By Nick Wagoner
Senior Writer

When the telephone rang at the Haslett household in Clayton around 1:15 Monday morning, Jim Haslett couldn’t help but think something was wrong.

“I thought something happened with my family,” Haslett said. “Who calls you at 1:15 in the morning? Usually it’s a prank call or something happened. I was kind of worried and my wife told me who it was.”

It wasn’t until after his wife Beth informed him that it was Rams owner Chip Rosenbloom and President John Shaw on the other end that Haslett realized what the call was about.

After hours of meeting and discussing the future of the Rams head coaching position behind closed doors, a Rams contingent including Rosenbloom, Shaw, President of Football Operations Jay Zygmunt, owner Lucia Rodriguez and minority owner Stan Kroenke had come to the conclusion that Scott Linehan was no longer the man for the job.

On the heels of a 31-14 loss to Buffalo that dropped his team to 0-4 for the second straight season, the decision wasn’t easy but it was clear. The Rams needed a change and it had to start at the top.

Rosenbloom and Co. called Linehan to a suite at the Four Season Hotel across from the Edward Jones Dome and informed him of the decision. It wasn’t an easy choice for Rosenbloom who had promised his mother Georgia Frontiere that Linehan would be given another chance before she passed away.

“We made the decision that a good man had to lose his job today,” Rosenbloom said. “He took 100 percent of responsibility for the failures of this organization. But we are all comparable; we all share in the responsibilities of losing games. You all know him as a kind, decent and honorable guy and when he walked into that hotel room yesterday, he took 100 percent responsibility and put no blame on anybody else in the organization, in any category, at any position, on any of his players.”

After a long internal debate about who should be the replacement, the Rams decided Haslett was the man for the job. Because of his previous experience as a head coach and his energy and leadership, Haslett ultimately won out instead of offensive coordinator Al Saunders, the other coach under consideration for the job.

When Haslett realized what the call was about – he said he had heard of reports on television about the possibility of a move Sunday – he roamed the house on the phone discussing the job and getting clarification on what type of control he would have as interim head coach.

Those questions centered specifically on personnel and how decisions about the roster and the depth chart would work. Last week, for instance, the Rams surprisingly released cornerback Fakhir Brown, a move with which Haslett did not necessarily agree.

Haslett was assured that he and Executive Vice President of Player Personnel Billy Devaney would maintain control of the roster with Zygmunt handling the things that come with “cap ramifications.”

After essentially being promised that he would have most of the normal power of a head coach, Haslett agreed to take on the task and become a head coach for the second time.

“I just kind of wanted to know what the plan was on personnel,” Haslett said. “I wanted to know because I knew there were some things we wanted to change as a staff, just things like that, little things that I really didn’t understand before.”

While it’s safe to assume there will be some changes in terms of the roster and the depth chart with Haslett taking over, there also has been some shuffling among the coaching staff.

Rick Venturi, Haslett’s most trusted advisor, will take over as defensive coordinator. Mike Cox moves from assistant secondary coach to linebackers coach and Todd Downing will jump from defensive quality control coach to assistant secondary coach.

The changes with Haslett in charge don’t stop there. Haslett said he wants to settle into a routine in terms of the practice schedule and that will begin this week. In addition, Haslett is opening up practice to the media after Linehan limited media to being able to watch only about the first 30 minutes of practice each day.

Haslett will begin working right away on instilling the fire and toughness that were part of the Haslett trademark in his six years as the head coach in New Orleans.

“We’ll try to get my personality into them as fast as we can, if that’s the way you want to look at it,” Haslett said. “I do like guys who are tough and hard-nosed and love to play the game.”

For his part, Haslett is happy to be given a second shot at being a head coach though he didn’t necessarily like the way the opportunity presented itself.

In a perfect world, Haslett said he would have led a defense that ranked among the best and brightest in the league and won a bunch of games before moving to an opportunity with another franchise.

But in the two and a quarter seasons in which Haslett coordinated the defense for Linehan, the Rams went 11-25 including just 3-17 in their past 20 games.

Despite the struggles of his defense and the Rams as a whole, Haslett believes the potential for a turnaround in the final three-quarters of the season is there.

For one, Haslett says there were plenty of signs of life in Sunday’s loss to Buffalo and he believes his second stint as a head coach will make him a better leader.

Haslett endured so much as a head coach in New Orleans, learning many lessons along the way that he believes will make him a more successful coach this time around.

“You try to look at it and look at the guys who have had second opportunities and most of them are successful,” Haslett said. “I looked at the Super Bowl and it was (Tom) Coughlin and Bill Belichick, it was their second time. They are all a much better coach the second time around.”

Haslett says perhaps the most important lesson he learned in his first run as a head coach was how to deal with adversity. Including hurricanes and relocation and mounting losses, Haslett pretty much saw and did it all as a head coach.

Along the way, he racked up a 45-51 record and led the Saints to the first playoff win in franchise history against the Rams in 2000.

“In the NFL, one thing about the game, there will be mistakes made,” Haslett said. “Something bad will happen every game, but that’s the National Football League. How you overcome it, how do you handle adversity, how do you handle crowd noise on the road, how do you handle a fumble, how do you handle things. Right now, we are not going that very well, but we’re going to work on that in the next couple of months and try to fix that because adversity does hit in the NFL.”

It remains to be seen what impact Haslett’s promotion will have on the Rams. He will get an extra week to sort out the details as the Rams enter their bye week.

And though Haslett would like to use the remaining 12 games as an audition to perhaps retain the head job, he’s keeping his focus on the short term.

“You like to think so, but right now I’m worrying about this year,” Haslett said. “Coaches live year-to-year anyways, so I’m going to try to worry about this year and these next 12 games and try to win some games. Hopefully we can turn this thing around.”

While Haslett can make no promises about what the next few months will bring, he firmly believes that nobody will question the effort of his team.

“I do know the makeup of most of the guys in the locker room and I think they do have a thirst and they want to get this thing right and we’re going to do the best we can at it,” Haslett said. “I promise you they’ll play hard, I will say that. They will play hard or they’re not going to be here and we’re going to give it everything we’ve got and we’ll try to keep the mistakes to a minimum. They will play hard that’s one thing I will promise you.”