Don`t be cruel, to a heart that`s true.
This is Elvis` city. If only Elvis were alive, St. Louis quarterback Neil Lomax could request that song on one of these steamy summer nights at Graceland. The words speak so aptly to Lomax`s vacillating career.
The Cardinals have moved their training base here from Charleston, Ill., for the last couple of weeks of the preseason. And as the team prepared to play the Bears Monday night in Soldier Field, Lomax worked on winning back the hearts and minds of his teammates and fans.
He has run the musical gamut from ”Blue Suede Shoes” to ”Heartbreak Hotel” in the last three years, starting out as a dandy and then becoming a dunce.
In the New York Times in the winter of 1984, Giants coach Bill Parcells called the then-fourth-year pro one of the top three quarterbacks in the National Football League.
A front-page headline in the Sporting News in September, 1985, blared
”The Next Great Quarterback” over a story about the aspiring phenom from Portland State.
The praises vanished in 1985 and 1986. After St. Louis and Lomax trod on their league playoff promises of 1984 with a combined record of 9-22-1 the last two years, he was transformed into ”The Great Quarterback Fraud.”
Jim Hanifan was driven out as head coach after the disappointing 1985 effort and former Dallas Cowboys assistant Gene Stallings took control of a bad situation.
This year, the Cardinals drafted quarterback Kelly Stouffer from Colorado State with the sixth draft pick. Lomax, at home in Portland, Ore., described his reaction succinctly: Grrrrr. He even gritted his teeth here last week when he made that noise.
Rumors abounded that Lomax would be traded. Reportedly, he was turned down by San Diego, Seattle and the Los Angeles Raiders, none of whom would give up a second-round draft pick for him.
Stouffer remains unsigned, rejecting the Cardinals` offer of $1.8 million for four years, and yet Stallings believes he has already made a strong contribution to the team.
”Neil will say no, but I think it`s made a difference in him that we drafted Stouffer,” Stallings said. ”It`s a certain threat.
”But I think Neil realizes I didn`t make the choice. If I did, it makes a little bit more of a difference to him. Our scouting department just picked out who they thought was the best player at that spot.”
That`s another story in this byzantine organization, where the head coach had virtually no approval power in the draft.
Stallings wouldn`t admit it, but he probably agrees with Lomax that St. Louis should have used its first-round pick to plug a hole in a listing ship loaded with leaks.
”This big quarterback controversy they talked about. Well, here I am. Where is everybody else?” Lomax challenged.
”I didn`t think quarterback was the area we needed to improve ourselves. I was surprised they drafted him. We needed help in the lines, tight end and defensive backs.”
What do you think goes through management`s mind?
”Don`t ask me that,” Lomax said. ”Coach Stallings doesn`t even know sometimes. He asks for help and doesn`t get it. I`m just a pawn in this game of chess. This team is unique.
”Look at Jim McMahon on the Bears. To me, McMahon is a good athlete. But he gets way too much credit for the things they do. That`s no stab at him. But Chicago has a great team without him.”
St. Louis doesn`t have a great team with or without Lomax. That supports the point Lomax emphasizes about his situation-that quarterbacks can`t do it all.
”Neil didn`t have as good a surrounding cast last year as he needs if he`s going to be good,” Stallings said.
”He was at a real disadvantage. We`d bring receivers in on Sunday who`d only been with us a few days. When you lose receivers like a Pat Tilley and a Roy Green to injury, you`re going to have problems. We did.
”I know very few quarterbacks who throw the ball well laying down. There are very few outstanding quarterbacks without outstanding receivers.
”I wouldn`t say our problems are corrected yet, but it`s getting a little closer. We`re protecting Neil a little better now, he has confidence in his receivers, and he`s had a good summer.”
Lomax should test the Bears` secondary after piling up impressive passing totals in his first two preseason games. He`s 19 of 27 for 224 yards and three touchdowns.
But don`t tell him he`s back. Lomax doesn`t see it that way.
”I picked up the paper the other day and the headline was `The New Neil Lomax.` What is this? I take it right in stride with the comics section. It`s great humor,” he said without the trace of a smile.
”I understand what I have to do, what this team has to do. It`s too bad a lot of media people don`t understand what goes on. We didn`t have a good football team the last two years, me included. I wasn`t a good quarterback.
”I tried to do so much more than I was able to do. I tried to be the hero. Tried to call my own plays, throw the bomb, do it all by myself. I found out I can`t.
”In 1984, when we were successful, I wasn`t being the hero. I was just executing my position.
”All the hoopla about me going into 1985 hurt the team, not me. We started out a little overconfident. We go 2-0, then 3-1, and everybody was writing more good things about us. Then we lost eight of the next nine games and we got back to reality real quick.
”I`ve learned to handle some pressures I`d never experienced. I used to be able to use the excuses that I was young and inexperienced. Now, after going to the Pro Bowl in 1984, I can`t use those excuses anymore. The media won`t let me alone.”
He refreshes himself every off-season in Oregon. Stallings was displeased Lomax didn`t stay in St. Louis and work out with other committed teammates, but Lomax claimed his chances of burnout were greater if he hadn`t returned to Portland.
”I prepare myself physically, mentally and spiritually to play a season,” he said. ”If I don`t do that well, I won`t have a good season. I think I`ve done these things well this past off-season. Maybe that`s what people are seeing in me-all this new Neil Lomax stuff.
”I have a lot of ministries I`m involved with back home in Portland. My church work helps me to give something back to the community. I work with kids, and not because of who I am but who I`m not. I`m not anybody special.
”We in the NFL are very spoiled. We get a lot of perks. We don`t deserve all of these things, but that`s the way the world is. So if I can help these kids, it puts value on life for me. It sounds like goody two-shoes, I know, but that`s the way I feel.
”My wife, Laurie, has helped me tremendously to handle things the last year. She keeps me within boundaries, so I don`t get mentally burned out.
”God has a plan for us. We can`t deviate from that plan. It`s not what the St. Louis Post-Dispatch wants, or USA Today wants, or even Coach Stallings. It`s bigger than that.”
Bigger than the NFL? Neil Lomax does have some funny ideas, doesn`t he?
