Wally Spiers: Tackling the grief of losing the Rams — or not

I don’t know of many who had less of a stake in the St. Louis Rams than me, but let me weigh in anyway now that they are gone.

I never bought a ticket, never attended a game, and if I paid any taxes to support the Edward Jones Dome, it couldn’t have been much. I don’t even have any Rams gear that I can donate to somebody as a gesture of protest now that the team has moved.

I used to have some Rams sleep shorts, but like the franchise, they weren’t of very good quality and didn’t endure.

My only connection was the television. Each week during the football season, usually, I would somehow end up watching the boring mediocrity which had become what we knew as the Rams. Dull offense. Stupid penalties. Unwatchable losses.

So, in some ways their going will be a relief to me. To paraphrase Elsa in “Frozen,” let ‘em go.

Anyone who is willing to pay more than $550 million (the proposed relocation fee for the Rams to move to Inglewood) just to leave town probably isn’t someone you’re going to want around anyway.

All we can do is say a fond farewell to a team we once loved which was a very different team from the losers who are leaving, and start working through the grieving process. You all know those steps, denial, anger, revenge, writing columns. That’s not exactly how it goes, but I’m on a rant and don’t want to take time to look it up.

It won’t be easy. Heck, I know a lot of people are still grieving the loss of the football Cardinals. A few weekends ago, I was at a bar where a lot of different games were on. One guy was watching the Arizona Cardinals and said he just hadn’t been able to give them up.

But I think we should look at the Rams this way. They are like a favorite relative who once meant everything to you but who now is terribly sick and not even a shadow of that person anymore. You have to let go.

Once we had the Greatest Show on Turf. Now they are the Dullest Low on Earth. They are dead to me and a heck of a lot of former fans.

On the brighter side, they have left behind a big indoor stadium and some nice practice facilities out in Earth City, Mo.

Let’s dream a little. Maybe Saint Louis University could bring back big-time college football. Until 1949, when they dropped the program, they used to play with the big boys.

I don’t know what to do with the practice facility. It has an indoor practice area with offices and outdoor fields. It’s on flat ground in a flood plain. It’s protected by flood levees. Maybe we could turn it into an airport. Who couldn’t use another one of those?

Sit back. Relax. Breathe in. Breathe out. Let ‘em go.

This story was originally published January 23, 2016 at 7:06 AM with the headline "Wally Spiers: Tackling the grief of losing the Rams — or not."