David White of the San Francisco Chronicle reports that a team administrator handed out copies of Mark Kreidler’s recent ESPN article.
Wow! This is getting ugly. Kiffin is gone very soon in my estimation.
Not to mention McFadden is wearing a boot and Fargas may miss significant time with a groin injury.
Maybe I’m going out on a limb here, but I don’t think Lane Kiffin is the saint many people in the Raider Nation think he is.
Lane Kiffin hasn’t really been a company guy. In any other profession he would have been fired some time ago. It’s not like 5-13 performance is enough to justify keeping a non-company guy around. I don’t think many unbiased outsiders can admit Lane Kiffin’s behavior is justified, even considering the circumstances. We haven’t seen a coach do what Kiffin has and its my belief if Davis gets enough evidence against Kiffin to not pay him, we will have another Shannahan situation, only Kiffin wont come back to haunt us.
Its hard to argue that we haven’t been better since the arrival of Kiffin, but really could we have gotten the same result without the public criticism by the coach? Recently, Kiffin has refused to call Al Davis by his name instead calling him, “the Owner.” Similarly, which I am unsure anyone has caught, is his refusal to call JaMarcus Russell by his name, instead deciding to call him, “The Quarterback.”
Kiffin’s behavior is somewhat childish. I don’t think his behavior is justified, even if Al Davis is an old quack. Did we forget Al Davis got us to a Super Bowl in 2002? Only eight teams have been to a Super Bowl since the last time we were there. That means 24 other teams are in a bigger drought than we are.
We have been bad, but we shouldn’t forget that Al Davis has done a lot more for the Raiders than Lane Kiffin has. It is also Al Davis’ team. I would be pretty pissed off if someone told me how to manage something I own and have been controlling for 45 years.
Do I agree with Al Davis’ way of doing things? Well no, not always, but who am I to tell him what to do? As a fan, I care about winning and losing, and when it comes to that, Al Davis knows more than Lane Kiffin.
Keep in mind, Lane Kiffin was a nobody before Davis hired him. He wouldn’t have gotten his shot without Al Davis. Heck, USC didn’t even throw him a going away party. He was often criticized for being too conservative.
Its Davis’ team, if you don’t agree with what Davis does, stop watching, stop buying tickets and merchandise and stop whining. You don’t have to follow him over the cliff if you don’t want to. You choose to follow the team and if you do follow them, do you trust Davis or a 5-13 Head Coach to lead you to the promised land?
Maybe Kiffin is the best coach we’ve had since Gruden, but that isn’t saying much. Gruden isn’t all that hot either, he won a Super Bowl with Dungy’s team and hasn’t done jack since.
Kiffin isn’t hardly involved in personnel, yet we give him so much credit. The credit for our turn around has everything to do with Tom Cable and Rathman, who deserve most the credit in coaching. The only improvement we have really made was running the ball and to small extent protecting the QB. That is really the only thing Kiffin has done since he came here.
I’d like to see Kiffin stay, if he can grow up. I do think he is a decent coach, but more importantly he has surrounded himself with the right people. Knapp, Cable, Rathman. Although Rathman is a Davis favorite along the lines of James Lofton.
If the relationship is broken, its not likely to be repaired in time to recover and win. The players have been spouting Kiffin’s “Control what we can control” and that leads me to believe Kiffin has perpetuated the response to any question about his job. I wonder just how much respect he actually has in the locker room, knowing Kiffin is all about himself.
Apparently, Adam Treu agrees with a lot of what I have to say. He would know.
Kiffin is whining and acting like a baby about not getting his way. Ironically, Kiffin tells his players not to whine about calls to refs, so that way they get calls later down the line. Control what you can control. Maybe he should take his own advice and control his mouth.
Some of you may have heard the Sports 1140 interview with Tim Brown live from Fred Biletnikoff’s Charity Golf Tournament. Freddie B was interviewed as well and even JT the Brick stopped by to chat. Also, I believe there was a Steve Wisnewski sighting off air.
Tim Brown seems to think that Russell is still two years away from being fully developed and that he could struggle this year. That said, Tim Brown said that when he played he did things to help his developing or weak QBs (Lord he knows better than anyone). IF his QB didn’t throw a certain pass well he ran routes that played to their strengths, etc.
Let us pray that Javon Walker and Drew Carter have that kind of attitude. Tim Brown is a class act, we can only hope any of the players we have are half as classy as Tim Brown.
Mini-Camp starts tomorrow, check back for all the late breaking Raiders detail and analysis.
Notes:
Odell Thurman isn’t really the type of guy the Raiders or Kiffin wants on the team. Good talent, but just not worth the trouble.
Lamont Jordan should have been cut already, if he shows up to camp, the Raiders have a malcontent hanging around our young RB core. That has got to end. Jordan should be gone by tomorrow…will he…anyone can guess.
Travis Henry got cut…and half of the single promiscuous women in Denver cried and promptly put their Prada bags on eBay for some extra cash.
June 3-5.
We get three days to see a preview of how the team might look. So what can we expect from a mandatory mini-camp?
1. Will Burgess show up? Yes, he isn’t the type of guy who will hold-out. He is unhappy and I suspect he might want to leave when his contract is up, but he isn’t going to be a malcontent.
2. Will Nnamdi sign his tender and show up? No, Nnamdi loses his contract negotiation power if he does. The Raiders REALLY need to sign this guy long term.
3. How will the RB rotation look? I’d suspect they go even carries across the board.
4. Which WR(s) will Russell develop chemistry with? Word was Drew Carter was so far. You’d think Curry has the edge, but in my mind Curry needs to get his act together or he is going to find himself as the #3 WR or worse.
5. Who might be in line to return kicks? JLH, Arman Shields, Tyvon Branch, etc We went from having hardly anyone who could do it to having a team full of them, some might be more prospects, but I’d think we can find a productive returner this year.
News and Notes:
Kiffin a dead-man walking….hardly. I think he realized he needed to be himself and not try to be a Jon Gruden. His enthusiasm seemed a bit on the forced side as Jerry McDonald observed, and I’d have to agree, it seems almost goofy. If anyone saw the locker room video after the first win you’ll see what I am talking about. He just appeared to be too enthusiastic to the point of fakeness. His players hardly responded and any good leader might change his coaching methods. Everything is in the past now. Only a horrible start could cost Kiffin his job.
Well, Kiffin finally broke his silence and it is just about what I thought it was. Kiffin had a rough offseason because Davis decided he was going to make the moves he wanted to make, with less of Kiffin’s input. The two obviously wouldn’t see eye to eye on everything, that is to be expected, and Davis obviously let Kiffin get some guys he wanted and Davis obviously got some guys Kiffin didn’t feel was a big need.
Ryan was ready to make a move for Kiffin to get his own guy. Ryan was ready to leave and Kiffin agreed, Davis put a stop to it. That was Al Davis overruling Ryan and Kiffin. So much for Davis siding with Rob all the time. It was more Davis liking Rob’s style and not knowing if the next defensive guy would go with the man-to-man scheme.
McFadden is not a need according to Kiffin and he says we could trade down. That is Kiffin’s opinion, as Al Davis doesn’t trade down in the first round, baby. Still, you have to put some stock into your head coach not thinking McFadden is a need. It could be a decoy, but Kiffin is pretty straight forward kinda guy.
Kiffin talked about defensive lineman with the 4th pick…interesting considering Dorsey and Ellis both play the same position as Kelly. Unless this is a decoy, Kiffin is talking about Gholston, he has to know Chris Long wont be there.
HMMMMM and Kiffin doesn’t expect the draft to be any different from last year in terms of how much say he gets.
If Gholston is there, I now officially think we will pick him regardless of whether McFadden is on the board.
If Gholston is not there, we will try to trade down and if we can’t we might take McFadden with that pick.
It has nothing to do with my personal liking of McFadden and more to do with our team and the actions they have been taking.
This is big news as well, because now we know Kiffin will be back, and like I’ve said on numerous occasions, his pride is hurt, but he still wants ot coach.
Podcast coming tomorrow!