Tag: Jim Everett

Rams legend Jim Everett is all-in on Steve Avila’s move to center

In an exclusive interview with Rams Wire, Jim Everett discusses Steve Avila’s move to center and why it’s one that will help LA beat the 49ers

It is never an easy thing to change positions, especially on the offensive line. For Rams lineman Steve Avila, his second season in the NFL begins with a new and daunting challenge.

Avila starred at left guard during his rookie year, establishing himself as an anchor for the Sean McVay offense for years to come. A member of the PFWA All-Rookie team, Avila was also an All-American at TCU during his senior season.

However, in 2024, Avila is being moved to center, a position he hasn’t played since his junior year in college. I had the pleasure of speaking with Rams legend Jim Everett over the weekend about Avila and what he sees in the young lineman, and Everett is all-in on the move.

“Honestly, we haven’t had a power center since McVay has been here. Very creative but the interior of this line is exactly what you have to be like to beat the Niners,” Everett told Rams Wire.

Everett’s view of building a strong interior offensive line is shared by the Rams, who re-signed Kevin Dotson and brought in Jonah Jackson to flank Avila.

Of course, the transition to center has its physical challenges, but it also comes with a whole new set of mental obstacles, as well. Not only will Avila be responsible for calling the checks on the line and pointing out assignments and protections, but he will also need to develop a deeper relationship with Matthew Stafford.

I asked Everett, “As a quarterback in the NFL, could you provide some insight into what the process looks like for Matthew Stafford and Steve Avila in building that QB-center relationship?”

Everett’s response was one of confidence.

“It’s a special relationship but Steve’s a natural and while it’s totally expected to have a few hiccups, they’ll do fine together,” he said.

Only time will tell if Everett’s words come true but based on Avila’s play and the experienced players around him, it seems like the former Rams quarterback is right on the money with his expectations.

Jim Everett: Rams got ‘too cute’ with Jalen Ramsey’s role in 2022

Jim Everett believes the Rams didn’t utilize Jalen Ramsey correctly during the 2022 season.

Jalen Ramsey’s name has been trending on social media recently as some believe the Los Angeles Rams could trade him this offseason. While Ramsey’s future with the Rams is unknown, former quarterback Jim Everett believes the Rams utilized Ramsey incorrectly in 2022.

“He’s being utilized improperly on the field,” Everett told Compare.bet. “You can call it a Star, you can call it whatever, but he’s a shutdown corner. He needs to shut down receivers and he would for any other team. I just can’t figure out what the Rams defense wants to try to do with that.”

In Raheem Morris’ defense, the Rams have deployed Ramsey more in the slot to prevent defenses from game-planning him out of matchups. Even with that being the case in certain situations, Everett thinks the Rams should allow the All-Pro cornerback to cover man-on-man more often.

“I guess maybe there is game-planning, but defense is still defense, and when you’ve got a guy like Jalen Ramsey, I would definitely use him as a shutdown corner,” Everett said. “I guess they want to use his linebacker skills. It speaks to the Nos. 2 and 3 DBs more than it does him, because if defenses know he’s always on the No. 1, they can game-plan to attack Nos. 2 and 3.

“I understand what they’re trying to do,” he added. “I just think they’re getting too cute.”

With Ramsey seeing more snaps out of the slot, he’s recorded 77-plus tackles in back-to-back seasons and posted a career-best 88 tackles in 2022. At the same time, he had a career-best 18 pass breakups and tied his career-high mark of four interceptions this past season.

Ramsey continues to be involved in trade rumors before the start of the new league year and the Rams could consider offers for the 28-year-old cornerback. But if the Rams elect to keep Ramsey on their roster entering the 2023 campaign, Everett wants to see more man-coverage for the lockdown cornerback.

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Former Saints QB Jim Everett says ‘these are the consequences’ of no post-Drew Brees plan

Derek Carr or Baker Mayfield, or more Andy Dalton? Former Saints QB Jim Everett says ‘these are the consequences’ of having no plan post-Drew Brees:

It’s safe to say the New Orleans Saints haven’t experienced as much success as they hoped for once Drew Brees called it a career. They’ve started a worrying series of quarterbacks in his place including Andy Dalton (14 games), Jameis Winston (10), Trevor Siemian (4), Taysom Hill (3), and Ian Book (1). As a team, the Saints have won 16 of their last 34 games with those passers in the lineup.

And former Saints quarterback Jim Everett puts much of that blame on general manager Mickey Loomis. Everett ranks fifth in New Orleans’ record books with 10,622 career passing yards, which he assembled in a 47-game run with the Saints from 1994 to 1996. Now, with his old team scrambling to recruit Derek Carr while being linked to Baker Mayfield and draft prospects like Hendon Hooker, he sees a disturbing lack of vision in New Orleans.

“After Drew Brees, it’s been a ship without a rudder, because they’ve just kind of been floating around,” Everett told Compare.bet’s Kyle Odegard. He pointed to the Saints’ widely-panned decision to trade up for Marcus Davenport in the 2018 draft, bypassing the 2019 league MVP Lamar Jackson along the way, as a badly missed opportunity. Everett continued, “You’ve got to have a plan. Mickey’s got to have a plan from the start. When they moved up and drafted Davenport, I thought they were taking Lamar to fill the cupboard. That didn’t happen. You had Drew Brees, and you didn’t have a plan after Drew, and these are the consequences.”

Everett did give Loomis some props for his year-to-year management of the team and its talent acquisition, but he took issue with the live-in-the-moment strategy that has left them without a sure thing under center. Even last year’s leading quarterback, Dalton, wasn’t signed with the expectation that he’d start 14 games. The plan from March to September was for Winston to play each week and help get the Saints to the playoffs. But back-to-back years with serious injuries took him out of action, and Loomis has quickly had to pivot from Plan A to Plan B, and sometimes Plans C or D.

It’s fair to wonder how much of the team’s vision left with Sean Payton a year ago. Dennis Allen’s first move as head coach was to full-throttle in pursuit of controversial quarterback Deshaun Watson, who didn’t exactly impress anyone when he finally returned from suspension last season. When the Saints struck out on Watson they went back to Winston and signed him to a two-year deal they’re likely to tear up soon. As Everett pointed out, they haven’t invested draft picks in a serious developmental prospect.

Everett added: ““I understand bringing in a serviceable veteran, a guy that can fill the gap. To some extent, I did that role with the Saints for awhile. But being real about where they are, they must find a rookie quarterback to rebuild that salary cap. It’s paramount. There are no two ways about it.”

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Throwback Thursday: Rams, Flipper Anderson stun Giants in 1989 playoffs

In the latest Giants Wire Throwback Thursday, we head back to the 1989 playoffs when the Los Angeles Rams stunned the New York Giants in OT.

In 1989, the New York Giants were back in the playoffs for the first time since their dominant, Super Bowl-winning season three years before.

In 1987, they opened at 0-2 before the players went on strike. The owners continued the season with replacement players, something the Giants did not stock up on, and before you could blink an eye, they were 0-5. They recovered to finish 6-9, but it was not enough to qualify for the postseason.

In 1988, the Giants finished 10-6 but failed to secure a postseason berth when they lost to the Jets, 27-21, in the final game.

The 1989 season would be the year the Giants rose back to prominence. They opened the season with an 8-1 record and went on to win the NFC East with a 12-4 record. As a division winner, they drew a bye in the wild-card round of the playoffs.

On Jan. 7, 1990, Bill Parcells’ crew hosted John Robinson’s Los Angeles Rams at Giants Stadium in the NFC divisional round. The Rams had disposed of the Philadelphia Eagles the week before in the wild-card round and came into New Jersey as three-point underdogs.

The Rams were one of the teams that managed to beat the Giants during the regular season, knocking them off, 31-10, in Anaheim on Nov. 12.

In this game, however, L.A. had to come 3,000 miles to play a Giants team that had lost just once at home that season. On a typical blustery Meadowlands afternoon, the feeling in the air was that the Giants were going to romp.

That didn’t happen. Instead, they were flatter than they had looked in weeks.

The over/under on the game was 39 points because, well, it was a Giants game with Parcells at the helm. As predicted, the game was a low-scoring one.

The Giants defense was putting in their typical home cold-weather defensive performance, and New York was up, 6-0, with 17 seconds to go in the first half. That’s when Los Angeles quarterback Jim Everett caught the Giants napping and hit wide receiver Willie “Flipper” Anderson for a 30-yard touchdown strike.

That would not be the last the Giants would see of Anderson on the day.

The Giants regained the lead in the third quarter on a 2-yard touchdown plunge by Ottis Anderson. The Rams would hold the Giants scoreless in the fourth quarter and tie the game at 13 with two short field goals by Mike Lansford, sending the game into overtime.

Fans were getting antsy, groaning about the Giants offense being put in dry dock in the second half by Parcells. An earlier interception that led to a Rams touchdown may have been the reason.

In overtime, the Rams won the coin toss and marched down the field on the stunned Giants. It took only 1:06 for the visitors to score the winning touchdown, a 30-yard reception by Anderson over Giants cornerback Mark Collins that ended with Flipper running straight through the back of the end zone, through the tunnel and into the locker room.

“When I came into the lockers, I was here by myself,” said Anderson, whose only two catches that Sunday were the Rams’ only touchdowns. “I didn’t know what to do.”

Neither did any of us who were watching in the stands. Was that it? Is the game over? Does that count?

It sure did. And it still stings.

The Giants would bounce back from this devastating loss and win the Super Bowl the next season, but it was another long offseason for Giants fans in 1990.

In retrospect, fans still cringe when they think about that day, and when they hear Flipper Anderson’s name, but they shouldn’t. Anderson only caught two passes on the day — both went for touchdowns — but was a well-known deep threat.

They should have been more aware of Anderson, who set a single-game NFL record for receiving yards (336) six weeks before against New Orleans. That record still stands.

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Saints can win at Mile High Stadium for the first time since 1994

The New Orleans Saints have an opportunity to defeat the Denver Broncos for the third time, and just the second time at Mile High Stadium.

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The NFL’s scheduling system means some teams face each other only rarely, which is illustrated well by the few meetings between the New Orleans Saints and the Denver Broncos. The two squads have played against one another just 11 times since their first game in 1970, with the Broncos owning a 9-2 all-time record.

But that doesn’t have anything to do with their upcoming matchup in Week 12. With Taysom Hill quarterbacking the Saints and underwhelming Broncos starter Drew Lock spiraling on the other side, the Saints have their best opportunity to win at Mile High Stadium for the first time since 1984.

That was a too-close 30-28 victory powered by 343 passing yards from Jim Everett, who threw 3 touchdown passes (2 of them to wide receiver Torrance Small, who also accounted for 200 receiving yards). Defensive backs Carl Lee and Vinnie Clark intercepted Broncos quarterback Hugh Millen 3 times (twice for Lee, his final year in the NFL), and the Saints pass rush racked up 4 sacks (with forever-underrated defensive end Wayne Martin getting home twice on his own).

Ironically, this was the final game current Broncos head coach Vic Fangio worked as Saints linebackers coach — he was hired as Carolina Panthers defensive coordinator months later, bringing Dome Patrol star Sam Mills with him as founding members of the new NFL franchise. Mills was recently named a semifinalist for the Pro Football Hall of Fame for the fourth time.

It could take another big day from the Saints defenders to escape with a win this Sunday. They were up to the task against the Atlanta Falcons in Taysom Hill’s first start, sacking Matt Ryan 8 times while picking him off twice, and shutting down the Falcons run game. The Broncos will be hoping to keep pressure off Lock against a tenacious Saints defensive line, so expect them to challenge New Orleans often on the ground after Melvin Gordon and Phillip Lindsay combined for 31 carries and 166 rushing yards (plus 2 touchdown runs) a week ago against a good Miami Dolphins defense.

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Jim Everett went after Jim Rome on live TV 26 years ago: ‘Seems like yesterday’

Jim Everett tackled Jim Rome to the ground 26 years ago today – on live television.

Jim Everett is most remembered for being the Rams’ all-time leader in passing yards. But one of the iconic moments from his career off the field came on April 6, 1994, when he went after Jim Rome on live television, knocking him out of his chair and tackling the host to the ground.

It all stemmed from a feud between Everett and Rome, after Rome refused to stop calling Everett “Chris.” Rome criticized Everett for avoiding hits on the field, thus calling him “Chris,” in reference to women’s tennis player Chris Evert. Everett understandably took exception to Rome’s badgering and put an end to it.

The video popped up on Twitter Monday and was retweeted more than 3,000 times, reminding everyone what a crazy interview that was on this date 26 years ago.

Everett even chimed in and tweeted, “Seems like yesterday” with a winking emoji.

Everett replied to a bunch of fans on Twitter who asked him questions about this clip, and for everyone who asked whether this was staged, Everett’s response was clear: it was not.

Everett also said he and Rome haven’t spoken since this incident, nor have they even run into each other at any point.

On the bright side, Everett and Evert have connected since the fight with Rome, and he feels bad about her being dragged into it.

Everett doesn’t seem to have any regret over going after Rome, not that he should. He was even surprised the host took it that far, egging the former Rams quarterback on to no end.

No matter how heated today’s “debate” shows get, they’ll never reach the level that Everett and Rome did on this date in 1994.

26 years ago, Jim Everett had enough of Jim Rome calling him Chris Everett

Jim Everett had enough of Jim Rome calling him Chris Everett and took matters into his hands on April 6, 1994.

One of those moments in sports television history that will live forever. It was April 6, 1994 — 26 years ago — when Jim Everett decided he had enough of Jim Rome calling him “Chris Everett.”

And watch what happened as the quarterback decided enough was enough of the sports talkie’s mouth running about him:

Jim Everett weighed in on the memory on Twitter.