RAM NOTEBOOK / TIM KAWAKAMI : Defensive Line Shuffle Continues

The Rams’ never-ending search for healthy, large bodies-- any healthy, large bodies--to plug into their defensive line has journeyed to new levels of desperateness, and nobody on the coaching staff is denying that.

Mike Charles was signed last Friday, given a cram course and played most of the game at defensive tackle in Sunday’s loss to the Kansas City Chiefs. And Charles might have been the Rams’ best lineman in the game.

Wednesday, the Rams signed David Rocker. They are now giving him a cram course and--surprise, surprise--he is expected to play much of the game Sunday at defensive tackle, teaming with Charles, against the Detroit Lions.

Taking two linemen who haven’t played a down this season and teaming them as your defensive tackles might be OK in the World League of American Football, but in the NFL, going against Christian Okoye and Barry Sanders in successive weeks, this is not quite standard operating procedure.

“It’s like being in training camp every day and every night,” said defensive line coach John Teerlinck. “I mean, you’re constantly putting in new people, trying to get people to line up right, let alone knowing what techniques or getting too involved in a scheme.

“We’re just trying to get four people on the field lining up in the right place at the right time.”

Teerlinck says he has never gone through a season such as this one.

“Hey, we didn’t have any of these problems in the USFL or at Iowa Lakes Junior College,” he said.

But the Rams have had season-long problems on their defensive line, which wasn’t exactly loaded with talent in the beginning. In 10 games, they have used 11 linemen, including six different tackles. After Sunday, it will be 13 linemen (they also signed defensive end Tom Gibson this week), with seven different tackles.

Their key players include three players no other team wanted this season, one rookie (Robert Young), and two Plan B players (Gerald Robinson and Karl Wilson), and they have used nine different line combinations in their first 10 games.

Holdovers Bill Hawkins, Mike Piel and Alvin Wright have been hurt and Kevin Greene has been moved to linebacker, causing much of the juggling.

But somehow, this makeshift jumble has held reasonably tight --considering the players--under heavy pressure. With Piel and Hawkins on injured reserve, Wright, who is nursing a chronically sore shoulder, is the only permanent lineman who played with the team before this season.

“Our goal is the same if we had Curly, Larry and Moe lined up out there,” Teerlinck said. “We want to play the defense and execute and stop people.

“But you do have to realize or at least come to the realization that if there’s people playing for you that did not play for anyone else the last 11 weeks in the National Football League, you’ve got a little more work to do than everyone else does and in a short amount of time.”

While most of the public perception of the Ram injury woes has focused on early-season offensive line, the defensive line has quietly been decimated, and has just six sacks this season to show for it.

Teerlinck, however, is carefully avoiding the usual coach’s lament about how injuries have ruined his squad’s chances at success.

“No, it has never come up,” Teerlinck said. “Shed no tears for us--quote me on that. We don’t care.

“Whatever we’ve got, we’re going to battle. We’re going to fight them on the land and the sea and the air. . . .

“There’s no one down in the mouth over what’s happened. You haven’t heard us or seen us cry once about it. They’re going to go out there, and they’re going to play as hard as they can, no matter who they are.

“We’re going to be those villagers fighting with the pitchforks and clubs and hatchets if we have to.”

Andre Ware has the pedigree of a superstar: the Detroit Lions’ No. 1 pick in 1990, a Heisman Trophy winner and recipient of about $1 million a year from the Detroit Lions.

But when starting quarterback Rodney Peete went down with a season-ending Achilles’ tendon injury last month, the Lions turned the offensive reins over to unheralded Erik Kramer, who comes to Detroit by way of the CFL and 1987 NFL replacement-game experience.

What’s going on in Detroit?

“Erik played a little better than Andre in the exhibition season and that’s the only thing I can go by,” Lions Coach Wayne Fontes said.

“I know Andre’s a No. 1 draft choice for us. But since I’ve been head coach here, I’ve always played the guys who’ve performed the best. And Erik, in the exhibition season, performed better than Andre did.

“When I made the choice to go to Erik, I didn’t hesitate, and when I made it, I talked to Andre and told him why I did it and the young man understands, and he’s just waiting his turn.”

Kramer, a member of the Calgary Stampeders in 1988 and ‘89, didn’t sound too pleased when asked if he was surprised to get the call after Ware’s injury.

“I knew that an opportunity down the road would present itself, and it did,” Kramer said. “I was there at the right time.”

Very Few Are Alike

How the personnel on the Ram defensive line has changed this season:

Game Left end Left tackle Right tackle Right end Phoenix Karl Wilson Alvin Wright Mike Piel Kevin Greene NY Giants Wilson Robert Young Piel Greene New Orleans Wilson Young Chris Pike Greene San Francisco Wilson Young Pike Greene Green Bay Greene Wilson Young Gerald Robinson San Diego Wilson Wright Pike Young Raiders Wilson Wright Young Robinson Atlanta Greene Wilson Young Robinson New Orleans Wilson Wright Pike Young Kansas City Robinson Wright Mike Charles Young Detroit (proj.) Greene David Rocker Charles Young