Oakland Raiders' owner Al Davis blasts Lane Kiffin as he names Tom Cable the replacement

September 30, 11:41 PMOakland Raiders ExaminerPatrick Patterson

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To the surprise of absolutely no one, Lane Kiffin was fired Monday as head coach of the Oakland Raiders. Al Davis held court for the media as he announced the change from Kiffin to Tom Cable. Al also did his best to paint Kiffin in as negative of a light as possible. 

On Lane Kiffin:

I just couldn’t go on much longer with the, what I would call, the propoganda, the lying, that had been going on for weeks, and months, and a year, and time.

Wow, Davis decided to just let it all hang out in what was probably the single most blunt firing press conference in the history of sports. He definitely wanted to make sure that the Raider Nation would be supportive of his move.

It was after his, false accusations on a Wednesday night, about the defense belonging to Al Davis and Kiffin, and attacking Rob Ryan publicly, which was unfair, unheard of in professional football that the head coach would attack one of his assistants.

It was speculated that the blowup between Kiffin and defensive coordinator Rob Ryan played a role in his firing, but Davis again let it all out. Not only is Davis looking to garner the support of the Nation, he is likely sabotaging Kiffin's chances to get hired again elsewhere.

But, he said, ‘We can’t win.  We gotta’ get a rookie quarterback to win.  We can’t win with this.’  So I said to him, ‘What do you mean you can’t win?’  And he said, ‘Well, we can’t win.’  And I said, ‘Then do the honorable thing.  If you don’t think you can win, resign.  If you don’t think you can win resign.  I don’t know what you’re talking about.’

Now this is a rather cryptic statement. Ultimately, it appears that Davis is saying that Kiffin had no faith in JaMarcus Russell, nor the rest of his team. This seems to be the origin of the whole "Davis told Kiffin to quit" rumor. If Kiffin truly didn't think he could do the job, that may have been the best course of action.

So, he was after a job in college that he didn’t get.  And it’s amazing how Bobby Petrino took the job.  They had called me, he didn’t realize they had called me.  A friend of mine who’s very big at the University of Arkansas, called me and said, ‘They’re interested in Lane Kiffin.  What do you think?’  I said, ‘Let him finish the season, and do what you want, whatever he wants.  Finish the season.’  They said, ‘O.k., we’ll wait.’  However, Petrino had a chance to get the job and that’s why he, really, left Atlanta sooner than the season was over, because he wanted to beat Lane for the job.  Lane was upset as hell about it, and went after some other job.  And Lane said to me this, ‘Will you let me go and not ask for any penalties if I leave and go to a college job, or go to another job.’  I said, ‘Lane, if you say that you’re not gonna’ get paid, if you’re gonna’ resign, I’ll certainly let you go right after the season.’

So much for Lane Kiffin's bold statement about not being a quitter. It seems that the rumors were true that he was trying to bolt the Raiders before the end of his rookie season. This definitely puts the entire saga in a different light. Perhaps the most telling statement was recorded by Tim Kawakami, of the confronted by John Herrera fame, in a post conference talk with Davis

I think he conned me like he conned all you people.

It was time for the change to happen. The rumors and drama have been hanging around for far too long. In being introduced Tom Cable said,

I have always been a Raider.

Maybe this is finally the fresh start the franchise needs. At least they should resemble a normal functional football team for at least the remainder of the season.