great. I’m ready to go play. … I feel really good. I feel like I could make every throw. Don’t know what else you need to hear from me.”

Rams coach Sean McVay said he will not hesitate to call 50-plus throws for Stafford in a game this season if that’s what it takes for the team to win.

Stafford, 34, was a limited participant for two weeks during training camp to manage the arm soreness, but the 14th-year quarterback showed no signs of limitations by making a variety of impressive throws throughout the summer. Stafford also dealt with arm soreness last season en route to leading the Rams to a Super Bowl championship.

“I’m not (concerned),” McVay said. “I think we’ve got a really good plan in place. No different really from last year. These are things that he was kind of working through in his own way, but you always want to be cognizant of a pitch count. But he’s feeling as good as … I tell you what, he’s thrown the ball excellent. He feels good. Everything that I’m seeing is reflective of everything he’s saying to me. I feel very good about that.

“Can’t look back at the past. It is something that will be very similar to last year. It’s not really anything that’s different.”

Stafford and the Rams aren’t concerned about the elbow soreness and they’re trying everything they can to limit the pain.

“I could always be better at trying to feel like I’m 21 again,” Stafford jokingly said. “I’ll keep trying.”

ALSO

Wide receiver Van Jefferson, who underwent knee surgery last year, didn’t practice Sunday. McVay said they’re taking it day-by-day with his recovery process. …

The Rams had their “Wednesday practice” of Week 1 under scorching conditions that reached 104 degrees Sunday in Thousand Oaks.

“It is something out there right now,” McVay said. “The only thing that’ll change is that we’ll get a lot more hydration breaks than normal. Our guys handled it really well, but golly, it is thick out there. But our guys did a great job in the walk-through. We won’t change anything in terms of our rhythm and routine. We just might add a couple more hydration breaks.”

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Troy Hill ready to be a playmaker for Rams' defense once again​

THOUSAND OAKS, Calif. – He was a pivotal playmaker on the NFL's No. 1 total defense in 2020 before taking a detour to Cleveland.

Now, cornerback Troy Hill looks do the same in 2022 after the Rams brought him back in a trade with the Browns this spring.

"It feels good (to be back)," Hill said after Sunday's practice. "Especially lining up with some of the greatest players to play the game and things like that, the camaraderie that goes along with it, feel good to be back in it. They play to the style I play and they let me be me, so I'm excited about that."

Alongside those players like All-Pro defensive lineman Aaron Donald and All-Pro defensive back Jalen Ramsey, Hill personally helped generate five of their 22 takeaways with three interceptions and two fumble recoveries; he returned two of those interceptions and one of those fumbles for touchdowns.
Ramsey was especially excited about the news of Hill's return when it was announced.

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Third-year safety Jordan Fuller, like Ramsey, also saw the impact Hill made first-hand as a rookie that year.

Having Hill back has made a "huge impact" on the defense so far, according to Fuller, and it was evident with his playmaking in camp.

"The first thing that comes to mind, I mean, he was scoring for us. He was scoring touchdowns for us," said Fuller, when asked .what he remembered most about Hill's impact during that 2020 season. "Obviously those plays change games. I'm happy that he's back."

Fuller also appreciates having another veteran voice to lean on when he has questions, a presence that impacts the secondary as a whole.

"It's a real calming figure," Rams defensive coordinator Raheem Morris said during training camp. "Another calming figure in that room."

That poise and ability to disrupt opposing offenses will be crucial for Los Angeles in Thursday night's season-opener against a Buffalo Bills offense that, led by quarterback Josh Allen, returns many of the players that helped it fifth in the NFL in total offense and third in scoring offense.

It will certainly be part of Hill's focus. And while Thursday night will officially kick off his second stint with the team, he's ultimately grateful to be able to play another season in the NFL.

"It's a blessing, you know what I'm saying? Thank God, coming up on Year 8, so that's probably first and foremost, because you don't want to take those for granted," Hill said. "The rest of it, I mean, being able to go out there and show that I can still play at a high level."

Swanson: Don’t tell them, but the Rams are going to repeat
THOUSAND OAKS – Can the Rams win the Super Bowl again?

I say they can. They say, “Defend the what now?” Or put them under oath and it’ll be: “I do not recall.”

Because the first rule of the Super Bowl Champions Club is… you do not talk about your Super Bowl championship.

You don’t wear your ring around. Don’t rock your team’s championship merch. And most definitely, don’t mention it.

When the New England Patriots opened training camp in 2019 trying to become the first team to repeat as Super Bowl champs since they did it back in 2004-05, coach Bill Belichick basically rejected a question about it: “I’m thinking about trying to have a good day today.”

Kansas City coach Andy Reid stuck to the script the next year when he was asked about a flag going up to commemorate the Chiefs’ Super Bowl LIV win: “We’ve tried to focus the best we can on just going forward.”

Last fall, when reigning champion Tampa Bay Buccaneers reconvened with the target on their backs, Coach Bruce Arians said flatly: “It’s over. That’s last year.”

Assuredly, Rams coach Sean McVay got the memo.

“We’ve moved on,” he said again after practice Friday, which was like Monday to the Rams, because they kick off their season – and, shhh, their Super Bowl championship defense – against Buffalo on Thursday.

“It feels,” McVay added, “like it was a long time ago.”

Or as veteran linebacker Leonard Floyd estimated: “A million years ago.”

But for those of us who aren’t exercising selective amnesia, Feb. 13 wasn’t actually so long ago.

It will be just 207 days between the season opener and their 23-20 Super Bowl win on their home turf at SoFi Stadium. That victory, six years after the Rams relocated back to Southern California, cemented L.A. as NFL town again after it went 22 years without one of the league’s teams residing in the area.

On the field, it proved the old adage: Defense wins. Or, rather, defense – paired with a swashbuckling, big-moment QB like Matthew Stafford – wins a championship.

But championships?

Twice as tall a task. Title winners will have played the most games the previous season and partied hardest afterward. Rosters never remain intact. Every game against them will be circled by opponents. And however optimistic oddsmakers’ predictions might be, technically they have the same one-in-32 odds as everyone else.

So, no, the Rams aren’t trying to tempt football fate.

But I can.

The Rams will do it. They’ll do it again.

Consider the connection between Stafford and Cooper Kupp with the vice tightening late in the Super Bowl. Kupp got the ball five times on the final drive, including hauling in that jaw-dropping no-look pass. You can trace that whole sequence to the 500 extra hours Stafford and Kupp spent getting in sync about exactly those sorts of plays.

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Now think how crisp the line will be between them when they get a whole ’nother season to talk this stuff over.

Also, Aaron Donald. He’s baaack. At peace with his career perhaps, the all-time defensive tackle remains keen for on-field conflict. If you think the dude swinging two helmets in a joint preseason practice is going to allow any sort of let down on the way to title No. 2, you might better duck.

Not that the Rams’ defense will need stoking. Yes, they lost eight-time Pro Bowl linebacker Von Miller, who signed a more lucrative deal with the Buffalo Bills. That’s giving pundits and prognosticators pause when deciding whether to pick the Rams to repeat.

But Floyd – who said his ankles are 100% healthy after causing him so much pain last season – is fine with that. He knows his guys are hungry to prove what they can do without Miller.

“A whole lot of new faces gotta step up,” Floyd said Friday, while taking a breather from a post-practice weight session. “We’ve been doing a good job of training and putting ourselves in different situations to get ourselves ready, and I believe we’re ready for it.”

New faces, new year, new goal – even if it’s the same as last season’s.

After all, that’s the recipe the Patriots followed.

Christian Fauria, a tight end on the Patriots’ back-to-back title teams, recently recounted the scene when the Patriots showed back up for work after winning in 2004. He told ESPN that, on a white board, Belichick listed some recent Super Bowl champions and their results the following season, none of which included another title.

“He painted a really clear picture of how important it was to just let it go,” Fauria said. “How each year is independent of its own.”

So don’t tell the Rams, but they’re about to embark on a super season.

Seriously, though, don’t mention it to them, or it might mess it up.

If you grew up in the 70’s, you remember Ernie Shavers. He was a top contender for the heavyweight championship for several years. He had many notable matches, with one in particular against Muhammad Ali. He beat Ali that night and knocked him down (Ali), but didn’t knock the champ out and lost in a split decision. It was such an injustice in my young mind that I hated Ali for a long time after that. Ernie was a soft spoken giant of a man with a shaven head that even Ali used to say was the hardest puncher he ever faced. It’s speculated that Ali‘s speaking problems developed because of brain damage suffered after fighting Shavers…

Anyway, Rest In Peace, Mr Shavers.

Where are they now? Former Rams RB & NFL touchdown leader Greg Bell​

After three-plus years, and leading the Bills in rushing two seasons, Greg Bell wanted to leave Buffalo in 1987 for greener pastures. Literally.

"I had tried to put a deal together to go to Miami," said Bell, who was a first-round draft choice out of Notre Dame and Pro Bowler in 1984. "I just wanted to be on natural surface. I had torn my abdomen on the bad turf that Buffalo had back then.

"We had tried to put together a trade in our same division and Buffalo didn't want to deal with that. We were just hoping that we could get into a deal. Not caring really what the principal parts of it were, just as long as I was getting out of Buffalo, and getting off the turf."

Bell got what he wanted, and the Rams' trick-or-treat bag was stuffed following a Halloween day three-team blockbuster.

The Indianapolis Colts traded rookie hold-out linebacker Cornelius Bennett to the Buffalo Bills for a first-round pick in 1988, first- and second-round picks in 1989, and Bell.

The Colts then traded Bell, the three draft choices acquired from Buffalo, plus first- and second-round picks in 1988, a second-round pick in 1989, and running back Owen Gill to the Rams for Eric Dickerson.

"It was a three-way deal that was going to benefit all three sides," Bell said. "I knew what I was capable of doing. I knew what Eric was capable of doing. The question mark probably was what was 'Biscuit' [Bennett] going to be? But he was one of the top college players, so we knew he was going to probably be a great player, as well."

Excited to be joining the Rams and looking forward to playing on the grass field at Anaheim Stadium, Bell wasn't initially certain if head coach John Robinson shared the same feeling.

"No one called me. Nothing," Bell said. "My first talking to John Robinson is when I flew out here. It was just crazy. John had no anticipation. He was taking what he got delivered.

"He drafted Eric because he wanted Eric. And to lose a premier back at that time probably was going to disappoint anybody, especially a guy like John Robinson, who loved running the ball.

"He said Charlie (White) was playing very well for him at that time and, 'We're going to keep going with what we've got. And where you can fit in, you'll fit in.'"

In 1988, his first full season with the Rams, Bell fit in and then some. Rushing for a team-high 1,212 yards, he led the NFL with 16 touchdowns.

"I knew I would be a large part of the offense because of John Robinson," Bell said. "John loved running the ball. No matter how much Jim Everett's development was coming and things of that nature, we're still talking about John Robinson. The student body right, student body left, counter trey, that was his history. So I knew I was going to get an opportunity to carry the ball."

The opportunities continued the following season when Bell again rushed for a team-high 1,137 yards and led the league with 15 touchdowns.

That was also the year Los Angeles posted an 11-5 record and reached the NFC Championship Game against San Francisco. How they got there is among Bell's fondest memories as a Ram.

"Going back to Philadelphia to play (in the NFC Wild Card Game) after just beating the New England Patriots (in Foxborough, MA in the regular-season finale), to this day, they say that's the greatest defense in NFL history. But then we must have been the greatest offense because we put something on Buddy Ryan's defense that made him stop talking for a while," Bell said of the 21-7 victory, when he rushed for 124 yards and a touchdown.

"I laugh because you turn around the next week and go and play against the second-greatest defense, the New York Giants (in the divisional round). I remember L.T. [Lawrence Taylor] before that game, 'Yeah, we're going to have to put a lockdown on Greg. We're not going to let him run like he did against Philadelphia.'

"But then what tends to shut people up a lot of times is that they forgot that we had a wide receiver who should be in the Hall of Fame, Henry Ellard. And you had Flipper Anderson and Aaron Cox and Ron Brown. We had more speed than they had ever seen before.

"I think about that team and I hate to say that we were the second-best team in the league. But other than the 49ers, we pretty much had a lock on beating pretty much everyone else. I wish we could have completed it, won for the city of Los Angeles."

The father of three adult children: Chanel, LeShon, and Rami; Bell remained in Southern California following his seven-year career with the Bills, Rams, and Raiders, and makes his home in Santa Barbara.

After working with New York governor Mario Cuomo and the Athletes Against Drunk Driving and Drug Prevention, and with Nancy Reagan's "Just Say No," Bell founded the Athletes for Life Foundation in 1989.

"I had a traumatic situation hit me where one of my closest friends on Earth, Stacey Toran, who was an all-star strong safety for the Raiders, killed himself in a drunk driving accident," Bell said. "I decided at that point, that if somebody that close to me wasn't hearing the message, I needed to do something for myself.

"And so that's how the mission of Athletes for Life got started, as an anti-drunk driving and drug provision. Really, because I lost my best friend to a drunk driving accident that I wish I could have helped him avoid."

In 2000, after meeting with school superintendents across the country, Bell widened the focus of the foundation. Its mission stayed the same, to help kids live their dreams and live an alcohol- and drug-free life, but it also began getting into educational services and having after-school programs for school districts in San Bernardino and Los Angeles counties. And there's a possibility it will expand to the Long Beach and Carson areas this coming school year.

"So many kids have all been educated – go to college, go to college, go to college. And we're starting to see now in our society because of technology, there's a fortitude of kids who are going straight from high school into the job force because they've got that gift. And so we're trying to help bring back programs like electronic tech positions, mechanics, carpentry, plumbing," Bell said.

"We work with ROP [Recreational Occupational Programs] here in Southern California. It's really a great program for kids who are non-traditional, that group of kids who are great at what they do with their hands. They could be great floorers. Contracting work is probably the No. 1 work in America right now. You can't find enough of them.

"It blew me away when the guy from Keller Interiors said, 'Greg, if I can get kids to be interested in flooring, I'll guarantee them a starting salary at $95,000. I'm dead serious. I need floorers. The more I get, the more I can work. I just don't have enough manpower.'"

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