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Bad franchises: Blame the Raiders' mess on Al Davis
January 18, 2007
Paul Attner
Sporting News
There won't be any postseason awards for these teams. They're the worst of the worst. In this week's magazine cover story, Sporting News examines how four franchises ended up in their current mess.
He arrives at the Raiders' practice complex, frequently at night, after most everyone has left. His driver opens the door for him and starts the laborious process of getting Al Davis out of his car and into his office. The driver takes Davis' weakened legs and turns them toward the pavement, then pulls him up so he can put his hands on his walker. Then Davis moves through the dark, slowly, methodically, until he disappears behind the doors at the center of Raider Nation.
The man who once would show off his vigor at league meetings by having workout equipment delivered to his room has seen his body fail him these past few years, just as his franchise, the one he has controlled and manipulated for the past 43 seasons, likewise has deteriorated. The once proud and arrogant Raiders -- winners of three Super Bowls, the self-proclaimed "Team of the Decades" -- now are contenders for another title: worst franchise in pro sports.
And at the center of everything wrong about the team is majority owner Davis, at 77 increasingly frail yet still firmly in charge of every aspect of the operation, unwilling to step aside, unwilling or unable to move out of the past and deal with today's NFL.
Davis and the Raiders exist in a world unlike any in the league. He surely must have been angered by this season and its 2-14 ugliness. Yet until he fired coach Art Shell on January 4, the most visible sign of displeasure from Davis over the past few months came after a perceived slight to his team's legacy. NFL Network ranked the top 20 all-time Super Bowl winners; it placed the Raiders' 1983 champions 20th. Davis was outraged; the organization sent out e-mails to national media questioning how the network could not rate the team as perhaps the best ever.
That legacy is all Davis has left, and he guards it with remarkable zeal. Everything about the Raiders is their past, the titles, the Hall of Fame players. But the present? The joke around the NFL is that no one does losing better than the Raiders. Even in the best of times, it is a dysfunctional organization. But the crushing pressure generated by losing this season created an ongoing soap opera of laughable proportions. One star receiver was suspended for complaining about a practice, another admitted he dropped passes because he didn't care, the head coach publicly accused a team personnel executive of undermining the organization to the media, the new quarterback wondered at one point, "What have I gotten into?"
The results on the field were truly embarrassing. The Raiders set franchise records for most losses and fewest points scored. In the Davis era, which began in 1963 when he became coach and general manager, they never had been shut out twice at home nor had they lost nine straight games; both happened this season. They finished last in the league in points (10.5 per game), offense (246.2 yards per game), sacks allowed (72), turnovers (46) and takeaway/giveaway differential (minus-23). How bad is bad? The Raiders lost to Houston despite holding the Texans to minus-5 yards passing. They had nary a touchdown in their last three games; LaDainian Tomlinson singlehandledly scored 15 more touchdowns than the Raiders this season.
But this was not an anomaly. Since losing Super Bowl 37 after the 2002 season, their 15-49 record is the worst in the NFL, outdoing even the pathetic Lions'. Over the past 12 years, Oakland has had three winning seasons, two while Jon Gruden was coach. Even more telling: The Raiders have not won a Super Bowl in 23 years and have played for the NFL title just once in that span. But until now, they never had suffered four consecutive losing seasons. Until now, they never had gone two years without a division win.
If Gruden had stayed, this current mess might not be happening. But he couldn't coexist with Davis, who disliked seeing his coach receive much of the credit for the team's success. Nor would Gruden abide by Davis' constant interference. Gruden welcomed a trade after the 2001 season that landed him in Tampa; he promptly coached the Bucs to a win over the Raiders in Super Bowl 37. In the five years since Gruden's departure, Davis has gone through three head coaches.
"Al had the coach he needed in Gruden," one NFL team official says. "If they had been able to work together, none of what you see now would have happened. But Al doesn't want anyone else to be in the spotlight but him. When people began saying Gruden was the reason the Raiders were good, it was only a matter of time before he was gone."
Once, coaching or playing for the Raiders was a gem on a resume. John Madden won a Super Bowl and is in the Hall of Fame. Tom Flores won two rings and might get in one day. Now, no proven head coach will work for Davis. And most high-profile candidates won't interview. After the 2005 season, the Raiders even were turned down by a college coach, Louisville's Bobby Petrino, who recently took over the Falcons. Shell's hiring a year ago was a desperate move; he was the loyal Raider who had been fired once, in 1994, by Oakland because he no longer met Davis' expectations. Davis still can sign some big-name free agents -- LaMont Jordan being the prime example -- if the money is right. But it's no longer an honor to be in a Raiders uniform.
The Raiders remain undaunted. Chief executive Amy Trask says that any view of them should embrace a bigger picture, that during this decade they've been to two AFC title games and won three AFC West championships, more than any division rival. "It's important that when you look at 2006, you look at it in the perspective of the last seven years," Trask says. "It is really only fair to look at it in that context. We've always been able to regain success. We can turn this around, and we will turn it around."
What does Davis think? The Raiders did not make him available for an interview.
Still, the common thread through all of this -- the reign of success, the decay into ineptness -- is Davis. Figuring out how the Raiders got into this present state of disrepair starts with him.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
There is no doubting that Davis is one of the great football men in NFL history. He already is in the Hall of Fame, and his immense intelligence and keen football instincts built the Raiders into one of the most successful, popular sports franchises ever. "Al is the last of a breed," says Ron Wolf, the former Packers general manager who worked 24 years with the Raiders and Davis. "He is brilliant and still very, very sharp. He knows every part of the franchise -- coaching, personnel, business. He was great in every area. But the game has changed so much -- it's so big now, it just is different from what it once was."
But Davis is not different. He continues to be the Raiders' personnel chief. He no longer attends practices, but he reviews practice tape. He has last say on lineup changes, on roster decisions, on hiring assistant coaches, on both the final setup of the draft board and players who are selected. He studies tapes of opponents and has significant input into game plans and schemes.
In his last public appearance, in the locker room December 17 after a loss to the Rams, Davis alluded to the strain of his workload. "(Practice tape) takes so goddamn long to go through," he lamented. "It takes three hours to go through offense, defense, special teams, looking at every player and watching what they're doing tactically, strategy and all."
As is his habit, he rambled from subject to subject. At one point, he said, "What I say to you is: five decades, five Super Bowls, four head coaches, four different quarterbacks." And: "I want to win. Obviously in life, I like certain things. I like beautiful women more than unbeautiful women. I'm not in any way demeaning the unbeautiful women. I want to win, and I will win, and we will win for the Raiders, and we'll get this thing straightened out."
He wears all white or all black. That hasn't changed, either; on this day, white was the choice. As he talked, he leaned on his walker, his face pasty-white and hollow, his eyes reddened, his left leg in a brace, both legs betraying him with every step. "I want to get this (leg) thing well -- it's tough," he admitted. "No one seems to have an answer." Davis won't say what is wrong; evidently it is a nerve problem that has defied treatment and cure.
Once, when he was younger, he was good enough to handle all of his multiple tasks at a superior level. But that was before the era of salary caps and free agents, before rules changes hindered his ability to run players in and out, to pay them what he wanted, to cut them at will. His best players were Raiders for life; Madden and Flores were his only coaches for 19 consecutive seasons.
January 18, 2007
Paul Attner
Sporting News
There won't be any postseason awards for these teams. They're the worst of the worst. In this week's magazine cover story, Sporting News examines how four franchises ended up in their current mess.
He arrives at the Raiders' practice complex, frequently at night, after most everyone has left. His driver opens the door for him and starts the laborious process of getting Al Davis out of his car and into his office. The driver takes Davis' weakened legs and turns them toward the pavement, then pulls him up so he can put his hands on his walker. Then Davis moves through the dark, slowly, methodically, until he disappears behind the doors at the center of Raider Nation.
The man who once would show off his vigor at league meetings by having workout equipment delivered to his room has seen his body fail him these past few years, just as his franchise, the one he has controlled and manipulated for the past 43 seasons, likewise has deteriorated. The once proud and arrogant Raiders -- winners of three Super Bowls, the self-proclaimed "Team of the Decades" -- now are contenders for another title: worst franchise in pro sports.
And at the center of everything wrong about the team is majority owner Davis, at 77 increasingly frail yet still firmly in charge of every aspect of the operation, unwilling to step aside, unwilling or unable to move out of the past and deal with today's NFL.
Davis and the Raiders exist in a world unlike any in the league. He surely must have been angered by this season and its 2-14 ugliness. Yet until he fired coach Art Shell on January 4, the most visible sign of displeasure from Davis over the past few months came after a perceived slight to his team's legacy. NFL Network ranked the top 20 all-time Super Bowl winners; it placed the Raiders' 1983 champions 20th. Davis was outraged; the organization sent out e-mails to national media questioning how the network could not rate the team as perhaps the best ever.
That legacy is all Davis has left, and he guards it with remarkable zeal. Everything about the Raiders is their past, the titles, the Hall of Fame players. But the present? The joke around the NFL is that no one does losing better than the Raiders. Even in the best of times, it is a dysfunctional organization. But the crushing pressure generated by losing this season created an ongoing soap opera of laughable proportions. One star receiver was suspended for complaining about a practice, another admitted he dropped passes because he didn't care, the head coach publicly accused a team personnel executive of undermining the organization to the media, the new quarterback wondered at one point, "What have I gotten into?"
The results on the field were truly embarrassing. The Raiders set franchise records for most losses and fewest points scored. In the Davis era, which began in 1963 when he became coach and general manager, they never had been shut out twice at home nor had they lost nine straight games; both happened this season. They finished last in the league in points (10.5 per game), offense (246.2 yards per game), sacks allowed (72), turnovers (46) and takeaway/giveaway differential (minus-23). How bad is bad? The Raiders lost to Houston despite holding the Texans to minus-5 yards passing. They had nary a touchdown in their last three games; LaDainian Tomlinson singlehandledly scored 15 more touchdowns than the Raiders this season.
But this was not an anomaly. Since losing Super Bowl 37 after the 2002 season, their 15-49 record is the worst in the NFL, outdoing even the pathetic Lions'. Over the past 12 years, Oakland has had three winning seasons, two while Jon Gruden was coach. Even more telling: The Raiders have not won a Super Bowl in 23 years and have played for the NFL title just once in that span. But until now, they never had suffered four consecutive losing seasons. Until now, they never had gone two years without a division win.
If Gruden had stayed, this current mess might not be happening. But he couldn't coexist with Davis, who disliked seeing his coach receive much of the credit for the team's success. Nor would Gruden abide by Davis' constant interference. Gruden welcomed a trade after the 2001 season that landed him in Tampa; he promptly coached the Bucs to a win over the Raiders in Super Bowl 37. In the five years since Gruden's departure, Davis has gone through three head coaches.
"Al had the coach he needed in Gruden," one NFL team official says. "If they had been able to work together, none of what you see now would have happened. But Al doesn't want anyone else to be in the spotlight but him. When people began saying Gruden was the reason the Raiders were good, it was only a matter of time before he was gone."
Once, coaching or playing for the Raiders was a gem on a resume. John Madden won a Super Bowl and is in the Hall of Fame. Tom Flores won two rings and might get in one day. Now, no proven head coach will work for Davis. And most high-profile candidates won't interview. After the 2005 season, the Raiders even were turned down by a college coach, Louisville's Bobby Petrino, who recently took over the Falcons. Shell's hiring a year ago was a desperate move; he was the loyal Raider who had been fired once, in 1994, by Oakland because he no longer met Davis' expectations. Davis still can sign some big-name free agents -- LaMont Jordan being the prime example -- if the money is right. But it's no longer an honor to be in a Raiders uniform.
The Raiders remain undaunted. Chief executive Amy Trask says that any view of them should embrace a bigger picture, that during this decade they've been to two AFC title games and won three AFC West championships, more than any division rival. "It's important that when you look at 2006, you look at it in the perspective of the last seven years," Trask says. "It is really only fair to look at it in that context. We've always been able to regain success. We can turn this around, and we will turn it around."
What does Davis think? The Raiders did not make him available for an interview.
Still, the common thread through all of this -- the reign of success, the decay into ineptness -- is Davis. Figuring out how the Raiders got into this present state of disrepair starts with him.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
There is no doubting that Davis is one of the great football men in NFL history. He already is in the Hall of Fame, and his immense intelligence and keen football instincts built the Raiders into one of the most successful, popular sports franchises ever. "Al is the last of a breed," says Ron Wolf, the former Packers general manager who worked 24 years with the Raiders and Davis. "He is brilliant and still very, very sharp. He knows every part of the franchise -- coaching, personnel, business. He was great in every area. But the game has changed so much -- it's so big now, it just is different from what it once was."
But Davis is not different. He continues to be the Raiders' personnel chief. He no longer attends practices, but he reviews practice tape. He has last say on lineup changes, on roster decisions, on hiring assistant coaches, on both the final setup of the draft board and players who are selected. He studies tapes of opponents and has significant input into game plans and schemes.
In his last public appearance, in the locker room December 17 after a loss to the Rams, Davis alluded to the strain of his workload. "(Practice tape) takes so goddamn long to go through," he lamented. "It takes three hours to go through offense, defense, special teams, looking at every player and watching what they're doing tactically, strategy and all."
As is his habit, he rambled from subject to subject. At one point, he said, "What I say to you is: five decades, five Super Bowls, four head coaches, four different quarterbacks." And: "I want to win. Obviously in life, I like certain things. I like beautiful women more than unbeautiful women. I'm not in any way demeaning the unbeautiful women. I want to win, and I will win, and we will win for the Raiders, and we'll get this thing straightened out."
He wears all white or all black. That hasn't changed, either; on this day, white was the choice. As he talked, he leaned on his walker, his face pasty-white and hollow, his eyes reddened, his left leg in a brace, both legs betraying him with every step. "I want to get this (leg) thing well -- it's tough," he admitted. "No one seems to have an answer." Davis won't say what is wrong; evidently it is a nerve problem that has defied treatment and cure.
Once, when he was younger, he was good enough to handle all of his multiple tasks at a superior level. But that was before the era of salary caps and free agents, before rules changes hindered his ability to run players in and out, to pay them what he wanted, to cut them at will. His best players were Raiders for life; Madden and Flores were his only coaches for 19 consecutive seasons.
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