By Lisa Zimmerman, Player Engagement Insider
Early in January, former Los Angeles Rams quarterback Jim Everett’s two eldest children, currently living away from California, received unique care packages. They opened boxes filled with vintage Los Angeles Rams gear. It was their father’s way of celebrating the Rams’ return to Los Angeles.
Everett was drafted by the Houston Oilers out of Purdue University as their third overall pick in 1986. His rights ended up being traded to the Los Angeles Rams and he went on to play eight years for the organization.
He subsequently played for the New Orleans Saints and San Diego Chargers before retiring in 1997 and settling permanently in the Los Angeles, California area.
Everett’s emotions are balanced by a strong understanding of the financial element that goes into the decisions made by both the NFL and its teams. He understood perfectly when then-Rams owner, Georgia Frontiere picked up and moved the team to St. Louis from Los Angeles in 1995, citing the debt situation the organization was dealing with at the time. Everett admitted that even he wanted out because of the state of the team. They were perennial underdogs and struggled at every turn.
“Georgia moving to St. Louis made so much financial sense that she couldn’t turn it down,” Everett said. “She knew Anaheim (California) couldn’t come up with the funds or the stadium. [By moving to St. Louis] she increased the value of her franchise and didn’t have to sell it.”
Everett, who traveled to St. Louis many times over the years to be a part of organization events, calls the team’s return to Los Angeles, “A dream come true.” He knows the adjustment for the organization and fans alike will be difficult, but is optimistic about the transition.
“St. Louis is going to feel a void a lot of us have felt,” he said. “The only thing I would say is we are one Ram nation, no matter where they play we’re always Rams. Everyone will welcome them here like they welcomed me there. They won a Super Bowl in St. Louis. But, it’s an entire industry coming home. I’m very excited for the Rams.”
Despite his Midwestern roots, Everett has become a firmly entrenched Los Angeleno. He was raised in New Mexico, where his father was a professor of education at the University of New Mexico and his mother was a special education teacher. Education was the priority in his family and Everett, who earned his bachelor’s degree in Industrial Management with a minor in Computers from Purdue, laughed when he said, “When I retired from the NFL, I was the least educated person in my family.”
He rectified that by earning his MBA from Pepperdine University. He had always had a strong interest in finance and was drawn to asset management. His plan was to partner with the man who had managed his finances throughout his football career and who had become a close friend. Unfortunately, he passed away just as Everett was graduating. However, Everett forged ahead, opened his own business and spent the next 14 years as a registered investment advisor.
In 2014, he realized he was ready for a new challenge. He had become interested in businesses that he had been recommending to some of his clients and decided to dive in himself. Everett currently works with two companies, one that has developed an ID chip to help companies track the condition of their products and the second, a small technology company that is developing a digital playbook, designed, in these initial stages to be used in high school sports and accessible on digital devices.
The NFL and college programs already have more advanced capabilities, but high school programs, especially the smaller ones, do not. Everett is hoping this new product will fill the void and increase what high school teams are able to do by offering packages of potential plays that can be downloaded all together.
“A playbook in a small school is probably just in the coach’s notebook,” Everett said. “What we’re trying to do is move things to digital. For example, the way football plays get exchanged now is through clinics or they steal it off the field. With this product they can purchase packages of certain plays. A basketball team may have certain plays, but they could buy the Triangle Offense and incorporate it into their own schemes. And that’s where it gets monetized. ”
Almost two decades after retiring from the NFL, Everett remains as busy as ever. Although one thing seems certain, come Sundays in September everything else will be put on hold as he cheers for his Rams in person.