St Louis Rams Kroenke Loves LA

The NFL would benefit most by moving the Rams to Los Angeles, leaving behind a St Louis market that lags economically and a stadium proposal doomed for failure, the team said in their relocation application provided to the Associated Press on Wednesday.

Rams owner Stan Kroenke, a real estate billionaire who still lives in Missouri, has proposed building a $1.8bn stadium in Inglewood, California, with plans to put the Rams back in the market they left to move to St Louis in 1995. The San Diego Chargers and Oakland Raiders want to move to the Los Angeles area, too, proposing to share a stadium that would be built in Carson, California. All three teams submitted applications last week and owners meeting January 12-13 in Houston could make a decision on relocation.

The Rams’ 29-page application, first obtained by the St Louis Post-Dispatch, lauds the Inglewood site, saying it has already been approved by the league as a potential stadium location and would offer far more than just a home for a sports team.

“The stadium serves as the epicentre for a NFL retail and entertainment district that includes a 6,000 seat theatre and up to 8.5m sq ft of office space, hotel retail and dining options,” the Rams said.

The team also explained in a withering assessment why St Louis is no longer worth staying for.

The application said Kroenke has made “significant investments” since taking control of the Rams in 2010, yet attendance is well below average. The team sold out every home game in St Louis from its arrival until 2006, but has rarely sold out in recent years in part because of on-the-field performance. The Rams have not had a winning season since 2003, and finished 7-9 this season.

Taxpayers funded construction of the Edward Jones Dome, which opened the year the Rams arrived. The unusual agreement between the dome authority and the team requires that the dome remain among the top tier of all NFL stadiums. Instead, it is generally considered among the worst, the Rams said, and 12 years of lease negotiations to rectify that were unsuccessful.

Last year, a taskforce appointed by Governor Jay Nixon developed plans for a $1bn stadium along the Mississippi river near the Gateway Arch. Aldermen have already agreed to contribute $150m toward the project, which also calls for state funding, money from personal seat licenses and funding from the league and the owner.

The Rams, though, said the stadium is doomed to failure. For one thing, it notes that the “rent and operating structure are 20 times what the Rams pay now.”

“Any NFL club that signs on to this proposal in St Louis will be well on the road to financial ruin, and the League will be harmed,” the Rams’ application said.

In a statement, the stadium taskforce said it has offered “a spectacular stadium proposal” that is everything the league has asked for.

“The Rams’ assessment of their experience in St Louis after 21 seasons of remarkable support by fans, businesses and the community is inaccurate and extremely disappointing,” the taskforce said.

The Rams raised doubts that the St Louis market, which also has baseball’s Cardinals and hockey’s Blues, can even support an NFL team.

The application cited two NFL-commissioned studies of the Los Angeles, San Diego, Oakland and St Louis markets. It says one study characterized the California markets as vibrant and growing, but said St Louis “lags, and will continue to lag, far behind in the economic drivers that are necessary for sustained success of an NFL franchise.”

Those studies “demonstrate that Los Angeles is a strong market with great opportunity, while St Louis is a market that will in all likelihood be unable to sustain three professional sports teams,” the application said.

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Rams Thrashed by Brady Bunch

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The New England Patriots showed that old England is their domain as well.

After the Patriots gave up an early 50-yard scoring play, Tom Brady responded by leading five straight touchdown drives Sunday, and New England (5-3) ran over the St. Louis Rams 45-7 in the NFL's annual regular-season game at Wembley Stadium.

"I hope they enjoyed the game today, all the fans," Brady said, "I know it got out of hand there, but that's how the Patriots like it. So it was a fun game for us."

"We've got a long way to go. ... We certainly haven't played our best football yet," he said. "Coach says the season doesn't start until after Thanksgiving, and it isn't even Halloween yet."

This offense is looking quite scary, though.

New England had at least 350 yards of total offense for the 17th straight game, breaking an NFL record set by the Rams in 1999-2000, back when Kurt Warner was leading "The Greatest Show on Turf."

This was arguably the greatest show put on by a team in London since the NFL started staging regular-season games here in 2007 -- or at least the most dominating. New England gave the British crowd a first-hand look at the league's top-ranked offense.

Brady led four straight touchdown drives for a commanding 28-7 lead by halftime, and then hit Brandon Lloyd for a 9-yard score to start the third quarter.

Brady passed for 304 yards with four touchdowns, and tight end Rob Gronkowski caught eight passes for 146 yards and two scores. Lloyd also had two touchdown catches, while Stevan Ridley ran for 127 yards and a score as the Patriots put themselves atop the AFC East heading into their off week.

The Rams (3-5), who also will be off, are last in the NFC West after losing two in a row.

The Rams struck first when Sam Bradford hit Chris Givens with a 50-yard touchdown pass on the opening drive of the game -- exactly the kind of statement the team hoped to make to ruffle the favored Patriots.

But St. Louis, which arrived in London on Tuesday -- three days before the Patriots -- to get better adjusted to the time difference, was the team that looked jetlagged the rest of the way.

"You can't ask for a better start to the game. First time we touched the ball we go down and score," Bradford said. "It just all fell apart from there."

After the Rams took the lead, Brady led a 78-yard drive to tie the score with a 19-yard pass to Lloyd. On his team's next drive, coach Bill Belichick opted to go for it on fourth down at the 1-yard line, and Shane Vereen broke into the end zone.

It was the only fourth down the Rams forced until the middle of the third quarter, when the Patriots had to settle for a 26-yard field goal to make it 38-7.

In between, Brady hit Gronkowski on a 7-yard touchdown pass and Ridley had another 1-yard run into the end zone 10 seconds before halftime.

Gronkowski celebrated both his touchdowns with theatrical spikes to fire up the crowd, doing a high-stepping strut before the first one to mimic a local tourist attraction. That led to questions about what the move was called, a Changing of the Gronk, a FrankenGronk, or what?

"That was a 'Palace Guard,'" the tight end said jokingly.

Even Brady was a bit perplexed.

"I don't know what the hell he was doing on that first one," Brady said. "I was trying to get out of the way. He needs some work on that."

St. Louis only had one other scoring opportunity in the first half, but botched the snap on a 52-yard field goal attempt.

Givens' touchdown gave him a reception of at least 50 yards for the fifth straight game, a rookie record, but he left temporarily with a toe injury and only managed two more catches after returning. Running back Steven Jackson was also largely shut down, finishing with 23 yards on seven carries. Bradford was 23 of 31 for 205 yards and added an interception in the fourth quarter before being replaced by backup Kellen Clemens near the end.

"It's embarrassing the way we played tonight," Bradford said. "Just embarrassing."

New England became the first team to win two games in London, having beaten Tampa Bay here in 2009. As expected, the Patriots also had the majority of crowd support from the 84,004 fans at Wembley, despite the Rams being the designated home team.

That, however, didn't stop backup quarterback Ryan Mallett from getting booed when taking a knee to run out the clock -- one of the few aspects of the American version of football the British crowd didn't seem to appreciate.

Belichick had no complaints about the atmosphere, though.

"The stadium was great," he said. "Playing on grass is always good. ... It's good to see the jerseys muddy, grass stains. Guys picking up dirt out of their facemasks, stuff like that. We don't see a lot of that back in the States."

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Rams Shorten Wembley Option

St Louis Rams have opted out of their commitment to play a game in London in 2013 and 2014, though they will still travel over this season.

The Rams - who finished last year with a 2-14 record, will honour their arrangement to take on the New England Patriots on October 28 at Wembley.

The NFL are due to stage a regular season contest in the English capital for the next five seasons but St Louis will now not be coming back so quickly, instead focusing their efforts on developing their current stadium.

"In an effort to focus on the Edward Jones Dome First Tier Process with the St. Louis Convention and Visitors Commission, the St. Louis Rams are withdrawing their commitment to play a home game in London in each of the 2013 and 2014 seasons," the team said in a statement to www.nfl.com.

"The St. Louis Rams will play the New England Patriots on Sunday, October 28, 2012 at London's historic Wembley Stadium as previously announced."

Rams Dispute Suspends Tickets

Ticket sales for the latest NFL game in London have been suspended because of a legal dispute involving one of the participants, the St Louis Rams.

The Rams were due to take on the New England Patriots at Wembley on 28 October, but their stadium lease requires all of the team's home games to be played in St Louis.

The team recently agreed to switch one home game to the UK for three years.

NFL commissioner Roger Goodell said he was optimistic of resolving the issue.

Competitive games have been played in London since 2007 and the NFL announced last autumn that it was going to stage at least one match per season in the UK until at least the 2016 season.

The dispute centres on a clause in the Rams' lease agreement on the Edward Jones Dome.

Goodell promised UK fans of American football that they will still have a game in 2012 but acknowledged that the line-up may have to be changed.

"We're going to play the London games," he said. "We hope it will be with the Rams and the New England Patriots. That's what we planned... but there are issues that obviously are going to have to get resolved.

"We know there are discussions going on. We hope they will get resolved shortly."

A statement on the NFL UK website said: "The reason for the postponement is to allow the Rams and their stadium authority time to finalise the technical amendments to the lease required under the terms of the Rams' commitment to London.

"The Rams have expressed optimism that a resolution is near, and we will provide updates as information becomes available."