Rams COO goes on Twitter rant to defend Steve Spagnuolo’s record as head coach

Kevin Demoff and Steve Spagnuolo both joined Rams in 2009, says St. Louis was too big of “a mess” to win

In 2009, the St. Louis Rams hired Steve Spagnuolo to be the new head of one of the worst teams in the NFL, then and shortly thereafter added a relatively young executive to the front office named Kevin Demoff. For the previous four seasons, Demoff had been with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, a connection that would eventually come back around to help the Rams win a Super Bowl, but first the organization had to go through some of the worst seasons in franchise history.

Spagnuolo and Demoff would go through it together for three years, but only Demoff survived to see 2012 and beyond. Now 12 years after Spagnuolo was fired, and following three Super Bowl wins as the Chiefs defensive coordinator, Demoff is repeating what I also happened to write on Monday: Steve Spagnuolo has earned a second opportunity.

First, Demoff tweeted that it is “well past time” for Spagnuolo to get a second opportunity as a head coach, adding that the franchise “was a mess” and that “nobody could have had success” from the 2009-2011 seasons. Demoff believes that despite his 10-38 record as head coach with two 14+ loss campaigns, Spagnuolo “changed the culture”.

But Demoff didn’t stop there.

Demoff notes that the Rams had gone 5-27 in the previous two seasons, leading to a coaching change and then an ownership change. The team was put up for sale only a few months after Spagnuolo was hired, meaning that the head coach was no longer working for the person who wanted him to be the head coach in the first place. The team had little shot of success in 2009 and went 1-15.

Another wrinkle that Demoff didn’t add here is that the team picked Chris Long with the second overall pick in 2008 and Jason Smith with the second overall pick in 2009, so the Rams weren’t getting significantly better in the draft as a result of their awful records. Smith was a flat out bust and Long was a good player, but not a franchise-changer. Spagnuolo wasn’t responsible for the draft picks (and luckily for Demoff, which makes him free to speak up, neither was Les Snead, as he wasn’t hired until 2012).

The Rams went 7-9 in 2010, but Demoff blames the 2011 CBA lockout and delayed transition for the Josh McDaniels offense for St. Louis’s poor season in 2011. The Rams went 2-14 and fired Spagnuolo as they had the worst offense in the NFL. Sam Bradford, the first overall pick in 2010, missed six games and wasn’t prepared for the McDaniels offense, his second coordinator in as many years. Demoff added that the 2011 team was just one of the worst rosters in the NFL.

He also says “I should have been better for him” in reference to his early days with the Rams.

Since being fired, Spagnuolo hasn’t received any head coaching interviews and this is in spite of helping the Chiefs win four AFC titles and three Super Bowls. The defense was probably better than the offense this past season.

The good news for Rams fans is that with Sean McVay in place (there’s that Tampa Bay connection I was talking about), if Spagnuolo gets another shot, it won’t have to be in L.A..

It should be somewhere.