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St. Louis Rams' London trip comes while fans still fear Los Angeles move

The St. Louis Rams are going to London on Sunday, in a much-maligned global publicity stunt, but the city Rams fans worry about most is still Los Angeles.

St. Louis's renovation proposal looks like this. The Ram plan... doesn't.
St. Louis's renovation proposal looks like this. The Ram plan... doesn't.
Dilip Vishwanat

For most football fans, news that their team would be playing a home game in London would come as little more than a minor annoyance. For St. Louis Rams fans, watching them play a home game in another city is—well, it's a bit of a touchy subject. The 2012 season was preceded by months of unproductive Rams stadium negotiations, with the Rams hoping for a gorgeous, retractable-roof boondoggle and the St. Louis convention authority offering... well, a bigger jumbotron and carpool-lane access. The leverage? Los Angeles, in pursuit of a team to call its own after losing the Rams and Raiders in the 90s.

The matter remains unresolved at midseason, with Jeff Fisher and company leading a promising rebuilding project and St. Louis fans hoping they'll be able to see the finished product in person. I think they're more likely than not to stay in town, but until the public-funding bubble for stadiums bursts it's hard to see a situation where St. Louis springs for anything near the Rams' initial proposal.

Going to London to play the New England Patriots is a sign more of their ineptitude than their nefarious intentions, but right now Rams fans are in a position where trust is a little hard. They might say they're just going out to the corner store for a pack of cigarettes, but we'll be watching the Edward Jones Dome out of the corner of our eyes until we see their car pull up in the driveway.