I have been watching football for thirty years ( I actually watched
the Miracle of the Meadowlands when it happened.), and one constant has been Al Davis' vehement denial of an obvious fact: He constantly meddles with the Oakland Raiders, and his coaches are just puppets, from John Rauch to John Madden, Tom Flores (the best of the bunch), Mike Shanahan, Art Shell and so on...
This worked well enough for twenty years, when the Raiders became the professional sports team with the best winning percentage. It fell off for much of the 1990s (when Shanahan won two Super Bowls coaching the Broncos after Davis fired him and refused to pay his salary), but thanks to Jon Gruden the Silver & Black were once again a championship caliber team. However, Davis couldn't quit screwing with his coaches, so Gruden left for Tampa (winning a Super Bowl there instead of Oakland). Since then, the Faders have been the laughingstock of the NFL. All the while, Al Davis denies that his meddling is what causes the problem.
Well, Warren Sapp (who played for the Raitards until the end of last season) told
Inside the NFL that it's actually
worse than anyone imagined. According to Sapp, the Crypt Keeper was scrapping game plans the team had worked on all week, and was sending in plays from the owner's box upstairs in the middle of games!
I think I speak for all Charger, Chief and Donkey fans when I say: Nice going, Al!