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St. Louis Rams Fire Scott Linehan

Written September 29, 2008 by Jack Jones

The St. Louis Rams fired their head coach Scott Linehan after four straight blowout losses to open the season at 0-4. Defensive coordinator Jim Haslett will be named the interim head coach, which is an interesting decision since the defense has looked so terrible in the early going, but he does have head coaching experience with the New Orleans Saints. Haslett was fired as coach of New Orleans after the 2005 season, and joined the Rams on Linehan’s first staff in 2006.

Owner Chip Rosenbloom said in a release, ”I have enormous respect for Scott Linehan as a person and believe under the right circumstances he will be regarded one day as a fine head coach. Unfortunately, the situation with the Rams as they exist today is no longer acceptable and we have to make a change.”

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Linehan never really did get things turned around in St. Louis, going 11-25, but this year was especially bad with the Rams being outscored 147-43 and have given up at least 30 points to their opponents in seven straight games dating back to last year.

The Linehan era started after Mike Martz was ran out of town. There were some high expectations after Martz led the Rams to their first Super Bowl in 1999 as offensive coordinator and then to a Super Bowl loss in 2001 as the head coach. His first season was 2006, when the team went 8-8, rallying to win four of their last six games after Linehan turned over play-calling duties to offensive coordinator Greg Olson.

Last year the team started out 0-4 on their way to eight straight losses. The 3-13 finish netted them Chris Long with the second pick in the NFL draft. The team was plagued by injuries to their offensive line, starting with the loss of tackle Orlando Pace in the opener. Linehan reclaimed play-calling duties that year after three games.

After Olson was replaced by new offensive coordinator Al Saunders, Linehan again relinquished play-calling duties. Other changes were made to turn things around, but none of them seemed to work as once again St. Louis got off to a poor start.

This last week he caused quite a stir with the player when he benched star quarterback Marc Bulger, the highest-paid player in franchise history, and went with 38-year-old backup Trent Green. That was one of six lineup changes for the Bills game.

The decision to fire Linehan was made so quickly following the latest loss so the Rams could use their bye week to adjust and try and get the season turned around. Sunday things started out better for the Rams, who led 14-6 at the half, but the Buffalo Bills then went on a 25-0 second half run to finish them off 31-14. The loss was St. Louis’ 17th in their last 20 games.

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