Arriving in style

When the last pick in the NFL Draft rode in the back of a police truck, wearing an orange prison jumpsuit and a ball and chain, two long-suffering Rams fans suffered more.

Locals Brad Stevenson and Keith Harris came to see David Vobora at the Newport Dunes Waterfront Resort on Monday night as if he were the team’s savior.

Vobora looked more like a criminal than a linebacker. Well, he is a rookie from the University of Idaho Vandals.

Call him Mr. Irrelevant XXXIII.

For these two fans, any player from the Rams returning home to Orange County is a hero. The “Save the Rams” effort is long over with; the Rams moved to St. Louis prior to the 1995 season. Now, it was time to bail out Vobora.

Vobora reminded Stevenson and Harris of the Rams’ first-round selection in the 1996 NFL Draft. Lawrence Phillips was taken as the sixth overall pick that year. And the former Nebraska running back fumbled away his opportunity by putting up more numbers on the police blotter than on the field.

Once Stevenson, 47, and Harris, 46, figured out that Vobora’s situation was a hoax, they were relieved at the Irrelevant Week arrival party. But somehow they still believed in Vobora turning around a 3-13 franchise. In a meet and greet with a couple hundred fans, the two patiently waited to shake hands with the 6-foot-1, 242-pound Vobora.

Today, Vobora will take a tour of Huntington Beach, where he will take part at 6:30 p.m. in a Main Street welcome, an Irrelevant Rams Cheerleader contest and closing ceremonies.

After meeting with family members Monday, hugging a dozen or so eager grandmothers, and cooperating with a couple of TV reporters asking silly questions like, “How long have they been doing this?,” the latest Mr. Irrelevant freed himself up for Stevenson and Harris.

First, Vobora assured them about the Rams future, even when he didn’t even know his own. Not every Mr. Irrelevant makes it in the NFL. Just because you’re in the latest Madden video game doesn’t guarantee anything.

“I’ll tell you,” said Vobora, wearing a No. 252 jersey, reflecting where he was chosen in the draft — dead last, “this is going to be a good year for the Rams. You know the last time [quarterback] Trent Green came to the Rams, they won the Super Bowl [in 1999]?”

“Yeah, because he got injured,” responded Harris as Vobora grinned.

“If Trent Green goes down in the preseason, he’ll be measuring you for rings, baby!” said Stevenson as Vobora’s smile grew bigger.

The closest Vobora will get to such a prize is the over-sized key given to him to by the city of Newport Beach at the beginning of the arrival party.

Someone joked that the key looked more like a key to the local ARCO bathroom. Vobora kept it anyway and sported it around his neck like some clock on Flavor Flav.

The timing couldn’t have been better after hearing he was heading to Disneyland — which he did Tuesday — and to the Playboy Mansion on Friday. Christmas really came early for Vobora. Anything you can imagine — from used golf balls to a dozen combs — song girls from Los Alamitos High brought to Vobora, sitting on a lifeguard tower.

“An Arena Football [League] shirt,” Paul Salata, the founder of Irrelevant Week, announced the latest gag gift. “In case you don’t make the [NFL], you put this on.”

Vobora put the shirt to the side, believing a family member from Oregon would make better use of it.

The experts say Vobora has a chance to join the Rams, who are low on the depth chart at linebacker. His grandmothers, Lu Vobora and Toni Putney, think he’s a lock.

Lu came to the party in style. The 75-year-old wore a poncho, with the Rams logo and colors — blue and gold — and Vobora’s name on the back.

“I happened to be on a Panama cruise [recently],” she said. “The tour guide that I was with had gone into one of the countries in [Latin] America and he saw this [poncho] and he knew [Vobora] was Mr. Irrelevant. So he bought this for me.

“When I came home [to Medford, Ore.], I had [Vobora] embroidered on the back.”

Putney, in a more casual look, said Lu outdid everyone with the poncho. Their grandson did as well the day before the arrival party.

Vobora rode in an orange Lamborghini and drove it.

“As long as I don’t get in trouble, I’ll tell you it was 130 in the third gear,” Vobora said of how fast he drove. “And the guy who owned the car said, ‘You need to hammer it. You’re a linebacker, why don’t you hit it harder?’ ”

Maybe if Vobora had, Mr. Irrelevant would’ve been locked up in jail, making him a no-show to his own party.

DAVID CARRILLO PEÑALOZA may be reached at (714) 966-4612 or at david.carillo@latimes.com.