I’m sure it’s crass perhaps even rude of me to compare DeAngelo Hall a professional football player to a terminal illness th

All’s not well in Raiderland

Oakland’s performance Monday night against the hated Denver Broncos and cocksure Super Bowl winning coach Mike Shanahan was abysmal. It is true that no one game can represent an entire sixteen game schedule but the Raiders season opener was horrendous and with arch-rivals Kansas City next up on the docket , followed by monster clashes against league power houses Buffalo and San Diego, the Raiders quickly find themselves in a must win situation.

Raiderland formally known as Outcastland

Raiders owner Al Davis has initiated a house cleaning that has seen a mass exodus of the very outcasts he once coveted. Al Davis, frequently referred to as the most ruthless man in NFL coined a phrase that has come to define the Raiders as an organization "just win, baby" which loosely translated means Raiders player can act with immunity in the Bay area provided the teams record was a winning won. It is widely believed of Al Davis that he would employ Charlie Manson himself to quarterback the Silver and Black if O’l Charlie could just guarantee the Raiders a playoff spot. The winds of change have begun to blow in off the Bay and the crisp Pacific air has filled the Raiders Nation with the optimism of youth (not that I’m calling anyone in the Raider Nation an optimist) Quarterback JaMarcus Russell 23, Ball Carrier Darren McFadden aka RunDMC 21 and Defensiveback Nnamdi Asomugha 27 spearhead a talented Raiders youth movement.

A movement needs a little Mo...as in momentum

Few outcast remain on the rebuilt Raider’s squad the went into the opening game of the 08/09 NFL season against the Denver Broncos. DeAngelo Hall the Raiders 31 year old starting right corner and one of the leftovers from the Raiders previous incarnation as the league detention centre is one of the NFL poorest decision makers and I’m not talking about broken plays or lost coverage here. In Monday nights game alone Hall who is suppose to be a Veteran and therefor one would assume a leader on a young Raiders team took not one foolish 15 yard unsportsmanlike conducts but two, on the same drive, with only one play separating volatile infractions. Denver for their part delivered scoring a touchdown on the drive and never looking back during the 34-14 drilling of their most hated division rival, Denver quarterback Jay Cutler 2 TD 235 yards spent the majority of day avoiding the Raiders pass defender N. Asomugha in favour of the aforementioned DeAngelo Hall.

If Al Davis and the Raiders intend to right the good ship Silver & Black, a good first step would be ridding themselves of the lingering internal cancer known as DeAngelo Hall.

I’m sure it’s crass perhaps even rude of me to compare DeAngelo Hall a professional football player to a terminal illness that has claimed the live of so many so I won’t, instead I will compare Hall to capital punishment, the death penalty, the gas chamber.

Al Davis is on the verge of turning the good ship Raider around. An abundance of young, talented athletes are at the centre of this mysterious shift and a player with Hall’s history, attitude and piss poor performance on Monday nights should not be permitted to hang around dropping random cyanide tablets that could easily land in the vicinity of one or more of these blessed young-men. We must protect the Deathstar!

Z. Black