Raidertopia

Wow, I finally agree with something Gwen Knapp writes.

The Raiders should just cut their losses along with Jamarcus Russell. But it really is hard to believe that’ll happen after what Davis said (and displayed on the infamous overhead projector).  After all, it would basically be admitting “Lance” was right about Russell.

Here’s what I see happening – Russell gets talked into renegotiating his contract with a deep pay cut or incentives.  He has to have an agent that’ll tell him it’s better than not and risk being cut.  After all, what team would want him at anything more than the league minimum?

They may call the Raiders’ bluff though, and decline to renegotiate.  In that case, it will be interesting to see if the Raiders have the cojones to cut him as they should.

And all this will have to happen fast as the risk of him getting injured in training camp is too high.

It’s just a really sad situation for Raider fans.  I wanted WR Calvin Johnson when Russell was selected, but I was optimistic after hearing many, including Mel “The Hair” Kiper, rave about his skills.  We all hoped he would be the team’s saviour.

Al Davis has officially lost it.

If the draft picks of the last several years and the mad money thrown at mediocre players the last several years weren’t proof enough, the way the Raider management is reacting to Rich Gannon’s offer of help for their mega-bust of a QB is the clincher.

This post on the Silver and Black Report outlines the situation very well.

The Raiders are acting like children, led by that buffoonish John Herrerra.

The Raiders responded to Gannon’s offer through team executive and John Herrera.  From the Oakland Tribune:

“It’s Rich that needs the help,” Raiders senior executive John Herrera said. “When he goes on a radio show offering Mr. Davis help, Tom Cable help, the Raiders help, maybe it’s Rich that needs the help.”

What the hell does that even mean?  That doesn’t even fit as a response.  It’s like in Dodgeball when Ben Stiller’s character responds with “touche” at a completely inappropriate time.  Sounds like John Herrera basically just said, “I know you are, but what am I?” or “I’m not a towel, you’re a towel.”  Are they trying to say he’s desperate for work? (read more at Bleacher Report….)

I have totally lost faith in this organization.  Things will not change unless Davis relinquishes power, hires a General Manager and that GM hires a competent coach with power to hire his own staff and select his own players.  Sadly, that might not happen until the old man passes away.  John Madden has even stated that it must be done.  I wonder if he’s been banished from Raider headquarters as well?

Remember when the Raiders were successful?  They were led by GMs or senior executives named Al LoCasale, Ron Wolf, and Bruce Allen.  Coincidence?  I think not.  Al’s Wingman has a good review of those eras and how the Raiders should have handled the Gannon offer (Hint: with professionalism).  Wolf turned Green Bay around and you just watch how Allen turns the Redskin franchise around.

The news that Russell skipped the final team meeting for “personal reasons” which was later discovered to be a trip to Las Vegas is yet another sign that this guy is a loser and a bust.  Now, the team (Herrerra) says he went with the permission of the team and with a team official.  So, that makes it right?  That’s a further indictment on the Raider management.

I can’t wait to see what gem they choose at #8 in the 2010 draft.

Meanwhile, “Lance” Kiffin is having a hearty laugh at all this.

The Raiders lose to San Diego for the 13th straight time.

13!

I never thought I’d see the team so bad and for so long. Post-game comments included these gems:

“I did a pretty good job,” Russell told reporters.

“I thought he did some really good things that way today,” Cable said. “Very much seemed to be in control today. A couple of throws hed probably like to have over again but for the most part he gave us a chance to win today and that’s what you ask your quarterback to do.”

That’s what it has come to in Raiderville. That’s how low the bar has been set for a number one overall draft pick that’s supposed to lead this team. The most pathetic thing is that these comments came after he threw for a whopping 109 yards passing (81 net yards). The longest pass play went for 15 yards. He had one bad interception where he said “it didn’t hurt too much”. I guess he forgot that it led to a San Diego touchdown or he just missed that while he rested his fat ass on the bench in his ski cap. He was lucky that at least one more wasn’t intercepted and that he didn’t lose his fumble.

The season is half over.  JaMarcus Russell has 2 touchdown passes.

Two touchdown passes in eight games.  I would be willing to bet that just about every other starting QB in the league has two in a quarter.

I didn’t think it was possible, but this inept offense is on pace to be worse than the infamous Tom Walsh B&B offense.

This team is maddening to watch.  They’re not even entertaining.  The QB is horrible.  The WRs can’t get open and when they do, they can’t catch.  The return game is non-existent.  The defense folds when they need a stop and they allow way too many third down conversions.

The defense still cannot stop the run.  Tomlinson is officially over the hill, but has all three of his TDs against the Raiders this year.

I generally like the speedy, active linebackers (Howard and Morrison), but they cannot fill a gap to save their lives.  The Raiders need a stout, strong linebacker like Brian Cushing that can fill a hole, shed blockers, and tackle well.

Chris Chambers is a veteran WR who was just released and who could instantly help the Raiders (if Russell can get him the ball….did I mention that he can’t hit the side of a barn?), but I’ll be surprised if they sign him.

I’ll also be surprised if Al Davis hires a take-charge GM before he dies.  He needs to do this to rescue the franchise, but he’s a stubborn old man.  In his head, doing that would just be an admission that he was wrong and his critics were right.

So much for “Just Win, Baby”.

Blindly loyal.

That’s me.

Won ton at Bleacher Report writes exactly what I feel, though I have about 10 more years as a Raider fan on him.  I’m not going to be spending any ticket or tog money on them, but I’m not jumping ship.  I can understand how others might be and I can’t say that I blame them.  My nature dooms me to endure the pain.

Jarrod Cooper gives a frank assessment of the team on KNBR and he speaks the unfortunate truth.

It’s nothing that isn’t now totally obvious.  Take what NY Giant Antonio Pierce, who grew up a Raider fan, said about playing against the pathetic Raider offense. It sounds a lot like what the 49ers were saying in a pre-season scrimmage, but at least that actually was a scrimmage.

It’s a truly depressing situation where hope is dwindling. I never thought it would come to this, but Ray Ratto is now a voice of reason and someone whose writing I am know plugging. Read his latest on the Raiders and what they’ve become. Us Raider fans like to point out the 2002 Super Bowl but it really has been sandwiched by about 20 years of some pretty sad football…

Yes, quarter-century. Going back to 1986, the Raiders have made the playoffs six times; of the teams that have existed that long, only Arizona and Cincinnati have been less January. The last six years and change have been spectacularly awful, but this has gone on a lot longer than anyone wants to admit.

Obviously, the pre-2000 slump pales in comparison to what we’ve been seeing the past 6-7 years and it appear to not be getting any better. I should have seen this coming with the selection of Heyward-Bey at number 7 this spring. Oh, and by the way, the guy I wanted, Jeremy Maclin, had a great game last week and will undoubtedly be showcased against the Raiders on Sunday. I hope Al is watching. And it will add to the Raiders embarrassment when Crabtree, just across the bay, starts playing at first rounder’s level while Heyward-Bey continues to struggle.

And JaMarcus Russell?  I’ve almost lost all hope in him.  I don’t see any improvement in him.  I don’t think an inaccurate passer can suddenly become accurate.  I don’t think he’ll work hard enough to be a good quarterback and I don’t think he has the leadership qualities (see Antonio Pierce’s comments).  I also think that Al Davis is totally off base in comparing him to other, slow-starting QBs that became great ones.  That’s like the Heyward-Bey pick – a reach.  And wishful thinking.

That’s what everyone must be saying after details of the Rich Gannon ban became public.

I’ve got to agree with Jerry Mac, David White, the AP’s Dubow, and even Tim Kawakami on this one.

Gannon was a truth machine.  His comments were based on facts and his experiences with the team.  Sure, the truth hurts, especially when you’ve been so bad for half a decade.  It’s the man’s job as a broadcaster to comment on these things and what he said had mostly already been said on Raider blogs and by loyal Raider fans everywhere.  Yes, I said loyal.  You can be critical and yet still be loyal.

This Herrera guy should shut up.  Is Davis actually sanctioning what this guy’s saying?  The word “clown” comes to mind whenever this guy talks. First there was the bizarre Kawakami press conference incident last year, now this.  The Raiders really need some competent PR people.  Here’s a sample of what he said:

“Rich Gannon is not welcome here.”

“He was one of the least popular players with his teammates that we ever had here and he still can’t seem to get over the fact that he played the worst game in Super Bowl history.  He threw five interceptions and three of them were returned for touchdowns. He has blamed everyone else for that.”

“I guess it’s our fault he threw five interceptions.”

“He’s attacked us on a regular basis since becoming a member of the media,” Herrera said. “After affording him the opportunity to establish a career here, he has since gone on to attack us in a way that’s totally unacceptable.”

No, Herrera.  What is totally unacceptable is the way Oakland handled this situation. Banning one of their all-time greats because he hurt their pride is unacceptable.

What does Gannon’s Super Bowl meltdown have to do with him being brutally honest? His brutal honesty was probably the reason he was unpopular with his teammates.  The team was full of slackers and underachievers and Al Davis scholarship players.  He came to the Raiders at a time when they desperately needed his leadership.  And I’ve never heard him deflect the blame for that Super Bowl performance.

Herrera also used Gannon’s “they should just blow up the building and start all over again” quote as a reason to ban him, citing that it’s improper to use such words in a post 9/11 society.  I think the fact that Herrera related that quote to 9/11 is more inappropriate than Gannon’s words.

In the end, the Raiders relented and lifted the ban.  Well, they had to anyway because of NFL rules.

I think I speak for many Raiders fans when I say that I was proud of the Rich Gannon years and what he did to lift the team to greatness.  He was simply doing his job when he was critical of the team.  He always qualified his comments by saying it hurt him to watch the team in its current tailspin.  I wish Rich was still at QB or at the very least in a coaching capacity with the team.  His knowledge and dedication to the game is sorely needed.  I guess that will never happen.

Now….banning Warren Sapp?  I’m all for that.

So, this is where the Raiders stand.

How things have changed.

Players don’t want to come and play here any more.

They ignore the great and glorious history and superbad uniforms and instead believe the hate-hype from mediots on ESPN and the like.

Granted, Al Davis has mostly himself to blame for this.  For making crap personnel and coaching decisions and putting an inferior product on the field.  But I don’t think any other sports organization gets as much negative pub and is the subject of outright attack journalism than the Oakland Raiders.  Jealous revenge for all those years when they were among the best, maybe?

Forbes put another nail in the Raider coffin when they recently rated the Raiders the most worthless NFL franchise.  They are actually losing money.  Hard to do with the popularity of the NFL and income sharing.

If Seymour really never arrives, it will just perpetuate the current image of the Raiders as dysfunctional losers.  I don’t know what will turn that around.  Oh yeah – winning.  But that will be more difficult when you can’t make moves to improve your team because that player will just refuse to play for you. Meanwhile, the mocking and jokes are coming from media outlets everywhere.

On the lighter side, Just Blog, Baby has a funny article from Al Davis’ diaries about the Seymour situation.  And an astute post on the trade being vintage Al:

Going from the Pats to the Raiders is tough pill to swallow. If given the choice, playing for a winning cheater is much more appealing than playing for a legendary owner turned captain of a sinking ship.

What Seymour doesn’t realize is that if he becomes a part of the Raider resurrection then he’ll be held in reverence with some of the all-time greats that have played for a franchise that is a pillar of the NFL and has a fan base as faithful and dedicated as any in sports.

Here’s hoping that he will realize this and report, but he looks lost for the critical opener v San Diego and I don’t have a very good feeling about this whole situation. The Raiders resigned DT William Joseph who they had cut to make room for Seymour – bad sign.

Worst case scenario (which could very well happen since this is the bad luck Raiders we’re talking about): Seymour announces his retirement which means he basically remains property of the Raiders and they’re still out the #1 pick in 2011. Another free gift for the Patsies. And if he ever does decide to come back and play, he’ll just be older and that much less effective. Or the Raiders can trade him to another team, but who’s going to give a desperate team another #1?

Sad thing is, if this guy can still perform at a high level, he can plug a huge hole in the Raider font four. Trevor Scott is, at best, a situational player and a real weakness at RDE. Seymour can actually make them a fairly formidable line – three top 10 draft picks (Warren was a 3, Seymour was a 6, Ellis was an and Tommy Kelly, who’s being paid like a #1.

(Hat tip to Calico Jack for the inspiration on the play on words for the blog post title)

I can’t wait to see what surprises await the second day of the draft after what the Raiders did on Day 1.

Michael Mitchell?  Yeah, the guy can hit and is, of course, fast, but he was from a small school (Ohio U) and not even ranked on most boards.  Yet, he was the Raider 2nd round pick.  Yes, I said 2nd round!  By all other accounts he could have been had in the 5-7 rounds.

Are they outsmarting themselves?  It’s as if the Raiders think they know more than everyone else by picking these guys.  They think they’ll be able to say, “I told ya so”, if these guys pan out.  It’s as if they think it adds to their “renegade” image.  They’re just being ridiculed for it.

Bottom line – both these players could have been had for a much cheaper price.  The Raiders need players and giving up more than a player’s worth is what has been putting them back the last several years.  This is just more of the same, just a different venue (draft vs free agency).

Someone should just rank the players by stopwatch speed so we can get a better idea of who the Raiders might draft each round.

Darrius Heyward-Bey?

Seventh overall pick in the 2009 NFL Draft.

25th ranked player on the board.  50th on some.

4th ranked WR on the board by most raters!

Note: The other three WRs were available.

This is a classic “reach” pick.

However much we Raider fans hope things have changed in Raiderville, it appears they haven’t changed at all.  Al Davis will take a clockwatch time over football production and football skills every time.  It is truly reached ridiculous proportions.  ESPN put up a graphic listing many of these stopwatch guys and, surprise, most of them were busts.

If they were really so enamored with Heyward-Bey, the Raiders should have traded down and taken him later.  They didn’t even wait their ten minutes to pick in case someone called in with an offer.  I think they chose after only a couple of minutes.  Rare for the Raiders.

The guy has inconsistent hands and was even shut out in two big ACC games last year.  You don’t pick a guy #7 that disappears for a couple of games.  In college!

I was hoping for Maclin, but wouldn’t have been disappointed if it was Crabtree.  But Heyward-Bey?

This joke of a pick will just fuel the Raider haters and we’ll see plenty more Raider ridicule in both the press and TV media.  Sorry, but they’ll deserve it.

And this just in, the Forty-Niners just picked Crabtree so old Uncle Al will just have to look across the bay to see his mistake or pick up the Chron to read about it.

I am very disappointed in the pick.

As each losing season passes, as each inept performance on display, as each embarrassment is televised nationally, as the great history of the Raiders is being tarnished week by week, Mike Lombardi’s words appear more true than ever…

I have heard the laughing, I have seen the dumb mistakes and I have been in that airport waiting for the plane ride home after getting my butt kicked in. And no one can imagine how bad that feels — not because of the losing but the fact there is no hope. Not one SINGLE ounce of hope — for tomorrow or next week, or next year. And two years from now, the same thing will happen unless “someone in the building” stops trying to coach and control the team. When I first started in football, I would study this man and learn as much as possible about football and the workings of a personnel department. I had great respect for him and always ignored the bad comments I might hear. When I worked for the 49ers, Bill Walsh told me “the most football I ever learned was (while) working for the Raiders,” and that prompted me to want to join them many years later. Much of what we tried to install in Cleveland in terms of the player personnel department came from ideas I stole from reading and talking to “someone in the building.” But that was then and this is now — and now he is more interested in preserving his legacy and having articles written about his greatness and what player he is making into the next great Raider than he is in winning….(read more)

Raider fans don’t particularly like the guy since he has seemingly been holding a grudge against the Raiders since he left the organization. He takes verbal pot shots at them every chance he gets, but I think he’s spot on here. And it’s very unfortunate.

I agree with a lot of other bloggers that are calling for a kind of boycott. Stop buying tickets to home games and stop buying merchandise. A message has to be sent to Al Davis. As if the continual losing hasn’t made enough of a mockery of the team’s famous slogans and made a light bulb go off in his head.

We should have all seen this coming with the whole Marcus Allen situation years ago. He took a classy guy, a hall of famer, a “great Raider” as he himself would say and benched him for completely egotistical purposes. The saddest thing was that Allen was needed on the field to win football games. Remember “Just Win, Baby”? He, of course, ended up burning the Raiders when he changed teams and joined their hated, divisional rivals.  I used to give Davis the benefit of the doubt there, thinking something happened behind closed doors that I wasn’t privy to. I truly believe now that it was a total power play and Allen was getting bigger than Davis, in Davis’ eyes.  His ego couldn’t take it.  The whole soap opera this year with the team and Lane Kiffin is similar in many respects.

So much for getting wiser with age.

Al – Please hire a General Manager, and (more importantly) go away and retire.

I guess Raider fans can take solace in that, even though losing, they have been losing in varied and interesting ways.  Like performance art.  Yes, interesting if not maddening.  Depressing, isn’t it?

Things are just bad and I don’t see it getting better this season.

How bad?

Well, besides the huge embarrassment of historic proportions last weekend, luck is just not on the Raiders’ side…again.  What does it say when your prize draft pick who was supposed to be the dynamo of the offense has not one, but two, turf toes?  When your top, pass rushing defensive end has been out with a triceps injury?  When your stud special teams player and nickel back hurts his shoulder when he falls down on his own returning a kickoff?

It’s not going to get better on defense with Al Davis’ scholarship player, Sam Williams, starting at outside linebacker.  The Raiders are also very weak at the point of attack at defensive end with either Kalimba Edwards or rookie Trevor Scott starting.  And the most depressing thing about it is that Rob Ryan is still the Raider defensive coordinator.

On offense, Russell needs to improve or bust talk will really accelerate.  Regardless of the supporting cast, he just hasn’t looked good at all.  The problems at fullback with Justin Griffith’s injury is  another key to the offense’s regression, along with the disappearing act of the entire cast of wide receivers.  It’s really shocking how low their production has been.  They have to be approaching some kind of record.  I’m very disappointed to see how poorly one of my favorite Raiders, Ronald Curry, has been playing. Now, he’s not happy and sees himself elsewhere next year.  He should look in the mirror and realize that he’s been benched because of his dropped balls and look to improve and get back on the field.  I don’t know why he seems so baffled at his benching, although the lack of communication between him and coach is troubling, if true.

I guess in the bigger picture, the Raiders problems are nothing compared to the trials and tribulations that everyday life provide.  It is only a game after all.  A game played by millionaires, mostly.  To put everything in perspective, read about Jim Otto and what he’s going through in his life after football.