Does Rams Owner Stan Kroenke Keep Head Coach Jeff Fisher To Lose?

Perhaps I should've had the foresight to ask Bernie Miklasz about this when he was on Turf Show Radio back in April, but the longtime P-D columnist and current host over at 101 ESPN had a very, very original take last night after the Rams' 13-37 loss to the Bears:

If anything, we can speculate that Kroenke is content to keep Fisher around because the coach is potentially useful and valuable in another way. Fisher has the experience of guiding a franchise through a difficult relocation; he was the coach during the Houston Oilers’ transition into the Tennessee Titans.

If anything, these demoralizing losses by the 2015 Rams works in Kroenke’s favor.

The chronic losing isn’t healthy for attendance.

And the continued setbacks — when combined with Kroenke’s snub of the St. Louis stadium force and ostensibly the fans — is toxic for local support. Kroenke hasn’t done his part here — not even close — but the NFL may not care about that.

It’s hard to see why Kroenke would acknowledge his own responsibility in his team’s decline on the field, and in home attendance. If the NFL refuses to recognize Kroenke’s culpability in the Rams’ performance, then why would he own up to it?

Empty seats at home games — and those occupied by fans of the visiting team — give Kroenke and a Rams’ executive a good opportunity to perpetuate a bogus case for moving the team. You know, the usual tripe: St. Louis doesn’t care about the Rams, St. Louis is a baseball town, St. Louis is struggling, St. Louis is dangerous and doomed, St. Louis can’t support the NFL.

So if you really want to know why Coach Fisher is secure, the speculative answer is pretty simple.

Coach Fisher may be bad for local business … but he’s very good for Kroenke’s master business plan.

Kroenke can win by losing.

I'm not one for conspiracy theories, but there's no denying that if Stan Kroenke wants to move the Rams to Los Angeles, it serves him best to avoid winning.

I'll have more on the laziness Miklasz alludes to in "the usual tripe" this week, but I thought this section out of his piece, which you should obviously read in its entirety, was worthy of highlighting here at TST.

I've been as critical as anyone about Fisherball, so I'm certainly susceptible to some underhanded Stan Kroenke shenanigans. So going full Major League is perhaps less crazy than it would seem...