It will be admitting he was wrong and “Lance” was right. And he hates Lance. Al is an old, stubborn, vengeful man.

I know I always looked at the Russell situation as an unfinished test. He never had a full off season and regular season until (kind of) this past year. If it wasn’t for the money invested, I’d say keep him in limited roles. A drive behind a stout line, here and there. A fake play or a real play as a blocking Tight End. Maybe Full Back action, just to make him work more during a strong lead in a game. BTW, this is also possible if he takes a pay cut as well, but after that hold out in preseason of 07′ I’m sure thats not an option.

So, My vote is to let him go, yet I’ll always wonder what a full off season of camp with Hue Jackson, could provide. I know that a healthy Gradkowski or Campbell are better options and on the cheap. Makes Sense.

Focusing on the trench work, so plays can have a chance on both sides of the ball, is what I hope to see.

Hope you saw Nnamdi on Total Access. Everyone treated him with deserved respect, except one fat pig. The bitterness of Sapp not getting on the top ten list of Greatest Defenders in Silver and Black, showed during the 4 Downs ending segment. If Nnamdi wasn’t such a perfect gentleman and stand up guy, He could easily of snapped on that pig. The middle segment of Nnamdi and Rod Woodson talking shop was the coolest.

Simple formula, correct?

Mr. Panos thinks so.

Now, I must admit, Gannon was in the wrong to talk about it publicly, instead of “only” calling Al Davis and Tom Cable, privately. Sounds like pure pitty on sports radio and we all know how easily Al gets offended. He needs to address the Gannon issue in a press release. Why burn your bridges with a QB, that I always thought would be a hard nosed practice involved and tireless complex play calling coach. As HC or OC, but as a QB Coach for starters. Why the hell not?

I’m posting this comment, on what might be the eve of Tom Cable’s fate.

P.S. That punk Kiffin is proving once again that he will step on anyone to take a “greedy” short cut in life. Tennessee is screwed big time, because of the timing of this. Lord! Is breaking a 4 year contract this early with a Univ, that easy? I never had bad blood for USC, but now I hope they drop off the map and teams like CAL and Stanford take over the PAC 10. Most importantly, I hope he gets screwed out of a pay check in this situation as well. What a Gamoto!

A friend and I were lucky enough to score some on-field credentials from a family member who works at Fox sports and arrived bright and early to milk the whole experience for all we could. We were on field by around 10 AM when only a handful of guys were present doing some real light warm ups. As time went on the first really notable player to take the field was Gradkowski (why are you not surprised?) and he proceeded to take part in some light throwing. A short time later Jamarcus emerged and the two began to alternate throws as receivers would run duplicate routes.

(Before I go on I just want to state that up to this point I have been a huge Jamarcus Russell supporter. I felt like if he was to bust it would be a catastrophic event for this organization so I rooted for Jamarcus to succeed because I felt like I had to. I guess in a way I considered him “Too big to fail,” Oh the Irony.)

Now here’s the thing that bugged me about yesterday morning. Jamarcus came out dressed in his sweatsuit warmups like everyone else but also wearing a HUGE pair of white headphones. I even made a comment to my friend right off the bat, “Jeez Jamarcus, ever hear of ear buds?” Now, I’m no frickin square, the fur coats, the rock earings, none of that stuff has ever bothered me. I actually tend to appreciate flashy athletes, that is, if they can back it up. But here was Jamarcus with these headphones going through drills and looking HORRIBLE. Missing guys right and left, over and under. It was really actually quite depressing to watch up-close. There is no question Gradkowski
is 100 times more accurate, and if you’d been in a cave for 3 years and taken to this field to watch, there is no way you would Identify Jamarcus as the better paid of the two.

But the headphones remained. Throw after throw, miss after miss, the headphones remained. And I know they were on because between throws Jamarcus would occasionally sway to the beat of whatever he was listening to. It was just a perfect little snapshot of the state we have found ourselves in as Raider fans. I leaned over to my buddy and said “You’d think after 3 bad throws in a row he might consider taking off the phones and concentrating a little bit” But it never happened. You never got the sense that he even cared.

It was jarring to watch the team immediately deflate when he came into the game yesterday. He has lost that team in every way imaginable. I guess it just took for me to see someone else behind center to truly understand how bad he’s been playing this year. But like I said, you just don’t get the sense that it matters to much to #2. At least he still has his headphones.

Gannon may have not been everyones buddy on the 02′ team, but who cares? A true leader gets things done. In Gannon’s case, grabbing the face masks of players and barking instructions at them was one way of communicating. I’m sure that attitude was carried into the locker room and team meetings. I’m not saying that is how it should be done, but hell …. it worked! In todays NFL, you have too many players that think that their shit smells like roses and if the coaches can’t let them know otherwise, then that is when the leaders with pads on have to step up and motivate and/or correct teammates.

I know Al Davis does not want to win in the media wars, yet he does on the field, but we can not (as an organization) burn our bridges with guys like Gannon. Some day he’d make a great QB/OC coach or maybe even a HC. He is a honors student of the game and he, like other retired Raiders, watch from the outside … pissed off and all. Why? Because he, as well as others share the same feeling. We need to get our shit in order and together. Raiders-4-life is what they are. They share frustrating facts, like us fans do, because they CARE!

I almost wish I could have Herrara’s job. My wife could do a better job than him. What connections to the team, does he have, besides working for the team for the last 10 years? Can’t Amy Trask replace his ass? You have to have a calm and witty personality to battle the mediots of the world. John just makes us look bad and the worst part is … it’s always in front of the bay area “haters club.”

I agree about that fat ass Sapp. He should walk the plank! I don’t catch him on the three channels he gets paid by, very often, but I’ve read some nasty quotes and don’t understand why he gets all these jobs. Must be the Mike Irvin reason: over the top personalities. ie MORONS for the moron viewers. He sure does bring a side of stupidity to a show. Everyone has “that guy.” In espn’s case 90% are that guy.

Speaking of percentages … I must end this blog comment with Tom Cable’s most recent press conference theme. That is the whole “90% speech.” Coach Cable said that 90% of the team is there. Totally where they need to be on game day. When asked if Russell was part of that small 10%, he hesitated at first, but admitted (of course after the 3 point game) that JaMarcus was part of that 10%. I just want to know how/why JR regressed this year. 5 out of last years last 7 games, he was making huge strides in the right direction. Now after a whole off season in camp, he is worse. WTF? After Pears got exposed at LG and our running game got slowed down (damn you Mike Nolan!) it is hard to see us have a fighting chance in weeks to come. Unless… McFadden and Bush have a break out game or three or eight and a west coast style looks to be the safest way for Russell or a backup to manage the clock. Bombs should not be thrown into triple coverage, ever again and getting to the other teams 30 on 4th down can be an advantage with Janakowski. So, Do it! Too many weapons are injured or have little experience and I’m burnt out with watching growing pains.