If there's one thing I've learned about St. Louis sports fans while growing up and living here, it's this: winning isn't enough. If you don't do it their way, you'll never be accepted.

Just ask Cardinals manager Tony LaRussa, who has never been fully espoused in St. Louis. After leading an 83 win team to a World Series victory last season, you would think that the entire city would, at long last, embrace him. It hasn't happened. Unbelievably, there were/are fans (message board types) who refuse to appreciate the championship, saving their joy for the day LaRussa manages his last Cardinals game.

This season, with every starting position player and their two best pitchers being injured, the Cards were remarkably in the N.L. Central race in September before bowing out. Still, calls for LaRussa's ouster were being hailed in June and July.

On the message board Cards Clubhouse, this is but a very small sample of what was being said at that board about him mere months after leading the team to a World Series title:

"He has wore out his welcome in my mind and I wouldnt mind seeing him being fired tomorrow ... Scott Rolen hates and Now I and Albert Pujols hate you."

"He's been making poor management decisions just like that for the last year and a half."

"In my mind, he never was a great manager, the players made him look great. Now, that he doesn't have the players, his 'coat of armor' is very thin, or never was there. Subject at hand!.. Fire the guy..."

"La Russa only wins on talent, anyone could do better then him, he over manages, and it hurts him."

Would you like to know why St. Louisans don't like Tony LaRussa? It's simple, really. There are two reasons.

1) His use of bench players. LaRussa will often sit a regular and play a bench player if he has superior career numbers against that night's starting pitcher. This drives fans here nuts, for reasons known only to their them. A regular could be hitting .022 against a certain pitcher, and a reserve .734, and if LaRussa started the player hitting .734, it's an outrage.

But that's not the main reason. The main reason fans here don't like LaRussa is this:

2) He's not Whitey Herzog.

The same Whitey Herzog who is the epitome of a gutless quitter. 80 games into the 1990 season, the Cardinals had a record of 33-47 ... and Herzog quit, because he couldn't hack it anymore.

Five seasons previous, Herzog got himself ejected from game 7 of the World Series because he was still angry at a call from Game 6. He went into the game unprepared, unfocused and killed his team by choosing to blame the umpire, Don Denkinger, instead of moving on:

"The Cardinals made their frustrations clear throughout the game. ABC television cameras caught Herzog screaming and belittling Denkinger from the Cardinals' dugout throughout the contest ... Herzog even went so far as to directly tell Denkinger that had he gotten "the call" right in Game 6, the Cardinals wouldn't have been subjected to a seventh game in the first place."

Does anyone believe for one second LaRussa would do this? After Detroit's Kenny Rogers blantantly cheated in game 2 of last year's World Series, LaRussa wouldn't let his team dwell on that after they lost. They just moved on to game 3. Herzog couldn't move on, and this was a game 7.

Twice, the White Rat (an appropriate nickname) took his ball and went home like a child. He should forever be remembered for his cowardice in this city, but he's worshipped above any sports figure save Stan Musial.

Which brings us to the St. Louis Rams and their head coach, Scott Linehan. After yesterday's humiliating defeat, 24-3 to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, it's pretty evident where this season is headed for the team. Straight in the garbage can.

And you can thank Scott Linehan for that. Of course the team is going to suffer after losing Orlando Pace and Tye Hill with injury. But it goes beyond that. The offensive play-calling is beyond drab and confusing, the special teams are horrible and the defense is one of the worst tackling units ever assembled.

Most of this has to fall on Linehan's shoulders. He looks scared and confused. Watch him on the sidelines, and he simply sits there with a blank look on his face, clutching his play sheet like Rain Man when he watches People's Court.

At one point in the game, with the Rams down 14-3 and Tampa Bay getting the ball on offense, the miraculous happened and Linehan started yelling and clapping his hands, doing his best cheerleader routine, trying to light a fire under the team's belly. A few plays later, the Buccaneers scored a touchdown.

But that was a rare moment of Linehan exuberance. Maybe the Bucs scored because Rams players were trying to get their minds around the fact that Scott Linehan is actually a living, breathing soul who has the capability to move his arms, legs and mouth.

And you know what? Rams fans deserve this. They deserve every last bit of the mediocre, excruciatingly boring Scott Linehan era. An era that has explosive offensive players all over the offense who can't score a touchdown. An era that has seen him hire a special teams coach who at this time last year was coaching high school kids.

I make no apologies for the fact that I was, and still am, an enormous Mike Martz supporter. I loved the guy. Because I happen to like guys who say, "Fuck you, I'm doing it my way," no matter what the circumstances are. And that was Martz's greatest, yet most confounding quality. He said, "Fuck you." In fact, he said it so much, he got himself fired.

But despite what mediocre broadcasters like Tom Jackson, comically inept websites like Football Outsiders and ill-informed fans like the ones we have in St. Louis believe, at his core, Martz was a hell of a coach. And facts bear that out.

Martz engineered the greatest offense in football history. His 56 wins are the third most in the history of the Rams franchise, behind Chuck Knox's 57 and John Robinson's 79. And among head coaches who were at the helm for at least 50 games, Martz's .609 winning percentage trails only Knox's .737 and George Allen's .708.

And one thing was for sure: Martz was never boring. He was also extremely tough on his team, and quarterbacks in particular. He was excitable, showed intense emotion and had the kind of arrogance that the media hates and many fans embrace. But not in St. Louis.

Why, you ask? Again, it's quite simple. He didn't do it the St. Louis way. He didn't cry like Dick Vermeil. He threw the ball - a lot. He challenged any plays on the field his players asked him to, citing his trust for them. He would often burn all three of the team's timeouts with time left in the first quarter. And he challenged the fat slobs that represent the media, who would roast him when he didn't give them the answers they wanted. And they wanted traditional, grind it out football, like all media does.

Never mind his record setting offenses, his Super Bowl and playoff appearances, and that he is the only coach in the history of the National Football League to take an 8-8 team on the road and win a playoff game. He didn't do it the way St. Louis fans wanted to - he called timeouts and threw challenge flags, and in St. Louis, you don't call timeouts and throw challenge flags.

Here, you run the ball up the middle and fall down after hitting the back of the offensive lineman. Here, you keep the challenge flag in your pocket. And you damn well better have every timeout at the end of the first half.

So instead of having a coach who takes risks, a coach who says "fuck you," a coach who does what he believes is the right thing to do instead of doing what everybody else wants him to do, we have Scott Linehan.

A boring, unprepared, perplexed, drab, possibly autistic Scott Linehan. And Rams fans, you deserve every ounce of this. Even though the team can't score touchdowns, the special teams are an embarrassment and the defense can't tackle, it sure is better to lose with Linehan than win with Martz, right?

Because at least Scott Linehan loses with all his timeouts left. And Lord knows that's the most important thing in this town.