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Monte Kiffin looks like a sidekick to an old-time western movie star. His face is thin, lined and Florida tanned, and he sort of crackles when he talks. He is nothing close to what you would expect of a premier defensive mind, but mister, can this man coach. He''s been at it 20 years in the NFL, seven with the Bucs, a career assistant with gifts matched by very few of his peers.In a Super Bowl full of these dark and shining story lines, Kiffin''s aw-shucks spiderman costumes kids and costumes demeanor isn''t going to command the room. but his schemes will envelop the raiders'' offensive coaching staff, for sure, in the days and hours before this championship game."they put you to an extreme mental kids test," says chris palmer, the texans'' offensive coordinator. "what they do is not extremely spiderman complicated. but it is executed incredibly well costumes by a lot of great kids athletes. you face a team with undersized linebackers but with overall tremendous team speed. they say speed kills. tampa is a perfect example." it is so tempting to project the demise of the raiders, this brooding franchise with its paranoid owner and obsession with greatness and slights, real and spiderman imagined. you can hear it now, the way they costumes will proclaim ad nauseam their virtues and achievements, ignoring how they haven''t been to a super bowl since the 1983 season--a lapse that threatens their self-labeled "team of the decades" boast.they will drag with them the worst fans in football, weirdos who buy tickets for the right to act as if they come from some faraway planet covered in silver and black. these strange folks are reason enough to wonder about a raiders win.yet win they will. there is something to how planets align at times, falling nearly into place even in the nfl universe. this is the raiders'' time, the next step in their progression. beaten by the ravens in the afc title game after kids the 2000 season, by the infamous tuck rule in last season''s playoffs, they have cleared away all but one obstacle this season. and it just happens to be, of all folks, jon gruden, the admired chucky whose national persona, of course, was molded as the coach of these very same raiders.
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