Carson Palmer, FTW

I found out from Dan via text message about an hour ago. Yes, we're all excited here. Ray Ratto has an interesting first take on the trade:

But what it absolutely means is this: Hue Jackson is now the general manager of the Oakland Raiders, the living modern-day embodiment of the man who hired him. He went from offensive coordinator to head coach to the master of the football operations department in nine months, a rise so meteoric that even Al in the afterlife must find that a bit breathtaking.

And then my favorite line:

Even Joseph Stalin cooled his heels for two years before throwing his elbows around.

We'll have more reactions as they come in. But I'll tell you what, Al loved players from USC, and he loved Heisman Trophy winners. It's on.

Where is Al?

Nice work by Dan rounding up the coaching news. One thing caught my eye in a post by Jerry Mac last night, "Gilbride says 'conversation' was an interview":

“I had a very enjoyable conversation with Mr. Davis. I’m very flattered he took the time to speak from … I believe he’s still in the hospital. To be honest with you, I know I got the interview because of the success we’ve had as a football team, in particular the players and coaches on the offensive side.

“I think it would be disrespectful for me to go into anything besides what matters so much to these players and these coaches in this particular game. But I think I certainly appreciate the job that players and coaches have done.” (emphasis added)

Tim Kawakami wrote a blog item Monday speculating on Al Davis' health, but Gilbride's comment is the first reference I've heard to this by someone who is not a local sportswriter.

Please do Not Stand Too Close to Dan

As he may decide to suicide bomb the Hall of Fame after Lester Hayes (and Kenny Stabler and Ray Guy, but it's Lester that has pushed Dan over the edge) did not make the cut in the voting. Again.

But Shannon Sharpe?

I just threw up in my mouth

Live Blogging from San Carlos

I'm at Dan's, and Kristy has some awesome breakfast burritos going, while Dan tries to figure out how to make Bloody Marys based on his engineer buddy's intensely detailed specifications.

So far, the Raiders look good on Defense, even without Nmamdi. The Offense isn't looking as hot.

Al's not there, but Lance just might be.

Right now, the Raiders are threatening.

Pre-Game Thoughts: Do I Even Care?

I'm not sure that I do, but we have a blog that needs to be updated, so let's give it a shot.

JaMarcus is not playing today. Andrew Walter is. Jerry Mac goes through a scenario in which Walter plays well, the Raiders win, and are then left to decide what happens next week in Miami with a (presumably) healthy JaMarcus. It's not pretty.

Nothing against Andrew Walter, but seeing him get killed, week after week, during the Art Shell regime, made me excited for the Raiders to draft JaMarcus in the first place.

I exchanged text messages with Dan, who is in Denver, and he asked, "If Walter plays, is that a good thing?" Honestly, I don't know. I guess we still have a shot at the playoffs, since every other team in our division sucks almost as much as we do. But for sure, the "JaMarcus is a bust" talk will accelerate. Even worse, the thoughtful birthday present my brother got me will land me on the front page of straightcashhomey.net.

One other thing. I was running to the store to get some beers for the game, which I will be watching incrementally on The Red Zone Channel. I was listening to Greg Papa and Tom Flores discussing the release of DeAngelo Hall, when Papa said, "One thing that people may not know about the Raiders, that we see every day on the inside, is that if you don't play well, you will not be here very long." That's a paraphrase.

Anyway, all I could think when I heard that was, really, Greg?

Really?

Sorry Dan, for bringing those guys up. Enjoy your trip.

Don't Call it a Comeback: John's Picks

Now that my colon is no longer a semi-colon, I'm coming back to rock the picks. We haven't tallied up a score in a while, and I think dobolina is off being a new dad or something, so it will just be me vs. Dan vs. Sllaacs. We'll get a new score after this weekend.

Okay, party people.

So. The Tom Cable Era begins. Yes, the press conferences may be bland. I don't give a good Gosh Darn It, as long as the product on the field isn't dull. Or shit, go ahead and be dull, just win a goddam football game, okay? I think the Saints are a better team, and should win the game at home in the dome. But it's also a homecoming of sorts for JaMarcus, who dominated in his last appearance there, in 2007 Sugar Bowl. So, the Aints win, 27-24.

Rush Limbaugh's favorite quarterback also happens to be my fantasy QB. I didn't pick him out of a "social concern," in fact the auto-draft did it for me. I was quite happy with him for the first three weeks of the season. Now, he promises to bring it. And since Chris Dennebaum--the biggest Philly Phanatic I know--is getting married this Sunday, I think the Iggles join the rest of the Philly sports renaissance going on right now. JTO may throw for 300 and 3 TDs, but so does Donovan. 35-28 Eagles.

Seattle sucks. I mean, they really, really suck. They Art Shell Suck. They suck so bad, Walt Coleman's mother called up Paul Allen and asked if she could audit some team meetings and improve her deep throat technique. I mean, they're not as bad as the Lions or the Rams, but they still suck. Green Bay 37-6.

In a rematch of last year's AFC Championship game, I think the Patriots will beat the Chargers. They're not that great. They almost lost to us. The Chargers don't look like they can score points to me. So there. 18-14 San Diego.

Who the Fuck is Randy Hanson? Also, John's Picks.

Good job by Dan and Sllaacs keeping up the blog while I've been out of action. I think all of the stupidity of the last week made me sick.

Anyway, so just what the Raiders the morning of a game with a division rival: More controversy. Some guy named Randy Hanson was suspended by Lance after the Monday Night Debacle of September 8 after he was overheard saying, "It's a good thing that Shanahan didn't have our players, or else he would have beaten us 1,000-0."

So now he's the latest assistant coach to come out and call Lance a liar, and what with all the injuries, I'll be shocked if we keep the game within 30 points today. The only inflection we're likely to see or hear is in Al's voice when he speaks to the media this week, if he was telling Corkran the truth. on thisAt least that will be interesting. Chargers win, 42-10.

Jerry has more on this, saying that Kiffin's big mistake was in not talking to Al before trying to fire Rob, etc, which is the same shit Shanny did 20 years ago when he tried to purge his staff of Art Shell and Tom Walsh. We all know how that ended up.

Again, I'm not saying Kiffin is the 2nd coming of Bill Walsh. He's clearly not. He's also probably a hypocrite, as Peterson argues so persuasively. But anyone who thinks he's the only, or even the main problem, is in denial. Deep, crushing, unhealthy denial.

The 49ers are playing pretty good football. It could be a shoot out in the dome. I like the 9ers, actually, 31-28.

I like Tampa over the Packers, in a squeaker, 17-14. Maybe even OT. Raiders fans will watch, wistfully, remembering what it was like to have a well-coached football team.

Jets-Cardinals. Maybe there's something to this trade speculation of Jerry's. I would trade every receiver who is not a rookie, and next years (likely Top-5) for Anquan Boldin. Do it NBA-style, so the cap numbers match. But that's just me. I'm weird, I want JaMarcus to be successful.

Oh. Cardinals win after they return 3 Favre INTs for six. I'd a double-bagged.

What About Those Timeouts?

Dan's favorite broadcaster and Chester McGlockton (wearing Craig Sager's tie) were discussing why Kiffin didn't use one of the 2 timeouts he had before that last field goal.

And it's a good question, although not necessarily for the reasons they were talking about.

I thought at the very least he could have tried to pull a Shanahan.

Maybe Lance really has given up.

Per Dan: The Bridge is Over.

Dan Emails from Texas

Dan is going to a lake, and promises to post later. In the comments to my Hater of the Week post, he linked to Vic Carucci's column on the Kiffin-Davis relationship as it continues to evolve. It's the opposite of Gwen Knapp's column from yesterday, which I would't use to line my cat box.

The Inaugural CLOAK OF IMMORTALITY Nancy Gay Memorial Hater of the Week Award

I was reading The Sporting Green in the Chronicle this morning while riding BART. Ray Ratto had a clever column asking Roger Goodell to step in and help fix our two struggling Bay Area teams by combining them. Then I got to Dan's Favorite Football Writer's column on the elite teams of the NFL. It was informative; I learned a lot of new things about what's going on around the league. Who knew that Vince Young needed to be defended by his coach? I didn't get that info from ESPN.

Then, in her last item, she took an incredibly cheap shot:

-- Interesting e-mail of the week: I posed this question last weekend to an NFL general manager - why has Steelers rookie coach Mike Tomlin, 35, shown himself to be a more confident, commanding, respected leader than Raiders coach Lane Kiffin, 32?

Talent aside (particularly at the quarterback position), the GM summed up the difference in a surprisingly succinct way: "Because Mike Tomlin was prepared for the Steelers' job and Lane Kiffin was given the Raiders' job."

This general manager has a point. Tomlin had been the Buccaneers' defensive backs coach from 2001 through '05 and the Vikings' defensive coordinator in '06. He had NFL credibility that his players instantly respected.

Kiffin had been USC's offensive coordinator and shared play-calling duties with Trojans assistant head coach Steve Sarkisian - Al Davis' first choice for the job - in 2005-'06. Before that, he was a position coach on offense at Fresno State, Colorado State and USC, where he also had recruiting coordinator responsibilities.

In retrospect, Kiffin's greatest selling point to the beaten-down Raiders' players was that he wasn't Art Shell.

Really? Which GM did she ask? Isiah Thomas?

Talent aside?

Talent aside?

One more time:

TALENT ASIDE?!

Has anyone ever heard the phrase "Making chicken salad out of chicken shit?" Because what Lane Kiffin's been asked to do in the job he's been "given" is make chicken salad out of bat guano.

The Steelers are a team a year removed from winning the SUPER BOWL. The only key contributor not still on that team is locker room-cancer Joey Porter.

The Raiders haven't won more than 5 games in 5 years now. The only player on the team who played there when the Raiders were good is Barry "False Start" Simms.

So how could talent just be pushed aside when asking that question? I'm not saying Lane Kiffin is a better coach than Omar Epps or anything like that. I'm just saying that Vince Lombardi couldn't win more than 6 games with this Raiders team as currently constructed. Hell, Al Davis circa 1963 couldn't win more than 6 games with this team.

Give the kid a break. He's got Mono. He's trying to rebuild not just a team's talent but an entire culture of losing that goes back at least five years. He was "given" the job because Nobody Else Would Touch it with a Ten Foot Pole. At least nobody whose previous job wasn't turning down sheets in a bed and breakfast.

So congratulations, Nancy. The CLOAK OF IMMORTALITY is naming a new award in your honor:

The CLOAK OF IMMORTALITY Nancy Gay Memorial Hater of the Week Award.

This weeks winner of the inaugural CLOAK OF IMMORTALITY Nancy Gay Hater of the Week Award is:

Nancy Gay

Congratulations, Nancy. You've just been named the winner of the CLOAK OF IMMORTALITY Nancy Gay Memorial Hater of the Week Award. Prizes include scorn heaped upon your head by the members of the Raider Nation, Al Davis never ever saying at your funeral, "Time never stops for the great ones, we give them the CLOAK OF IMMORTALITY," and the wishes of hundreds that you get a parking ticket.

At Least Somebody's a Winner This Week

My fantasy football team, Bubba Malaysia, destroyed Dan's team (Ain't Skeered) by a score of 120.22-109.56. Yes, my fantasy team takes its name from what happens when you plug "John Sousa" into the Ron Mexico Name Generator. It's my ultimate disguise, in case I ever need treatment for Herpes and don't want the Professor to find out.

Bubba Malaysia, which was 2-23 at the same time the Raiders were, has now won 5 straight games and is the hottest team in the Yale Wives Club league (so named because the founders all had wives who went to Yale), thanks to Adrian Peterson's rookie dominance and switching from Carson Palmer to Ben Roethlisberger 4 games ago.

Now I'm facing the ultimate real team/fantasy team conundrum: do I hope Peterson is too hurt to play next week against the Raiders, because he's their only legitimate offensive threat (apparently that's one more than the Raiders possess), or do I hope he gets better because he is certain to gash the Raiders pourous run defense?

Anybody have any answers?

1st Quarter: 3-0

McCown seems different this week. He seems more relaxed, more confident. The crowd isn't murdering him, so maybe that helps. That sweet fake hand-off to open the game where he busted off a big run was a good call. And so far Devin Hester hasn't done anything.

Like Dan, I'm optimistic.