Rick Reilly, all-time great chickenshit

This is old, I know. But I work, and there's a baby in the house and I've also been a little busy worrying about who will back up Kyle Boller now that Jason Campbell's collar bone is broken.

But thank Christ for Rick Reilly, who took it upon himself last week to reflect HONESTLY on the legacy of Al Davis.

You know how I know how I know Reilly's column is lazy? Because he quotes 8 outside sources in his column and links to zero of them. That's this many:



You get the idea. Anyway, he sets up a straw man, the idea that everyone who has written an obit about Davis glossed over the darker areas.

As you pass the casket at Maori funerals in New Zealand, you are encouraged to speak frankly to the dead man, sometimes even mentioning his faults, right out loud.

With all due respect to his life and legacy, I think we need a funeral like that for recently departed Oakland Raiders owner Al Davis -- a man I covered since I was 25.

It's white of him to educate us about the religious practices of the Maori. Since he doesn't link to where he got this information, I googled "Maori funeral rites and got this from wikipedia:

• Tangihanga or funeral rites may take two or three days. The deceased lies in state, usually in an open coffin flanked by female relatives dressed in black, their heads sometimes wreathed in kawakawa leaves, who take few and short breaks. During the day, visitors come, sometimes from great distances despite only a distant relationship, to address the deceased. They may speak frankly of his or her faults as well as virtues, but singing and joking are also appropriate. Free expression of grief by both men and women is encouraged. Traditional beliefs may be invoked, and the deceased told to return to the ancestral homeland, Hawaiki, by way of te rerenga wairua, the spirits' journey. The close kin or kiri mate ("dead skin") may not speak. On the last night, the pō whakamutunga (night of ending), the mourners hold a vigil and at sunrise the coffin is closed, before a church or marae funeral service and/or graveside interment ceremony, invariably Christian. It is traditional for mourners to wash their hands in water and sprinkle some on their heads before leaving a cemetery. After the burial rites are completed, a feast is traditionally served. Mourners are expected to provide koha or gifts towards the meal. After the burial, the home of the deceased and the place they died are ritually cleansed with karakia (prayers or incantations) and desanctified with food and drink, in a ceremony called takahi whare, trampling the house. That night, the pō whakangahau (night of entertainment) is a night of relaxation and rest. The widow or widower is not left alone for several nights following.
• During the following year, the kinfolk of a prominent deceased person will visit other marae, "bringing the death" (kawe mate) to them. They carry pictures of the person on to the marae.
• Unveilings of headstones (hura kōwhatu) are usually held about a year after a death, often on a public holiday to accommodate visitors who could not get to the tangihanga. The dead are remembered and more grief expressed.

Notice he left out the parts about the graveside internment ceremony (invariably Christian, totally appropriate for a recently-deceased Jew like Al Davis). This is instructive, because he spends the rest of the column destroying his straw man with Honesty by cherry-picking quotes from obituaries. Let's take a look at just one of those, "Raiders' Al Davis, sport's ultimate bad guy, will be missed" a 9-year old pre-Superbowl column by Bill Plaschke (thanks again, google). 

Actually, take a minute or two and read the whole column. It's a good lesson in how to write a balanced, nuanced take on a complicated man's life. Anyway, his column alternates something good with something not-so-good. Let's take a look at the passage Reilly quotes:

It would be wonderful if today could be a tribute to the brains behind the AFL-NFL merger, the curator of the downfield passing game, the first football executive to hire both a Latino and an African American head coach, the only owner whose successor probably will be a woman.

Notice first what he left off all the non-bolded text. But anyway, the next sentence:

But it's hard to hand over your heart to a guy who used to make his equipment man fall to his knees and clean his shoes when he entered the locker room.

Wait, that sounds familiar. Where have I read that before? Oh, unattributed, in Rick Reilly's HONEST Maori eulogy.

Yet after practices, Davis would routinely throw a towel down on the locker room floor and wait for somebody to clean his shoes. No please, no thank you. Just do it, baby. And grown men would.

Looking at Plashcke's obituary now, I'd like to quote at length another passage.

In the end, this intimidation changed a league, broke down barriers and created a unique sports culture, a group simply known as Raider Fan. This is a name given to any of thousands of spectators — many from Los Angeles — who embrace the sort of havoc in the stands that Davis' team attempts on the field.

What will happen to Raider Fan now? What if Davis' heirs sell the team to someone who will attempt to move them back to Los Angeles' new NFL stadium?

For that to happen, the team must first change the silver and black colors that are so popular among gang members. And second, well, they might as well change the name.

Contrast this with Reilly's Maori Funeral Address.

Yes, Al Davis "was what all Raiders fans identified with" (SBNation.com).

And the rest of the league has had to live with them ever since. A Raiders jersey or jacket became gang uniform in Oakland and L.A. "The Black Hole" at Oakland games is about as disgusting a place as you can find. YouTube is lousy with guys in Raiders jerseys throwing haymakers. Now, there's talk that Davis' oldest son, Mark, may sell the Raiders to Philip Anschutz, who would move the team to Los Angeles. After what happened at Dodgers Stadium this year, you want to bring a thug element that would make Dodgers fans look like Our Gang? Better barricade I-5.

I'm not even going to address the racial coding of "gang uniform" and "thug element." It's too easy and once you bring it up, people get all defensive, because no white person anywhere in the United States is ever racist. And never mind that youtube is also lousy with Eagles fans and Broncos fans and Jets fans throwing haymakers at people. So let's just look at the Plaschke quote next to the Reilly quote and draw our own conclusions.

Oh fuck it. I'd accuse Reilly of plagiarism but I honestly don't think he's smart enough to plagiarize. What he is is Lazy. And chickenshit. He could have written a column where he just flat-out called Al Davis an asshole. Like Jeremy Stahl in Slate's "Al Davis, all-time great asshole."

But Reilly doesn't have the balls. So he plays anthropologist, and libels a bunch fans, and takes cheap shots.

Flores on Al

What Tom Flores had to say about Al's passing is about exactly what I felt when I heard the news this morning:

"The fact that he passed was not surprising but the fact that he passed was shocking."

The rest of his comments are here.

We are losers again

Two days after his team wrapped up its most successful season since 2002 - and by far the most gratifying for fans - Al Davis decided to fire coach Tom Cable. Couldn't stand the faint whiff of success? Angry that the Team of the Decades couldn't extend its NFL record 11-loss streak into this decade? Miffed that he never put out a press release about how great Jacoby Ford will be? Still irked that he slept through the first day of the draft this year?

More plausible, but still crazy, was that he couldn't risk the chance that the 49ers would one-up him by stealing his prized Hue Jackson. And of course "a source" even says that Cable's post-game comment, "We're not losers anymore" apparently did not go over well with Al Davis. The implication being that this somehow contributed to the decision.

Perhaps Hue Jackson will get the job and everything will go swimmingly next year. History doesn't favor that outcome, but we can hope. In the meantime, the first positive vibes in many years are gone. Here's some player reaction, courtesy of Jerry:

Shane Lechler: After stating that Gallery and Bush will be gone in free agency, "It's going to be a huge setback...It's hard to understand why the decision was made...we finally felt like we were headed in the right way, and the owner goes and pulls the (plug)."

Robert Gallery: "I think this is going to hit 99 percent of the locker room really hard because people respected how he dealt with us and where we were headed. It's definitely a step back from what we've done going forward the last year or two."

And the fans lose again.

Al Davis taken to the Hospital

I just got a Skype message from a friend in Oakland who has a friend who works at a cardiologist's office across the street from Summit Hospital that Al Davis pulled up in a limo in the VIP lot. He was taken into the ER by his own cardiologist.

We'll keep you posted if we hear anything else.

How NOT to capitalize on the good feelings after a 3-game winning streak

So here come the Raiders, hottest team in the league, winners of three straight. Sunday's game was exhilarating to be sure. But after 7 years, Raiders fans are like abused spouses, always looking away, unsure and untrusting, wondering if this time, the counseling and AA will finally work, or if something will snap and we're back to the screaming and the beating and the misery.

How little we trust this team can be illustrated by this text message transcript from Sunday, as Dan and I watched the game on opposite coasts.

All times Eastern:

Nov 7, 2010 7:15 PM (after the "fumbled" punt by Nick Miller)

John: What the fuck just happened?

Dan: The NFL is a joke. Rigged.

Dan: These Refs should not get a game check this week.

Dan: God Campbell sucks.

John: Why is it always us?

Dan: I turned it off. Refs obviously preordained this one.

John: Seymour made a huge play.

Nov 7, 2010 7:49 PM

John: Ford!

John: OT!!!

Dan: Waiting to see how they will take this away. My nerves are shot.

John: LOL

John: Ford

Nov 7, 2010 8:01 PM

Dan: Can we declare them for real? I need an anxiety pill.

We all needed an anxiety pill. Even Monday and Tuesday, in the afterglow of the biggest win since the AFC Championship Game against Tennessee in 2002, with fawning national coverage, I kept waiting for something stupid to happen.

And today, it finally did. Via Jerry comes this article by Steve Corkran.

The question is not why would Al Davis want Jason Campbell to stay the starting quarterback. That's not an indefensible position. He's won three in a row, and overcame an awful first half to win the game Sunday. What I don't understand is why the fuck would Al send his simpering underlings to anonymously insist that Al Davis wants Campbell to start.

Is Al not getting enough credit? Jesus Christ, even Mel Kiper (paid access only) wrote, "But Davis perhaps didn't get enough credit." He then goes on to give Davis credit for drafting good players and hiring Hue Jackson.

This would make sense if we were in the middle of another losing season. But we're not. The Raiders are a national feel-good story. They just had a sellout game, where the crowd played a huge role in the victory, causing false starts and delay-of-game penalties.

And this is how they're rewarded, with "sources inside and outside the organization" saying, "Mr. Davis likes what Jason has done the past month and doesn't see the need to change when things are going well" and "He thinks Jason is a classic fit for the Raiders style of play."

Again with the classic style of play. If "Just Win, Baby" means anything at all, Al will his coaches and his players play, grow some self confidence, and shut the fuck up.

This why suck, Part 789

Jerry Mac, writing about why the Raiders didn't draft Larry Fitzgerald:

At the time, the Raiders felt pretty good about their receiving corps of Jerry Porter, Ronald Curry and Doug Gabriel. The following year, they would bring in Randy Moss.

Since that 2005 season, Fitzgerald has more receptions than any receivcer in the NFL (475) for 6,413 yards and 52 touchdowns. The Raiders recieving leaders during that span _ Jerry Porter, Ronald Curry (in 2006 and 2007), Johnnie Lee Higgins and Louis Murphy, combined for 249 receptions, 3,273 yards and 18 touchdowns.

But while Fitzgerald was available and brought in for a visit, it was purely for show. They never considered drafting him because he didn’t have a fast enough time in the 40-yard dash. Davis’ favorite receiver, I’ve been told by was Roy Williams out of Texas. (emphasis added)

Yes, this Roy Williams. I will now mix a qualuude-and-drano cocktail.

Gradkowski!

So Bruce Almighty is the starter, and there are a couple of competing views by the ANG newsguys.

Writing of Hue Jackson's comment that it was his idea put Bruce in on Sunday, Cam Inman says Jackson is undermining Cable's authority, and it's only a matter of time before he replaces Cable as head coach.

Jerry Mac has a different take. He writes that Cable, in naming Bruce the starter, is showing being decisive, and notices his lack of lip-service to Al Davis in the decision.

Jerry writes:

Seems like a major shift that Cable isn’t giving the owner his due on an important decision, or offering up a glowing endorsement of their conversations. What makes this more interesting is that Jackson, Davis’ hand-picked offensive coordinator, said he was the one who suggested the quarterback switch in the first place.

Jackson, of course, mentioned "Coach Davis" when he discussed the decision to bench Campbell in favor of Gradkowski.

So what's going on? Is Jackson undermining Cable? Or is he providing cover for the decision? Al is on record as saying Campbell reminds him of Jim Plunkett. If Jackson is Davis' hand-picked guy, maybe it makes sense for Cable to have him take credit for the decision, since he has a latitude that Cable might not necessarily have.

It seems to me that Jackson can't really undermine Cable's authority, since everyone knows Raiders head coaches don't really have any authority to undermine. All Jackson said is that it was his idea; Cable made the ultimate decision. It seems like they're playing good cop/bad cop with Davis.

It makes sense that if the Raiders start losing, Cable gets fired. He should be. But if they start winning, who knows what will happen. Al is weird enough to do anything.

Am I the only person who thought of Al Davis when I read this?

I've compared Al, in his later career (especially since 2002) to Simon Bolivar in Gabriel Garcia Marquez's The General in his Labyrinth. Twice, actually.

So maybe it's not a surprise that as I was reading Jeffrey Goldberg's interview with Fidel Castro that I thought about Al again.

Mainly it was this passage:

A frail and aged Fidel stood to greet us. He was wearing a red shirt, sweatpants, and black New Balance sneakers. The room was crowded with officials and family: His wife, Dalia, and son Antonio, as well as an Interior Ministry general, a translator, a doctor and several bodyguards, all of whom appeared to have been recruited from the Cuban national wrestling team. Two of these bodyguards held Castro at the elbow.

Lowell Cohn, who wrote over the weekend about Al lashing out at Adam Schefter for connecting the Raiders with Matt Leinert--and who writes better about Al Davis than anyone--wrote this after the infamous overhead projector press conference:

And when the whole shebang was over and the reporters left, Davis sat at the table on the stage and didn’t leave, didn’t leave until every reporter had departed. I know why. I think I do. He has trouble walking, says it’s nothing serious, just a bum quad. Maybe. I believe he wanted everyone out so we would not see him depart — either struggle to his feet or be wheeled out.

The parallels between the two men are fascinating--and yes, obviously one is a dictator and one owns a football team, so let's not insult each other's intelligence and get that out of the way up front. But these men are or were giants in their fields, now aging, struggling to hold onto their power, and, I don't know, make one last splash before they check out. They came to power at roughly the same time; they both were thorns in the sides of their bigger, more powerful neighbors who never gave up, always stayed defiant, and now seem to be caring about their legacies and not quite knowing how to manage it.

I Want to Believe

Monte Poole called last weekend the Raiders' "finest weekend since their AFC championship victory over Tennessee on Jan. 19, 2003." It sure felt that way around here. No games were played. No touchdowns were scored. But the feeling of success was unmistakable.

Years ago, this blog began as an outlet for our love for the Raiders, always prepared to look on the bright side when the poor organizational moves offered scant brightness to find. Unfortunately, the CLOAK has turned intensely critical as all hope has been lost.

But I want to believe. I really do. And this draft has me thinking, "Maybe, just maybe..." But one celestial body is using his epic girth to blot out the emergence of a bright side in Alameda. Does JaMarcus wear a CLOAK OF IMMORTALITY, never to be purged from the roster?

Ironically, Al's desire to believe is the only thing that might crush mine. According to John Clayton (not really "news" but he has the reach...kinda like TMZ I guess), once Al Davis gives the final word, JaMarcus will hit the streets. On Sunday, Gwen Knapp detailed the risk for all Raider fans if Al does not make a clean break. He wants to believe.

Al, please let me be the bigger fool.

Al Arrives for Saturday Draft

After the rather sensible First Round pick of Rolando McClain, and subsequent need+value picks Lamarr Houston and Jared Veldheer, speculation centered around whether Al had been led to believe that this year's draft would start on Saturday as in years past. Many of us had images of an angry Al Davis banging on a locked door with his cane as Bruce Campbell was passed up at pick #8.

Apparently Al has arrived for Saturday. Here are the Raiders' first three picks of the day:

Round 4, #106: Bruce Campbell, OT Maryland. The first Saturday pick is the one everyone thought Al would pick first.

Round 4, #108: Jacoby Ford, WR Clemson. The Raiders trade up aggressively - moving Captain Kirk - to get the fastest player in the draft, who ran a 4.28 at the combine.

Round 5, #138: Walter McFadden, CB Auburn. We just can't go a draft without picking a corner.

These three picks are classic Al. But it's almost like we got the first three picks for free this year. And with the possibility that JaMarcus's days are done, I'm beside myself with glee over this year's draft.

Nicely done, Al.

Crazy

Ok, I'm slightly relieved that this whole offseason of coach indecision could, in the end, just add an up-and-coming offensive coordinator and an apparently decent defensive line coach to the staff. But after shaking my head at this article a few times, two quotes bear repeating.

1. Hue Jackson: "It's a chance to go out and assist the head coach..." Not Tom Cable, the head coach.
2. Tom Cable: "I think it's a good decision by the organization." By the organization. Not the head coach. He's basically just observing as his (as of today) offensive coordinator is hired.

So here we sit undecided on Cable as head coach while the owner makes quite possibly the most important hiring on the coaching staff. Who does that?

And for another rhetorical question, did we really expect anything to change?

Our new offensive coordinator had this to say about his new job:

"The challenge with going to the Oakland Raiders and helping them become what they want to become is exciting. That's what you look for. I want to run to the challenge."

I wish you luck, Hue. The bottom line is that 2010 - like 2009 - will be highly dependent upon the development of JaMarcus Russell. As such, I haven't renewed contact with the Raiders ticket office just yet.

It's that time of the year

We're heading down the homestretch into the what is usually the most exciting part of the year for our beloved Oakland Raiders, the off season.

With that, several local writers attended a pretty interesting Tom Cable press conference yesterday, with most of them focusing on what he had to say about JaMarcus. It also sounds like Tom Cable is making the case for his job, and putting a lot of the blame on #2.

Gwen Knapp discusses the JaMarcus portion of the interview, goes through all the accusations of violence leveled against Cable, and then wonders at this exchange:

The most revealing moments came when Cable responded to questions about whether he'd received feedback from his boss. He either said he hadn't or simply shook his head. It all sounded and looked very familiar.

Lowell Cohn dwells on Cable's statements about JaMarcus, and says that Cable is calling into question JaMarcus' morality. Not that he's a degenerate or anything, at least off the field, but in football terms. This sentence stuck out:

As I understand it, the coach said the player has abundant talent but instead of nurturing the abundant talent, he has squandered it. This is a moral criticism. It means Russell has not been a right guy. It means he makes bad choices and he is defined by those choices — bust. The moral criticism is especially harsh when you remember the money Russell willingly took without giving effort in return. This is a devastating criticism and it doesn’t come from me. It comes from the player’s own coach.

Cam Inman cuts Russell some slack and calls out Richard Seymour, saying he's been a bust, too. So there's suckage all around, and I'm still pretty convinced that Al needs to go away and let somebody who cares about winning football games more than he cares about lawsuits and he-said, we-said BS. Happy New Year.

Welcome Back, Randy, JaMarcus

This was going to be a strictly Randy Hanson post, with the theme song to "Welcome Back, Kotter."



I thought it would be appropriate because it's a cool song from a cool show, and because Al is from Brooklyn.

Anyway, Jerry Mac does a breakdown/speculation of why in the name of anything Randy Hanson could possibly be back working for the Raiders, concluding, rather pithily and quite brutally, "You want a successful business model, check with Fortune 500." To make the implication explicit, The Raiders do not have a successful business model as Al Davis has currently constructed it.

But while I was out picking my daughter up from school, JaMarcus addressed the media, so we give him a nice welcome back, kinda sorta. He promises that when he gets back on the field, we'll see a "Totally different JaMarcus." But he hasn't lost any weight or changed his work ethic. So there. And he's keeping his money.

Kawakami has a transcript. God doesn't make mistakes, and time will tell, and it's not the end of the world.

Finally, since we opened with Brooklyn, we can close with Brooklyn, too. Lowell Cohn talks to Ira Miller, who invents the verb "to Raider." Getting Raidered sounds an awful lot like getting debacled. Ira likes Gradkowski, at least in relation to JaMarcus. This exchange stood out to me, after Miller says that "Getting the No. 1 draft choice off the field certainly helped them:

Cohn: Which No. 1 draft choice?

Miller: Both of them - the quarterback and Heyward-Bey. I don't think Heyward-Bey has any chance. He's one of Al's fantasies -- he runs fast.

That's kind of the impression I get about DHB, too. I got into a discussion via twitter yesterday with the author of Raiders Blog, who is still optimistic that DHB will pan out once he learns to catch the ball, because he's a good kid, works hard, etc. And I agree that sure, he's a good kid, etc, and I feel bad about suggesting he jump off the Golden Gate Bridge. That was a joke in poor taste. But the point is, DHB is not a football player. He's a track star. We may as well have drafted Usain Bolt. And anyone who suggests the Randy Hanson issue is overblown, or is not a big deal, or not a red flag indicator that something is deeply, deeply diseased and rotten within the structure of the Raiders organization is deep, deep denial. They're like the wives who stayed with Tom Cable after he beat them.

Because at the very least, we should be able to enjoy the sweet taste of a rare victory for longer than two days before reminding everyone in the stupidest way possible of the dysfunction that is the team we love.

Bronco Bill names Gradkowski AFC West Player of the Week

Congratulations to Bruce Almighty for being the AFC West player of the week over at Bill Williamson's AFC West blog. He really did play a great game. Yes, he got some lucky breaks, but you know what they say about luck being created by hard work. Or something. Some guy named Thomas Jefferson said it. I think he was one of Al Davis's fellow Founding Fathers.

Anyway, Jerry Mac counts down the top five wins since the wheels came off in 2003. Feel free to insert your "Well, that couldn't have been hard, since they've only won five games since 2003" joke here. The one that catches my attention is the 2004 game against Tampa Bay, in Chucky's return to the Coliseum, and the rematch of Super Bowl Debacle XXXVIII. The Raiders were 1-1 under Norv Turner, and if I remember correctly, Rich Gannon was lighting it up, narrowly losing to Pittsburgh in the opener. The game against Tampa was the last game he ever played, because he broke his neck on Derrick Brooks' hit. I always thought that if Rich keeps playing well, that season turns out differently, and maybe what Norv has going on down in San Diego is happening here. Anyway, if "'If' was a fifth," as Sllaacs likes to say, "we'd all be drunk."

Monte Poole's mystery buyers

Monte Poole has a great column up about the Message to Al Billboard that went up yesterday on 880.

What interests me is that there are people--Raiders fans!--who have a lot of money who would love to buy the Raiders. Local people, maybe?

More intriguingly, one multimillionaire sports figure who does not wish to be identified has several times over the past 18 months expressed an unwavering curiosity. A longtime fan of the team, he is displeased about its decline and, moreover, says he is in contact with one or more billionaires with a DEFINITE interest.

Oh my god. It's too much to even hope for right now. It makes me sick. But as the former player quoted by Poole earlier says

"I hate to say it, because the old man is a legend," the former player said. "But I think we're going to be like this as long as he's around to run things. And I really don't see him giving that up."

I don't, either, which puts us fans in an awkward position of watching our beloved team suck so much ass, and at times wishing ill on a legend. But the possibilities, especially if the Steve Young/Brent Jones team got control, are amazing. Maybe they do share a stadium in Santa Clara with the 49ers. Maybe they get a real GM who evaluates football players, instead of plain athletes. There's a difference, and it's obvious to anyone who sees the way Michael Crabtree runs routes and catches the ball on Sundays versus the way DHB sprints down the field and does jack shit on Sundays.

Or maybe they don't share a stadium with the Niners. Maybe they get a new one in Oakland, that they could call it Davis field. They could keep all of the slogans and traditions and the Raiders could still be the TEAM OF DECADES with PRIDE AND POISE and a COMMITMENT TO EXCELLENCE Al could still come out for press conferences and take credit for identifying great co-ownership and front-office talent. Or he could just put on his CLOAK OF IMMORTALITY and ride off into the sunset.

But they would have to guarantee that Herrera is never placed in front of a microphone again. That's the only deal breaker.

A fan can hope.

Message to Al

Or, as it's known around my house when the Professor is trying to tell me something if I'm reading or trying to write a blog post, "Talking to a fucking a wall."

Written Off

I wrote off the Art Shell debacle as a miserable experience that might have redeeming value in proving to Al that an exclusively seven-step-drop, hurl the ball deep offense just wouldn't work.

How do we write off this one? Proof that, despite his postseason "I told you so" rants over JaMarcus Russell and Johnnie Lee Higgins, measurables like arm strength and 40 times don't win ballgames?

Nope. The only remedy is to overhaul the organization, put smart football people in positions of power, give a talented coaching staff the freedom to coach, and hold the players accountable. Are JaMarcus and DHB completely delusional and incapable of understanding the difference between good play and poor play? Maybe. But they are a product of an environment where the coach has limited power, players are not held accountable, and Al Davis will continue to find positive signs to encourage the players upon whom he has placed outrageous bets.

Can the Raiders find success organized in this way? Yes, but only under truly extraordinary circumstances. I fear that when we apply Gannon-Gruden to the law of averages, this team will be awful for 40 years.

The Raiders organization is simply built to lose.

"Unmitigated disaster"

Lowell Cohn's JaMarcus Russell column. It's worth reading in full, but here's a taste:

Russell’s passer rating was 45.8. That is a remedial number. You score a number like that and you go live in a hole like Saddam Hussein at the end or you live under a rock or you disguise yourself as a wandering minstrel and play the guitar and sing Beatles’ songs at Times Square for spare change.

So there. JaMarcus was Saddam Hussein-in-a-hole bad. I still think that by "look at the tape," Tom Cable means, "Get torn a new asshole by Al Davis and name JaMarcus the starter for the rest of the season and never try this shit again." But anyway, back to our regularly scheduled programming, "Looking for the Nadir."

Raiders get weird again, the sequel

Late yesterday and this morning brought some columnists out regarding the latest Raider drama. That's about all the Raiders are good for, it seems--drama--because they certainly aren't a football team in the sense that their an organization that cares about winning games or developing a program. In fact, on Monday Night Countdown's weekly, "C'mon, Man!" segment, Tom Jackson was able to quip, "We should rename this segment 'The Raiders' because they show up every week," and then played the clip of Louis Murphy and Johnnie Lee Higgins running into each other, Keystone Cops-style.

So first up, Cam Inman talks to Lance Kiffin, who gives Tom Cable a nice character reference:

"Any head coach deserves a certain amount of time to get things going and install what he wants to install. Tom has not had enough time," Kiffin said by phone Monday from his office as the University of Tennessee's coach. "I would think he definitely should have another season after this, at least."

Really? Even after more assault allegations surfaced against Cable on Sunday, via ESPN's report pertaining to claims of two ex-wives and an ex-girlfriend?

"If any of that was accurate, that would surprise me," Kiffin added. "In my year-and-a-half with Tom, I never saw anything like that. I thought he was a first-class coach and a great person."

I'm sure Al will take this under advisement.

Next up is Tim Kawakami, who writes,

Now the team is 2-6 and there are the new serious charges. Al is known to be very protective of women. He wants his franchise to be first-class. He must be horrified by the association to violence against women.

I give him major credit for that.

So Al has a problem. He wants “cause” to fire Cable, so he has to wait, but he also is embarrassed that Cable’s behavior continues to shed bad light on a franchise that is not exactly permanently bathed in light, anyway.

Al has a lot of problems. A shitty football team is the biggest problem.

Scott Ostler gets in on the act, calling the Raiders a "Creepshow" that is hitting its all-time low, although every time I think that, they hit a new low. Anyway,

What's really bizarre in Monday's two news releases is the juxtaposition of warnings.

In one statement, the Raiders say they're evaluating the matter, and alert us that they have fired employees in the past for inappropriate conduct. In the other statement, they call into question the validity of ESPN's report.

So the Raiders might wind up firing their coach over charges they suggest might be nothing but phony-baloney smears in ESPN's attacks on the Raiders.

Creepy.

Finally, in this perusal of local columnist reactions, we get Lowell Cohn. His piece really should be read in its entirety, but here's a taste:

Several benefits would accrue from firing Cable ASAP. We wouldn’t have to see his sad face anymore or hear him swear the Raiders will be a great team in a week or so: “I have great faith in where we’re going and what we can do as a football team.”

That storyline is so over with. And we wouldn’t have to ask whom Cable slapped, or if he actually did slap anyone, or if he really punches people, or if he has a problem controlling his rage or if he has rage to begin with.

Anyway, have a nice day. Any minute now, Al may show up with his overhead projector and announce that Randy Hanson is the interim head coach. That would be awesome.

Meanwhile, in Bizaro Raiders Universe

Raiders name Sean Payton head coach.

Somehow, this got debacled, and we ended up with two years of Norv, followed by Art, Lance, and now OJ Cable.

I will now punch myself in the face.