Lane Kiffin Story

[Angry Pope]

Cloaked in silver and black



By Sam Farmer
LA Times

July 25, 2007

Maybe Lane Kiffin is too young to know better. Or too forthright to care. Either way, the NFL's youngest head coach - a former USC assistant who could still pass for a student - doesn't flinch as he lifts the silver-and-black curtain and describes step by step the process by which the Oakland Raiders hired him.

That's not a state secret, of course, but the Raiders usually treat things that way.

On the day he was hired, Kiffin said, Raiders owner Al Davis had him enter team headquarters through a back door 'undercover, like it's the CIA or something.'

Now, however, Kiffin's career is on display. He'll surely be among the most scrutinized NFL coaches this season, a 32-year-old prodigy - the youngest NFL coach in the modern era - taking over a franchise that finished a league-worst 2-14 last season.

The next phase of the youth movement begins today when the Raiders open training camp in Napa, Calif.

'People think, 'Did you just take the job so you could be the youngest head coach in the history of the NFL?' No, not at all,' said Kiffin, the son of Tampa Bay defensive coordinator Monte Kiffin. 'I had to have long conversations with him [Davis]. He had to figure out if I was the right guy, and I had to figure out if the job was right. Personnel issues, staff hirings - there was a lot that went into that before I was going to accept the job.'

Kiffin first talked about the hiring process while attending the NFL owners meetings in March, then expanded on his comments Wednesday in a phone interview.

Typical of the Raiders, the job search was anything but routine. After firing Art Shell, Davis was initially eyeing Steve Sarkisian, USC's assistant head coach and quarterbacks coach who had worked as an assistant for the Raiders in 2004. Sarkisian had three interviews with team officials.

'It was a great experience for me,' Sarkisian recalled Wednesday. 'What Al does is he takes you from A to Z, but you never go through the alphabet in order. You go from A to B to T to K....You're all over the place, whether it's your offense, to training camp, to travel, back to how you're going to handle this type of blitz, to how you're going to handle this type of player. It's all over the map. So there's no script, no manual that's going to get you ready for it.'

On the third interview, Sarkisian brought along Kiffin and Mark Jackson, a former USC director of football operations. Sarkisian's thought was, should he take the job, he would bring along both and hire Kiffin as offensive coordinator.

It didn't get that far. Sarkisian returned to L.A. and, when Davis called, informed the owner he planned to stay at USC. That's when the Raiders turned their attention to Kiffin. But getting him back to Oakland wasn't as simple as making a call and booking a plane ticket.

First, the Raiders left phone messages but couldn't find him. Davis dispatched John Herrera, a longtime team administrator, to root him out. Kiffin was interviewing Trojans recruits when Herrera located him, gauged his interest in the job, then arranged for him to return to Oakland. It was the Sunday of the conference championship games.

Kiffin made the hour flight to the Bay Area that night, met Davis at the team facility around 9 p.m., and dived right into an interview. No waiting around. No chance to unpack. Just hour after hour of talking football, right past midnight.

'If you guys know Al, that's his time,' Kiffin said. 'He gets cranked up at night. That's when he's going. He was ready to go. I thought he was going to need coffee or something. He didn't need anything....It was right in his wheelhouse.'

The next morning, after a short sleep at the hotel, Kiffin quietly re-entered the building and resumed the interview process. Davis had him break down Raiders tapes for five hours, starting at 8 a.m., before quizzing him on which players he liked and which he didn't. Then, he had him break down the rest of the teams in the AFC West. That was followed by another four-hour conversation, during which Kiffin gave his unvarnished appraisal.

'I wasn't going to say what he wanted to hear,' Kiffin said. 'If he wanted to hire me for that, I didn't want the job.'

Evidently, both sides liked what they heard, and Kiffin was hired Jan. 23. Kiffin, in turn, hired Jackson as director of football operations.

Since then, the Raiders have made several changes. They traded Randy Moss and made peace with disgruntled receiver Jerry Porter; used the No. 1 pick on Louisiana State quarterback JaMarcus Russell, bolstered the secondary by signing safety Donovin Darius and coaxed respected assistant coaches Greg Knapp and Tom Cable to join the staff.

Kiffin shrugs off the suggestion he might simply be a yes-man for Davis, or a pushover with the players.

'I really don't worry about what somebody's going to say or write, because I don't have control over that,' he said. 'Worrying about that has nothing to do with winning or losing.'

 

[TommyGirl]

I like Kiffin more and more with every interview I read.

 

[Angry Pope]

Kiffin could work some magic on Raiders
If evil Al Davis doesn't interfere, Oakland will benefit from youthful coach
Raiders quarterback JaMarcus Russell could have a fine NFL future with coach Lane Kiffin

Michael Ventre


It’s been quite clear for many years that Al Davis is the NFL’s Lord Voldemort. What isn’t yet established is whether he can coexist with new coach Lane Kiffin, who may as well be Harry Potter.

Against all my instincts, against everything that I know to be true in this life, somehow, I think they might just make it work.

As opposed to the popular book series by J.K. Rowling, which just wrapped with something called the “Deathly Hallows” — obvious code for Davis’ inner circle — Voldemort the evil wizard doesn’t have to commit his life to destroying young Harry, despite the silver-and-black demise of Mike Shanahan, Jon Gruden and Bill Callahan.


Maybe Davis finally realizes that you can attract more flies with honey than vinegar, and you can win more football games by letting the guy you hired to be head coach do his job.

Kiffin, at 32, is the modern era’s youngest NFL head coach. The son of Tampa Bay Buccaneers defensive coordinator Monte Kiffin was such a wunderkind as USC’s offensive coordinator under Pete Carroll that he hastened the exit of shaman Norm Chow.

But the questions about Kiffin have less to do with experience and more with temperament. As a big-time assistant, Kiffin was well ahead of the curve. He’s about as bright a young coach as there is in football today, although he has had a few public stumbles. The decision in the Texas-USC Rose Bowl to hand the ball to LenDale White on that critical fourth-and-2 without having Reggie Bush on the field is one. His lack of adjustments against a furious UCLA pass rush in last season’s 13-9 upset was another.

Yet his larger issues had to do with people skills. At USC, Kiffin was efficient and meticulous, but not warm and fatherly, as was Chow. That transition rankled a few, including Matt Leinart at first.

When it was announced that the Raiders had hired Kiffin to be their new head coach — after USC assistant head coach Steve Sarkisian turned down the job — the first reaction of many who had been around Kiffin was suppressed giggles.

He commanded respect from USC’s players, but they gave it to him grudgingly, because they recognized that he knew what he was doing, and to rebel even a little would cause the high-performance machine Carroll had created to sputter.

But the Raiders are all about rebelling. They rebel over the choices of salad dressings at training table. They rebel over parking spaces.


And this summer, Kiffin found out just how far they were willing to go in their rebellious ways. The Raiders were forced to cancel the final week of their offseason training program in June because the Players Association objected to the rigorous nature of the workouts. “The union has complained about the high level of intensity, player aggressiveness and fast pace of our practices and, as a result, has taken away the final week of our program,” Kiffin said in a statement.

Translation: Some lazy slugs in silver and black whined to their union because they’re losers, they don’t mind losing as long as they get paid, and they would be willing to consider winning only if it meant they could maintain their current level of apathy.

Bad sign.

 

[BigTron]

Who compares football to a damned stupid kids book. I wouldn't wipe my ass with this garbage. I should have been a writer. Some of these articles are painful.

 

[Rupert]

I stopped reading when he compared Al Davis to Voltron.

 

[TommyGirl]

And this summer, Kiffin found out just how far they were willing to go in their rebellious ways. The Raiders were forced to cancel the final week of their offseason training program in June because the Players Association objected to the rigorous nature of the workouts. “The union has complained about the high level of intensity, player aggressiveness and fast pace of our practices and, as a result, has taken away the final week of our program,” Kiffin said in a statement.

The same thing happened to the Redskins last year during camps. I wonder if this guy said the same thing then.

 

[Byron2112]

Man, I love hearing about those interviews, thanks Muff.

Wouldn't it be awsome to have heard that appraisal of the Raiders and the breakdown of the rest of the West?

Too bad as fans we only get to hear the opinions of Deion Sanders and the like.... it would be so sweet to hear what a sharp unbiased football guy, like Kiff comming from the college ranks, has to say about teams and players... just pure football.

 

[Angry Pope]

Kiffin's cuts show he has real power

Monte Poole
07/27/2007

BY FIRING three popular and functional veterans on successive days leading up to training camp, Lane Kiffin with his actions spoke more emphatically than anything he has said during his first six months as Oakland Raiders coach.
The releases of tight end Courtney Anderson, offensive lineman Adam Treu and special-teams performer Jarrod Cooper provide tangible proof Kiffin is charging into this disaster area with very real clout and is willing — no, eager — to wield it.

These moves were made, as he told reporters Thursday, "in the best interest of the team."

Which tells us almost as much about Kiff's own bulging self-assurance as it does about the amount of leash the former USC assistant coach has been given by the boss.

Almost. Anytime a Raiders coach flexes authority, it's because Al Davis allows it.

This is not unlike the way Davis responded the last time he was so utterly and thoroughly humiliated. In 1997, after the worst season in more than 30 years as Raiders boss, Davis fired head coach Joe Bugel, an old-school offensive line guy, andreplaced him with an impetuous young coach.

That coach was Jon Gruden. Together, Al and Jon hosed down the hallways. It was a gradual cleansing, though, taking a couple of years to weed out some of those not with the program.

Even then, there were numerous occasions when Davis used his veto power, especially regarding the coaching staff.

Kiffin, however, comes in exercising more control than Gruden did. There has been more turnover, on more levels, than at any other time in Raiders history.
The coaching staff has 14 new members. Unheard of for the Raiders. The front office has been revamped. The Nos. 2 and 3 football people under Davis last season, coach Art Shell and chief administrator Mike Lombardi, have been replaced by Kiffin and, among others, one of his former colleagues at USC, Mark Jackson, who has the title "director of football development."

Also in are new personnel men Rich Snead and George Streeter.

The result? A new sheriff, new deputies, practically a whole new posse.

And, certainly, a new mind-set.

Which is overdue and, in theory, the right way to go. Oakland for several years has been worse than bad. The Raiders have been misguided, priorities askew. When not managing by fear or spite, they were snoozing at the controls.

So if Kiffin is good, this is a masterful approach. It means a change in culture and the restoring of credibility. It means Davis may have found his worthy successor to his kingdom.

If Kiffin, 32, is in over his head, this is just a disaster of a different nature.

After all, the best of college coaches usually wilt in the NFL. Ask Steve Spurrier, who had the advantage of having played in the league. Rich Brooks didn't distinguish himself in St. Louis. Dennis Erickson was mediocre in Seattle and in San Francisco. Nick Saban, seeing what he was up against, cut and ran.

Jimmy Johnson was a marvelous coach in Dallas, an exception to the rule — until he got to Miami.

These guys were head coaches in college. Kiffin, though intelligent and cocksure, never had been a head coach on any level. He had zero experience running a team. Yet the rookie comes to the Raiders, worst team in the league last season and, arguably, for several seasons running.

This is a rebuilding job of monumental proportions. In an organization lacking a warm relationship with the league. With a frustrated fan base. And a 78-year-old owner who can't be blamed if he is impatient.

"We have a long ways to go, obviously," Kiffin said. "Fifteen wins in four years."

Davis said he hired Kiffin because he believes in him. Kiff sold himself well, conveying the proper balance of tenacity and reverence.

While the popular belief is that Davis prefers a puppet on the sideline, that's not necessarily true. He may invite it when he believes change is not needed, but he prefers to be mentally challenged and stimulated by his coach.

Kiffin shows signs of doing that. He's approaching this job ruthlessly and with conviction. He's going to do it his way. To use a football analogy, he's throwing deep.

Though neither Anderson, Treu or Cooper was a star, all seemed to deserve the opportunity to compete in camp. Anderson, a favorite of former coach Norv Turner, provided a big target but was inconsistent. Treu was a versatile, team-oriented, workaday lineman, willing to take any job he was given. Cooper was much the same way, though he'd only been a Raider for three years.

Then, too, Coop may have been gone no matter what. Being suspended for the first four games of the 2007 season, for violating the NFL policy on steroids, didn't help his cause.

With three cuts in three days, Kiffin has the attention of his entire roster and maybe a few assistants. The tension level is up. Everybody is on alert.

Welcome to Napa, fellas. Who's next?

 

[Angry Pope]

Image shift in the offing for Raiders

Coach Lane Kiffin is determined to reverse the recent losing culture

Jason Jones

August 3, 2007


NAPA -- No one has to tell Lane Kiffin he inherited a group of losers. The Raiders were an awful 2-14 football team last season, with an embarrassingly incompetent offense.

The defense played well for parts of most games. But that unit couldn't provide enough makeup to cover the many blemishes from Al Davis' worst season in more than four decades with the franchise.

Coming from USC, Kiffin saw his mentor, Pete Carroll, bring the Trojans from mediocrity to the top of college football.

Carroll started by changing the culture of the football team, something Kiffin said he intends to do with the Raiders. But for Kiffin, it's not as easy as landing a couple of top-ranked recruiting classes.

"Make no mistake, I never said this would be an easy thing to do," Kiffin said of making the Raiders winners. "This is not an easy job. This team wasn't 8-8; this team was 2-14 and a bad 2-14. So there's a lot of work to do here, and we're doing it one day at a time."

For Kiffin, the work begins by changing the losing culture of the Raiders -- a franchise that has won 15 games in the past four seasons. Changing the culture, the coach said, means bringing in new players with winning attitudes, getting rid of old ones who lack professionalism and Kiffin putting his own can-do personality into the team.

Some close observers of the Raiders, such as NFL agent Mike McCartney and former player Rod Woodson, say they have begun to see a change in the team's attitude.

McCartney said he and his client, quarterback Josh McCown, met with the Raiders' coaching staff before last season and that was enough to convince them to sign with the woeful Detroit Lions.

A year later, McCartney said that he not only approved McCown being traded to Oakland this spring but that two more of his clients, fullback Justin Griffith and Dominic Rhodes, signed free-agent deals with the Raiders.

The difference? The new coach.

"I'm very impressed with Lane Kiffin," McCartney said. "I'm impressed with his energy, enthusiasm -- he's changing that locker room. It seems to me they are really focused on a high character guy that will flourish in football."

Woodson, who played safety on the Raider team that reached the Super Bowl following the 2002 season, said he came away very impressed with Kiffin and the team's direction after attending a recent practice.

Winning in the NFL -- where talent is everywhere -- is all about mind-set, said Woodson, an 11-time Pro Bowler who played in Super Bowl XXX with Pittsburgh and was a member of Baltimore's 2000 team that won Super Bowl XXXV. Kiffin's pledge not to hold last season's performance over players' heads and his enforcement of team rules have the rookie coach on the right track, Woodson said.

"If you watch the practice, the coaches are on the guys about every little thing," Woodson said. "And that's part of being a disciplinarian. He's on track to do something good. He's got a lot of talent on paper, now they've got to find some football players."

Kiffin said he wants players who arrive early and stay late for practice and meetings, and act professionally at all times -- staying out of trouble, giving their best effort, and working to improve themselves and the team. Players who can't do that will have to find another team to join.

That's why special teams standout Jarrod Cooper's release wasn't surprising. He was on the bubble to make the team this season, and a four-game steroid suspension was enough to hasten his exit. Kiffin isn't just interested in great athletic talent. He wants players who are attentive to details and enthusiastic. Kiffin loves to say everything counts, and that includes a player's body language.

"I tell our guys, 'Make it so we can't cut you,' " Kiffin said. "... Don't ever give us a reason to cut you. Make it really hard on us."

Kiffin has also put several jobs up for competition, challenging veterans and rookies alike.

"When you change the culture, it's creating an environment for competition," Griffith said. "When you get out there and compete for a job it's going to change you automatically."

McCown knows a bit about coaches trying to change a losing culture considering his previous employers, Detroit and the Arizona Cardinals.

"When you haven't won a lot of games and you haven't played a lot of good football, that becomes your culture," McCown said. "I think (Lane's) thinking: 'OK, there's obviously a losing culture here, let's change that by bringing guys here who are focused on winning and doing the little things.' "

And even the most stubborn of holdovers has to admit Kiffin is having an effect.

Running back LaMont Jordan skipped voluntary minicamps and workouts in previous seasons. He's attended most this year.

He won't say the coaching change was the main reason why he decided to participate in the voluntary workouts, but he did praise Kiffin's approach for being thoughtful and consistent.

"Sometimes going through (organized team activities) with a new coach or a new staff, they're a lot different when you get out here to training camp," Jordan said. "Coach Kiffin isn't that way, this staff isn't that way. They're the same way now (in training camp) they were (in voluntary minicamps) and that's one way for you to definitely get respect of a team, by maintaining consistency."

Kiffin has seen players he was told were malcontents (he didn't name them, but think Jerry Porter) become some of the hardest workers with great attitudes.

He said he knows he can't turn the Raiders around as fast as he'd like, but he's going to do it his way.

"You have some guys that are on the fence," Kiffin said. "They'll either buy in or they're gone."

 

[Angry Pope]

Kiffin's youth is a positive as Raiders coach

By Mark Kaanapu

08/03/2007


WHEN LANE Kiffin was hired, all people wanted to talk about was his age. For anyone to have an opportunity such as coaching the Oakland Raiders at 32 years old is undeniably a leap.

But when you look at where Kiffin came from — when you look at his pedigree — you have to recognize that his youth isn't going to be a negative factor.

A guy can't have better genes than being the son of Monte Kiffin — Tampa Bay's defensive coordinator the past 13 years, someone who has coached in the NFL for nearly a quarter century, and someone who has coached high level college and pro football for more than 40 years.

Add to that Pete Carroll and everyone Kiffin was associated with over his past six years at USC, and there is no question that he has seen and knows what it takes to be a successful coach and to handle high-caliber football talent.

There's nothing immature or raw about Kiffin's experience.

That makes his age a positive. He's not young and unprepared: He's young and untainted. He's not tied down to any negative or damaging traditions. The older you get in the coaching business, the more you get set in your ways. Kiffin doesn't have that problem. He brings fresh ideas to the table and is willing to accept fresh ideas from those around him.

The Raiders were in desperate need of that type of attitude. It's something that can change the atmosphere in Oakland and change the culture in the locker room and on the field.

Kiffin has brought in the type of guys he wants to play on this team for the simple reason that he doesn't know any better. That's a good thing. It gives him backbone. He has no baggage and isn't afraid to do what he thinks is right.

You see that with some of the moves he's made already: cutting Jarrod Cooper — the team's ever-popular special teams captain, who was suspended by the NFL for violating the league's steroid policy — and Courtney Anderson. Those guys aren't gone because they lack athleticism, or haven't proven they can play. They are gone because there were other things going on, and Kiffin didn't want it infecting the culture of his team.

In the NFL, the pendulum is starting to swing back toward good character guys. The Raiders have always had a bad-boy mystique, but guys like Ken Stabler, Gene Upshaw, Fred Biletnikoff were in practice every day doing what they had to do. It's important for Kiffin to re-establish that type of culture.

Another big issue facing Kiffin is moving from the role of coordinator to head coach.

Nothing can prepare someone for the additional responsibilities that come with that move: the administrative, media and financial duties, and just dealing with the personnel. You can't be taught those things; you just have to do them. Being a head coach allows you to become a visionary, to strive to turn your vision into a reality, but at the expense of your true love: coaching.

Kiffin has a step up on many first-time coaches, though, in that he has a great coaching staff in place.

In the end, great coaches learn how to take talent and maximize it. That can prevent a bad stretch from turning into a loss. And that will be Kiffin's greatest challenge this year.


Since 2000, Mark Kaanapu, has been the head football coach at Menlo College in Atherton, the smallest school (enrollment 700) in the country with a football program. Raiders coaches Tom Rathman and Keith Millard formerly served on the Division III team's coaching staff, and ex-Cowboy Doug Cosbie was the head coach in the late'90s.

 

[Angry Pope]

Dickey: Give Kiffin time to clean up mess


Though new Raiders coach Lane Kiffin reminds a lot of people of Jon Gruden, Kiffin’s challenges are far tougher than Gruden’s.

Glenn Dickey

2007-08-07


SAN FRANCISCO -

Lane Kiffin reminds many people of Jon Gruden as a first-year coach with the Raiders, but he has a much tougher job. Gruden’s main goal was an attitude change. Kiffin’s main problem is a serious talent shortage.

That showed most recently when, with No. 1 overall pick JaMarcus Russell not signed, the Raiders signed veteran quarterback Daunte Culpepper. That was a clear sign they had no confidence in Josh McCown, signed in the offseason, and third-year quarterback Andrew Walter. Even if Russell had been in camp, McCown was expected to be the starter when the season started. But neither he nor Walter have looked good in early camp sessions.

Team owner Al Davis loves to talk about the past, when the Raiders were successful, and he compared Culpepper to Jim Plunkett. That’s a stretch. Culpepper has not been a good NFL quarterback since 2004 because of recurring knee problems.

His knee is supposedly healed, but the Miami Dolphins cut him after signing Trent Green. In Raiders camp, Culpepper has been spraying passes. Indeed, he almost hit me with a pass at one practice. I was standing on the sideline beyond the end line when a Culpepper pass went high over the head of a receiver, sailed over the pylon and hit a couple of feet from me.

McCown and Walter didn’t look much better. After practice, Kiffin criticized his quarterbacks for the interceptions they threw.

“Sometimes, players get in a habit of thinking that it’s just practice, so it doesn’t count,” he said. “That’s unacceptable.”

Kiffin is a very confident young man, as Gruden was, and he speaks of the future, obviously not expecting the same quick departure of the three Raiders coaches since Gruden — Bill Callahan, Norv Turner and Art Shell.

He has already started to reshape the roster, removing long snapper Adam Treu and special teams standout Jarrod Cooper. Some observers think he is getting rid of older players who are team leaders and might challenge his authority.

The offense he is installing is much like Gruden’s, an offshoot of the system that Bill Walsh brought to the NFL with more emphasis on shorter passes and a quarterback who can move. That’s quite different than the offense Davis prefers, with the deep passes, but Davis seems to have given Kiffin more authority than he’s ever given a new coach, including the ability to hire many new assistant coaches.

One of those coaches is offensive line coach Tom Cable, who is teaching a system of cut blocking — most notably used in Denver and Atlanta — which will only be used in games, not in practice.

“We don’t want to hurt our own players,” Kiffin said.

Davis has been good at identifying young coaches with bright futures but, since Gruden, he hasn’t been able to convince any of them to come to Oakland. He clearly thinks he’s got a gem in Kiffin and, from the limited exposure I’ve had to the new coach, I’m inclined to agree with that. Kiffin is obviously intelligent, seems to have a good grasp of what needs to be done and also seems to have the attention of his players.

In time, I think Kiffin will get it done. Just don’t expect it to happen overnight. It took some time for the Raiders to get in this mess, and it will take time to get out.