SEATTLE — The Rams think they are about to surprise you.

I have far less ambitious expectations. All I want them to do is not disappoint me.

As this struggling franchise begins its long journey back to NFL respectability with its season opener Sunday against NFC West foe Seattle, I don't expect many victories this season from a team that has far too many athletic limitations.

But under the direction of coach Steve Spagnuolo, the new Rams have already shown me something I rarely saw during the wretched decline of the Scott Linehan Rams. They showed me toughness. They showed me attitude. They showed that it doesn't really matter how few NFL studs they have on their roster anymore, as long as they come to work and play tough, smart, error-free football.

It's going to take time to turn this thing around, and anyone who believes the Rams will be this year's NFL overnight sensation is living in an overly optimistic dream world. It would be nice to dream of nine or 10 victories and hail them as this year's Atlanta Falcons, but five or six victories is more realistic.

But before we get any deeper into the football end of this conversation, let's talk business.

When we're talking about business and the Rams, that conversation should start and end with the potential sale of the team and what (if anything) the local powers that be are doing to make sure the Rams stay put in St. Louis.

Thankfully, we already heard from Gov. Jay Nixon last week when he said he is certain of two things: He will do everything in his power to insure that the Rams stay in St. Louis but that the state won't build them a new stadium.

Good for the governor; Nixon told me last week that he has already had several productive conversations with Rams ownership and intends to keep talking until he gets the job done. But there is only so much he can do, which begs the question of why is he the only one talking?

Publicly, it's been fairly quiet on the sales front, but don't mistake silence for inactivity. As we told you a few months ago, because of confidentiality clauses, potential buyers and Rams ownership have no choice but to keep their mouths shut. We've been fishing for weeks, to no avail.

But the people who are not bound by the confidentiality clauses, most notably in local government and at the Convention and Visitors Commission, which runs the Edward Jones Dome, have also been oddly silent, too. And that makes no sense.

With the notable exception of the governor, what are the local movers and shakers waiting for?

My fear is that the CVC is playing the foolish game that seems to be the signature move of local government, which is to react (typically way too late) rather than come up with an intelligent approach to keeping the Rams in St. Louis.

I'm not advocating submitting to municipal fleecing. However, if the CVC's strategy is to simply do nothing until it legally has to — waiting until the mandated 2012 arbitration — it could prove to be risky and downright foolhardy. Sitting idly by could be the very thing that guarantees the Rams will be sold and moved.

Because of the so-called "upper tier" clause in the Rams lease with the CVC, the two sides are obligated in 2012 to go before an arbitrator, who will determine what, if anything, the CVC must do to put the Rams in the top 25 percent of NFL stadiums. We all know there's no way the Dome can be upgraded enough by 2012 to get into that upper tier.

So what happens if an arbitrator says the city must build a new $700 million stadium?

I'll tell you exactly what happens. The government will say no, and the Rams ownership will gleefully embrace that decision because it means it can exercise the clause that allows it to break its lease. Do you know how attractive that makes the Rams on the open market if bidders know they no longer have to keep the team in St. Louis?

So that's why I would urge the local powers not to wait for an arbitration that you can't possibly win. Why not engage in talks with current ownership as soon as possible and try to come up with a new lease agreement that finds a way to satisfy everyone's most pressing needs?

Why not spend the next few months finding a way to negotiate a new lease that not only continues to guarantee sensible upgrades to the current building while finding a way to increase creative revenue streams for ownership? Such an approach also avoids an ungainly option that has a price tag in excess of half a billion dollars.

On the field and off, a lot will have to go right for the Rams to win games this season. But this is what I've always been taught from the NFL's wise guys I admire. No matter how bad your talent is, good coaching still matters. A bad coach will allow a bad team to sink to its level of incompetence. A good coach will create an atmosphere that will push a bad team to overachieve.

On the field, it seems that Spags will create that well-coached atmosphere to make the Rams overachieve. I don't expect them to disappoint me.

Off the field, I hope the local power brokers will be just as smart. I just don't want them to disappoint me either.