http://www.mercextra.com/blogs/kawak...cuse-for-2008/
Lane Kiffin, to his credit, isn’t picking the easy, political, non-confrontational way to survive in Al Davis’ shadow.
Less than a year into his Raiders coaching career, Kiffin is picking the hard way, which is gutsy enough to show he deserves a nice spirited run and also arrogant enough to display why he might blow himself up in the process.
In other words: He’s not a patsy like Art Shell or Norv Turner, and he’s not nearly as accomplished as Jon Gruden.
Somewhere in between. Right now, Kiffin’s a bold young coach who’s only getting older and bolder. Which means he has a chance to make this work. The only chance you get under Al.
Immediately after finishing 4-12 in his otherwise fairly impressive rookie season as head coach, Kiffin is knocking around some of Davis’ favorite pins. He’s challenging the Davis status quo.
Mostly, Kiffin is maneuvering to unseat incumbent defensive coordinator Rob Ryan, one of the few defensive coaches in Raiders history to retain Davis’ backing over a long period.
That’d be quite a feat, if Kiffin can pull it off, and it does appear that he’s about to, even if it comes contrary to the general wishes of The Al.
“I didn’t know Lane had that kind of power,” one NFL source said wryly Tuesday when I asked if there was league scuttle-butt about Rob Ryan’s departure and eventual landing spot. “Are you sure that he does?”
That’s what we’re all here to find out.
Pending Al activity, apparently Kiffin does have that juice, or at least Al is letting us believe that Kiffin has it, since there has been no eruption out of Mt. Raider to indicate otherwise.
Hey, Kiffin showed a lot in his rookie year: He can lead, he can think, he’s not a flashy poser, he can be independent, he might turn out to be something.
But he only went 4-12. In a lot of places, that gets you fired. With the Raiders in 2007, it was a big push forward.
So Kiffin probably deserves to pick the key assistants on his staff. Few Raiders coaches get that right and very few get to over-rule AD on the defensive coordinator spot, since that’s the spot Al himself admits that interests him the most.
Just last year, Al helpfully pointed out that Bill Belichick knew that Al mostly plotted defense, as every Raiders defensive coordinator of the last 40 years would confirm.
Al hires offensive-minded coaches to be the head coach. Always. He thinks the offense has to be run by a top guy.
Then Al hires the defensive coordinator, sets up the system, reviews the whole thing on a daily/hourly basis and what we’ve seen through the years, pretty much every year, is:
* A big, four-man line.
* Very little blitzing.
* Versatile linebackers.
* Man to man coverage on the outside with fast cornerbacks.
* Hard-hitting safeties–or safeties who you’d think can hit hard if they could just get into a play without taking terrible angles.
That’s the Al formula. That’s what has driven so many other coordinators crazy over the years, especially the last decade or so.
But Al found a kindred spirit with Rob Ryan when he signed on after the Callahan purge.
Ryan could tinker with a 3-4 at times, but since he was bringing that from Belichick’s Patriots team, Al let him do it a little, as long as Rob switched back to 4-3 most of the time.
Ryan is a get-after-’em coach, who likes to play man-to-man on the outside and let his LBs chase down stuff from sideline to sideline–again, very much Al.
Ryan knows personnel–hello, Kirk Morrison–and Al loves that.
Ryan’s players love him, which Al really respects.
So if Kiffin wants something different, something more like what his dad Monte Kiffin runs in Tampa–the Cover 2, which is also a four-man line, but is much safer on the outside and is basically a bend-but-don’t-break model–then he should probably get it.
I doubt Monte himself would seriously contemplate moving from his base in Tampa to the Raiders, since:
* He already makes more money than Al would ever pay him (Monte makes more than Lane);
* He has a good thing in Tampa (even if Jon Gruden goes, Monte stays if he wants);
* And he’s 68, so why pick up and move across the country only to get bugged by Al every time the Raiders don’t hold the opponent under 300 yards?
But Kiffin should get his own guy, possibly running a Cover 2 style with more deep zones and his own personnel.
Still, it’s a risky proposition for Kiffin, for two reasons.
* Rob Ryan could be headed to the New York Jets, but I also heard he could be hearing from a lot of other teams. That wouldn’t be a surprise at all.
What if San Diego calls? Or Denver? Hmm, if Rob Ryan ends up at one of those two teams, and they do some Raider butt-kicking in 2008, Al is not going to like that.
And he is going to hold someone accountable and that person is going to be in Raider HQ, every day of his remaining Raider career.
* And what if the Raiders defense–which, I concede, wasn’t very good this season–falls apart in 2008? Which is very possible given the still-anemic state of the offense.
(That is another point: Kiffin’s an offensive guy, and that offense isn’t very good. I’ll give him a year or two to figure it out, but Rob Ryan is more accomplished in this league that Kiffin.)
If the new def-coor isn’t Monte Kiffin, it has to be somebody rising or somebody falling–you’re not going to get a good established guy to come into this situation, not with Al sitting there.
You’re going to get someone like Greg Knapp, who took a thankless job as Kiffin’s off-coor because he needed a job.
So if the defense falters–again, remember, the players love Ryan–then Kiffin isn’t going to look very good.
This year, when the defense gave up big plays, it was Ryan’s fault. Now, if Kiffin does a defense retro-fit… it’s on Kiffin.
That’s why this move is risky, why it’s bold, and why I’m sure Kiffin knows he has to do it–to maintain his independence–and I’m sure he knows it could get him fired.
I respect him for that. But that also means he’s treading into dangerous water.
Raiders make DL Kelly $50.5 million man
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