Raiders officially release massive bust Russell
Posted by Anthony Stalter (05/06/2010 @ 4:59 pm)
Al Davis has finally decided to cut the cord on JaMarcus Russell, who is currently competing with Ryan Leaf for biggest draft bust in NFL history. The 24-year-old quarterback was officially released on Thursday, just three seasons after he was selected as the top pick in the 2007 draft.
Somewhere, Lane Kiffin is laughing. He was the one that urged Davis not to draft Russell in ’07, but against his head coach’s wishes, Al selected the LSU product anyway. Russell finishes his career in Oakland with a 7-18 record, a 52.1 completion percentage, an 18:33 touchdown-to-interception ratio and a 65.2 passer rating. Comparing the numbers, I think Craig Krenzel may have produced better numbers.
At this point, there won’t be many teams (if any) lining up to sign the former first overall pick. Even a quarterback-hungry team like the Bills will likely stick with what they currently have on their roster, despite the fact that Russell can throw the ball the length of 87 football fields while sitting down. Everyone outside of Al Davis realizes that if a quarterback isn’t accurate, doesn’t want to work hard and takes half a season to get into shape, then it doesn’t matter how far he can throw.
It seems as if Russell just wants to take his big payday from the NFL and walk off into the distance with it. And maybe that’s exactly what he should do.
Photo from fOTOGLIF
Was Al Davis right about Lane Kiffin?
Posted by Anthony Stalter (01/13/2010 @ 6:20 pm)
Peter Schrager of FOXSports.com points out that maybe Al Davis was right when he called Lane Kiffin out for being a liar.
Back in October 2007, the media jumped to call Al Davis everything from “crazy” to “senile” when the Raiders owner fired Kiffin under the most bizarre circumstances imaginable. With an overhead projector exhibiting a hand written letter he had penned to Kiffin, Davis referred to his then 32-year-old coach as a “flat-out liar” and said he was guilty of “bringing disgrace to the organization.”
On June 8, 2009, the Raiders organization issued a statement about Lane Kiffin’s hiring at Tennessee. The statement read: “Lane Kiffin is a flat-out liar. He lied to the team, he lied to the fans, and he lied to the media. He will try to destroy that university like he tried to destroy the Raiders.”
At the time it was released, the media viewed it as nothing more than sour grapes. In hindsight, Davis was right on the money. Once a weasel, always a weasel.
Now, the rat will have his cheese (and some wine) in Southern California.
After he fired Kiffin in ’07, Davis famously noted, “It hurts because I picked the guy. I picked the wrong guy.”
The University of Tennessee now knows just how Davis felt.
And if history tells us anything, so — eventually — will USC.
See, I told you Al Davis wasn’t crazy.
It is amazing how Lane Kiffin stormed into Knoxville, made all of these brash comments about turning UT into a winner, attacked other SEC coaches, brought in some recruits that would later be arrested for armed robbery and then left the program after only one season. That’s freaking unbelievable.
