This is not a defense of Josh McDaniels. On the day he and GM Dave Ziegler were fired, the Raiders were 30th in the NFL in scoring, 31st in total yards and, with the returning rushing champ in Josh Jacobs, dead last in rushing. Ian Rapoport reported Sunday that players and coaches ripped McDaniels at a recent team meeting, with the coach present. McDaniels and Ziegler made a series of decisions that were not panning out—and that’s putting it mildly. (No one’s talking about the decisions that left the offensive line in tatters. Jimmy Garoppolo is going to be lousy if he isn’t protected well, and those desperate off-the-mark throws to Davante Adams last Monday in Detroit were reflections of a leaky line more than a bad quarterback.)
When I woke up Wednesday morning and saw the 1:09 a.m. ET news that McDaniels and Ziegler got fired, my first thought, after “Holy crap,” was the Albert Einstein quote: “Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.” There will be coaches who will want this job. GMs too. This is the NFL, and these are the storied Raiders. Owner Mark Davis will convince Lou Anarumo or Brian Johnson or some other Joe Hot Coordinator that this job is a jewel, or maybe he’ll fall in love with Raider-loving Antonio Pierce over the next two months and give him the full-time gig.
But re: Einstein, this should be a time of internal reflection by what’s become a circus of a franchise. Blame over the state of the Raiders falls on McDaniels and Ziegler, of course. But it’s certainly shared in this case. Mark Davis has been in charge of the Raiders since his father died in 2011. Pierce is Mark Davis’ eighth head coach. The previous seven have lasted 16, 36, 12, 49, 53, 13 and 25 games. How about installing seven coaches in one of the most high-profile coaching jobs on planet earth … and not one of them lasts even halfway into a fourth season? How about firing the latest coach 1.5 years into a six-year contract, with an estimated $50 million left to pay McDaniels? Shouldn’t the owner take some responsibility for that? Shouldn’t the owner take a lot of responsibility for that?
In the 11 full seasons (2012-’22) Mark Davis has run the franchise, the Raiders have averaged 6.45 wins a season, with zero playoff wins. Three team presidents in the last three years. The chief operating officer, Mike Newquist, was fired Friday. When does it end?
I covered the first round of the Raiders’ draft last April. In the draft room, I asked Davis what he thought of Ziegler and McDaniels entering year two of their regime. He said, “When we hired them, everybody thought we were trying to re-create the Patriots. That wasn’t it. I was trying to find two great football men. Now, this is their chance to build something. They’re young, they love football, and I’m thrilled with them.”
Six months later, both are gone. Isn’t it time for an intervention in Las Vegas?
Read more in Peter King’s full Football Morning in America column.