Tag: Oakland Raiders (Page 18 of 33)

Is Eli’s foot getting better?

The New York Daily News reports that Eli Manning showed no limp while jogging and walking through drills at practice on Friday.

Manning, who hasn’t practiced all week, did have his injured right heel tightly wrapped under his sock and shoe, but he did not appear to be favoring it as he jogged and high-stepped through the pre-practice warmup. He also showed no ill-effects from the injury as he took part in the first-team offense’s walkthrough against the scout team. He was able to take snaps, drop back, hop in the pocket and throw with no obvious signs of pain or discomfort.

Of course, the media was positioned about 60 or so yards away from Manning, and we are only permitted to watch the first 20 or so minutes of practice. The Giants did little in that time that would truly indicate whether Manning will be able to play on Sunday against the Oakland Raiders.

Perhaps the only hint came when he took some snaps with the first-team offense, indicating there’s at least a chance. However, it should be noted that when the walkthrough drills began, David Carr took the first snaps with the starters.

The doctors have already told Manning that he won’t hurt foot anymore by playing on it, but that doesn’t mean he won’t be affected by the injury on game day.

Carr can turn around and hand the ball to Brandon Jacobs if need be to get the Giants a win over the Raiders this Sunday. But if the Giants need him to throw the ball to win, they could be in trouble.

It’ll be interesting to see what Tom Coughlin and the Giants decide to do with Manning over the weekend. He’ll likely be a game time decision.

Raiders head coach Cable to be arrested soon?

According to a report by Yahoo! Sports, Oakland Raiders head coach Tom Cable could soon be arrested for an altercation during training camp in which he fought with assistant Randy Hanson.

“Everybody is trying to figure out who’s going to take over if Tom isn’t here,” said an assistant coach, who spoke on the condition of anonymity. “John Marshall has a lot of experience, he’s probably the guy. But it’s nuts. It’s crazy when you start to really think about it.”

Although Napa Valley (Calif.) police have declined to comment on the investigation, NFL.com quoted the attorney for Raiders assistant coach Randy Hanson as saying that Hanson told police he had been assaulted by Cable on Aug. 5 while the Raiders were in training camp. Hanson was treated for a broken jaw and his attorney, San Francisco-based John McGuinn, said three other coaches, including Marshall, witnessed the attack.

McGuinn did not return three messages left by Yahoo!, but told NFL.com that the situation was “a textbook case of felony assault.”
These types of situations have a tendency to be overblown, but this is example 100,000,001 why the Raiders are the most dysfunctional team in the NFL.

The ironic part is that Al Davis probably loved how Cable handled the situation.

Fanhouse ranks the best & worst NFL organizations

NFL Fanhouse ranked the six best and worst organizations in football.

Top 3:

1. New England: OK folks, start with the rants. Yes, they cheated, but so do other people. Don’t argue with three Super Bowl titles since 2001 and an unbeaten regular season in 2007. Bill Belichick has built by taking players who fit his system over one-dimensional stars. Yes, they’ve been a little less successful drafting lately, and there’s a brain drain — Scott Pioli to Kansas City, Thomas Dimitroff to Atlanta, Josh McDaniels to Denver, Eric Mangini to New York and Cleveland, and (whoops) Charlie Weis to Notre Dame.

2. Pittsburgh: Continuity means three coaches over 40 years, with a record six Super Bowl wins. Dan Rooney, his son Art and the rest of the front office has hired superbly and drafted well. They know luck plays a part — if the Giants hadn’t been able to trade for Eli Manning, they would have drafted Ben Roethlisberger and maybe the Steelers wouldn’t have won two titles in four years. But they get premier players with low picks and develop talent — when it doesn’t gel at first, it still seems to work in the long-run, like with James Harrison, cut and re-signed a bunch of times until he developed into the league’s most dangerous pass rusher.

3. Baltimore: One title this decade and little change at the top, other than the dismissal of Brian Billick after the 2007 season. Who replaced him? John Harbaugh, who fans didn’t know and wasn’t on anyone’s “hot list.” Record so far: 16-6. The continuity comes from Ozzie Newsome, who has been running the personnel operation since 1996 after going straight from a Hall of Fame career on the field to the front office. Twenty-five teams passed on Ray Lewis before Newsome took him and 23 passed on Ed Reed. Joe Flacco looks like the next great QB (if Matt Ryan isn’t already it).

Bottom 3:

30. Oakland: For nearly 40 years after becoming coach in 1963, Al Davis was an innovative thinker. Now he’s an embittered owner, repeating out-of-date slogans, wasting money on players nobody else wants and letting his staff intimidate critics. If he let his CEO, Amy Trask, hire a football guy, it could be consistently better. The Richard Seymour deal was Snyderesque, mortgaging a first-round pick for a declining star. .

31. Cleveland: Why did Randy Lerner jump so quickly to hire Mangini, who treats his players like high school kids? The Browns are 54-110 since returning to the NFL in 1999. Enough said.

32. Detroit: Matt Millen is a very good broadcaster.

I feel bad for the Ford family in regards to the Lions, because they’re a very loyal group that is willing to stick by their hires even when things get rough. That said, they stuck by Millen too long and he wound up dragging the franchise into the depths of hell.

What’s amazing about Oakland is that Al Davis does have an eye for talent. He just operates off emotion and makes decisions on a whim. The Raiders would be much better off if he allowed some else to run the day-to-day operations, but that will never happen.

Seymour has five days to report to Raiders

The Raiders have sent defensive end Richard Seymour (whom they acquired from the Patriots last week in exchange for a 2011 first round pick) a letter notifying him that he has five days to report to the team or else he’ll be suspended.

From ESPN.com:

Once the Raiders sent the letter, it imposed a deadline on both sides, with plenty to lose for each. Oakland could lose the player it covets, and Seymour could lose a season of earning $3.685 million.

“I don’t have any knowledge of that right now,” Cable told the Associated Press when asked about the letter. “I’ve heard something about that, but I have no knowledge of that right now. It has been nothing more than just trying to get some of these details worked out, that’s it.”

The Raiders didn’t even call Seymour to make sure that if they did follow through with a trade that he would report. And now they’re threatening him with a letter? Wow.

Al Davis is out a 2011 first round pick and the player he acquired is AWOL two days before the first game. Typical Raiders.

Does Seymour want a new contract before reporting to Oakland?

According to NFL.com’s Jason La Canfora, he does:

Given what I have heard today, I’d be very surprised to see Richard Seymour in Oakland without a new contract. Seymour has one year left on his existing deal and is less than thrilled about being dealt from New England to Oakland yesterday.

Short of agreeing to a long-term deal, this situation remains sticky. The sides have a few days to figure things out, and contrary to what Raiders coach Tom Cable said today, there are no issues between Seymour and the Patriots to resolve, according to New England and league sources. It’s the norm for veterans of Seymour’s stature to get new deals as part of such trades, and given how much the Raiders parted with to get him — a 2011 first-round pick — there is not much disputing his worth.

One would think that if Al Davis was willing to give up a first round pick to acquire Seymour then he’d also be willing to pay the defensive end what he wanted. Chances are that Davis would have tried to overpay for Seymour once he became a free agent this offseason, so it would be a little surprising to see him not work out a deal now with the defensive end.

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