Here are a couple of interesting tidbits from team press conferences Thursday at the NFL scouting combine.

Fox names Orton his starter “right now.”
New Broncos head coach Jon Fox told reporters that Kyle Orton and not Tim Tebow is his starting quarterback as of right now. Fox said that he’s interested to see how Tebow looks but noted, “As far as I’m concerned, (Orton) is under contract and he’s the starting quarterback for the Denver Broncos.” It’s not surprising that Fox would side with the more seasoned quarterback, seeing as how he refused to give up on Jake Delhomme in Carolina until the bitter end.

Titans don’t plan on meeting with Shockey
New Titans head coach Mike Munchak said that the team has no plans to speak with free agent Jeremy Shockey about coming to Tennessee. As I wrote the day the Saints released him, I see Shockey winding up in Miami to play under new OC Brian Daboll (who loves to use his tight ends, almost to a fault sometimes).

Henne is still the Dolphins’ starter
Speaking of Miami, GM Jeff Ireland referred to Chad Henne as his starter during his press conference on Thursday. It looks like Henne is the clear-cut favorite to enter the 2011 season as the Dolphins’ starting quarterback, although don’t rule out Miami taking a flier on someone like TCU’s Andy Dalton or Iowa’s Ricky Stanzi in the middle rounds.

Listen, don’t talk to Al Davis about no Calvin Johnson. Because while drafting JaMarcus Russell may have been a mistake, it’s not like that lousy Megatron has helped the Lions win many games over the years.

Or so says Davis.

From Mlive.com:

Here’s what Davis said about Oakland’s recent draft success:

“I think we’ve been very successful the last four. I think we’re always pretty good. The thing that hurt, is the question someone asked, JaMarcus hurt a great deal. But the ones they wanted to take instead of JaMarcus, Brady Quinn, hasn’t played yet.

“There was some talk of Calvin Johnson. But you can take a look at Calvin up at Detroit. How many games did they win this year, Detroit, do you know? Six? Yeah. But up until now, Calvin hadn’t done anything for them. He had been eulogized, but he hadn’t made a lot of indelible impression on the won and lost. Listen, someone asked the question, it’s there. The JaMarcus thing hurt.”

Oh, brother. Only Al Davis could admit to a mistake but then try to rectify it by saying something stupid.

Hey, I blew it by drafting JaMarcus Russell but it’s not like anyone else that we wanted panned out – especially that Calvin Johnson kid. After all, football is a one-man sport and Johnson only helped the Lions win six games last year so it’s not like he would have helped. And don’t forget people, we drafted Darrius Heyward-Bey two drafts later so we got our own Calvin Johnson eventually.

Johnson has 4,191 yards and 33 touchdowns thus far in his promising career. Russell is out of the league already. Big difference.

In a shocking development, Al Davis has decided that he wants to hire a new head coach.

According to ESPN’s Adam Schefter via his Twitter page, the Raiders have informed Tom Cable that they will not pick up his $2.5 million option for next season. Davis is extremely high on offensive coordinator Hue Jackson, who was being pursued by the 49ers. The Crypt Keeper still had another two weeks to decide whether or not to bring Cable back, but obviously the Niners’ interest in Jackson spooked the Oakland owner.

Nothing against Jackson, but Cable should have been retained. The Raiders finished 6-0 against the rest o the AFC West this year and outside of Steve Spagnuolo in St. Louis, no head coach did more with less. Beating the Broncos twice isn’t impressive but going 4-0 against the Chargers and Chiefs (who will host a playoff game this Sunday) certainly is. Cable deserved another year in Oakland but because Davis is infatuated with offense (and is also bat-sh*t crazy), he won’t get that opportunity.

Jackson oversaw an offense that improved from 4,258 yards in 2009 to 5,674 in 2010 and deserves a head-coaching opportunity. But not at the expense of Cable in my opinion. The man transformed the Raiders from one of the laughingstocks in the NFL after the Lane Kiffin debacle, to an actual contender. Hopefully he lands on his feet elsewhere.

Update: According to the San Francisco Chronicle, the Raiders have promoted OC Hue Jackson to head coach.

Following the Raiders’ 16-14 win over the Rams on Sunday, a game in which Bruce Gradkowski gave Oakland a lift after Jason Campbell was benched in the second half, head coach Tom Cable wouldn’t commit to any quarterback for Week 3.

Here’s what he said in his post-game presser (from the Oakland Tribune):

“(I) made the switch at halftime at quarterback, basically to just give the team a lift, felt like we needed to change up a little bit and my job is to win games and do whatever it takes to do that.’’

He said the Raiders “weren’t in rhythm, weren’t in synch,’’ and when asked what it meant for the rest of the season said, “ I’ll worry about all that tomorrow, really. I want to go look at it. But today was about winning this game, what did it take to do that, that was the right choice, obviously, and it worked out, and Bruce came in and gave us a lift.’’

But here’s what the team said he said:

Included in the quote sheet distributed by the team was this sentence from Cable: “Today was about winning the game, it does not necessarily mean Campbell is replaced as the quarterback for the rest of the season.”

That’s not what he said, so why would the team try to pull a fast one on the media and attempt to put out a fire that hasn’t even started yet? What Cable said was fine – he didn’t want to make any decisions regarding the quarterback position for next week. And why would he? His backup just earned him a victory when his starting quarterback failed him. Why commit to anything?

Al Davis loved JaMarcus Russell, but Cable didn’t. Russell wasn’t cut sooner than he should have because Davis was protecting his investment. Now Campbell is Al’s investment (he was the one that orchestrated the trade with Washington) and once again there appears to be a conflict of interest.

It’ll be interesting to see how Cable handles the situation this week and whether or not Campbell lines up under center next Sunday in Arizona, or if it’ll be Gradkowski. Something tells me Al would prefer it to be Campbell.

“I see this young Jason Campbell as a football player like I saw Jim Plunkett.”

Oh, Al Davis…you goofy bastard.

After completing just 8-of-15 passes for 87 yards and an interception on Sunday, Campbell was benched for Bruce Gradkowski in the second half of the Raiders’ 16-14 win over the Rams. Gradkowski immediately led the Raiders on a touchdown drive and finished 11-of-22 for 162 yards with one score and one interception.

While he wasn’t Jim Plunkett himself, Gradkowski certainly played better than Campbell, who may be in danger of losing his starting job just two weeks into the season. That’s a pretty amazing notion considering the Raiders thought Campbell would solve their issue at quarterback after JaMarcus Russell had infected the position the last three years.

Perhaps what’s most interesting about Gradkowski is that he’s played savior before. He led the Raiders to upset wins last year over the Bengals and Steelers and some thought that he should have received a look at the starting job before Campbell was acquired.

He may have won the job anyway.