Current News: Alaric Jackson Avoids Criminal Charges, But the NFL’s Investigation Still Looms Over Training Camp
Another quiet week is the perfect excuse to reach back into the deepest corners of Rams lore, to a moment that had nothing to do with a box score or even a death of old Ram player and everything to do with a movie theater, a bag of popcorn, and a total shock for a kid growing up thousands of miles from the Coliseum. Read the Full Story on the Los Angeles Rams Substack!
The only real news today is that the The Los Angeles City Attorney’s Office has officially closed the door on criminal prosecution for Rams left tackle Alaric Jackson, declining to file charges stemming from his June 8 domestic battery arrest. For a fan base that would much rather be talking about roster battles and quarterback competitions heading into camp, it’s a welcome bit of clarity, and it means the franchise can turn its full attention toward football as training camp approaches. That said, the story is far from finished, and the legal relief Jackson just received does not guarantee he’ll be free and clear once the NFL’s own investigation wraps up.
Rather than pursue a standard misdemeanor case, prosecutors routed Jackson’s situation into a City Attorney hearing, which functions as a pre-filing diversion program rather than a courtroom prosecution. In practical terms, that path typically comes with its own set of conditions attached, and Jackson will likely be asked to complete some combination of behavioral counseling, community service, or restitution in order to keep the matter fully behind him. Importantly, the file itself has not been closed for good. City officials have made clear that if Jackson fails to satisfy those diversion requirements, or if new information surfaces before the statute of limitations runs out, the door remains open for charges to be revisited down the line. The decision to route the case this way also followed the accuser’s move to formally withdraw her request for a permanent restraining order, a development that preceded the City Attorney’s final call on prosecution. Read the Full Story on the Los Angeles Rams Substack!
First off, look at this picture and look how beautiful that looks. Honestly, even though that is Warren Beatty at the quarterback spot, in real life, our team lining up was always a work of art. Our uniforms were the best ever, which begs me to ask, why did we change them again? Was that when we were in St. Louis? I bet it was, but anyway, when I have the ability to buy the team, we will go back to these uniforms every day. Read the Full Story on the Los Angeles Rams Substack!
Now, picture the late 1970s on the East Coast, a time when the football landscape was almost entirely carved up between two dynasties. The Dallas Cowboys had already branded themselves America’s Team, and the coverage reflected it. The Pittsburgh Steelers, meanwhile, were in the middle of building one of the greatest dynasties the sport has ever seen. Between those two juggernauts, there was barely any oxygen left for a team playing its games on the opposite coast. Unless you happened to live in Southern California, actually seeing the Los Angeles Rams on television was a rare event, closer to spotting a mythical creature than watching a mainstream NFL franchise. They could never come close to selling out at the Los Angeles Colisuem so they were never on TV. For a lot of East Coast kids, those unmistakable blue-and-yellow curled horns existed mostly as a small photograph tucked inside the pages of a football digest, not as something you got to watch play out live on a Sunday afternoon.
Then came the movie theater moment that changed everything. Walking in expecting another glossy Hollywood sports story, probably centered on the Cowboys or some fictional stand-in team, nothing could have prepared an East Coast kid for what actually unfolded on screen. Warren Beatty’s 1978 hit, Heaven Can Wait, didn’t just feature football as a backdrop. It planted the Los Angeles Rams directly at the center of the plot, with Beatty’s character, Joe Pendleton, cast as the Rams’ own quarterback, marching his team toward the Super Bowl. Seeing an obscure, rarely-broadcast franchise suddenly treated like the center of the entire sporting universe on a massive movie screen produced a jolt of pride that’s hard to describe to anyone who wasn’t there for it. It was validation on a scale that a distant fan base almost never got, and for plenty of kids, that single afternoon in a theater sparked a loyalty that never faded. Remember, again, it was not like it is today. You had to walk over to the television set to change channels. You could only go so far when using a telephone. To get swag from the team, you had to write them a handwritten letter, place stamps on an envelope, and wait weeks until a response arrived. Being from New Jersey, almost no one knew who the Rams were back in the 1970s. Read the Full Story on the Los Angeles Rams Substack!
Read the Full Story on the Los Angeles Rams Substack!
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