Bill Callahan, a cursed name in Lincoln, Nebraska.
As a Husker fan, I actively rooted against Nebraska in 2007. I wanted them to lose so they could fire Callahan faster. They succeeded beyond my wildest dreams, including a 76-39 loss to Kansas.
We finished the season 1-6. I was worried that 1 win may have been enough to inspire confidence, but they fired the coach and AD pretty much the next day!
My buddies said I wasn’t a “true fan” because I cared about the long-term.
So let me get this straight. The allegation is that Callahan hated his team so much that he sabotaged it…
… but that he waited nineteen games to do so, going 11-5 and finishing first in the AFC, and then winning two playoff games, both quite easily. Only then did he decide he hated the Raiders and wanted to sabotage them. That’s the claim, is it?
And it is but the merest coincidence that Oakland’s implosion happened against the one opposing coach in the world who was best suited to exploit Oakland’s weaknesses. Oh, and who happened to be armed with the best team in the NFL.
I am just a touch skeptical.
So there appears to be two conspiracy theories. One is that Callahan sabotaged the Raiders in 2003 by changing their entire game plan right before the SuperBowl. The other is that Callahan sabotaged the Raiders in 2003 by using a game plan that was so old that Jon Gruden knew from when he had coached the Raiders in 2001.
Does anyone know why this is surfacing now? Is it just a matter of super bowl pre-game story dredging, or is there somethig else to it?
I think it would be interesting to find out if the change to the gameplay isn’t what set off Robbins. Maybe he felt the change was too much to study and understand before the game and just cracked under the pressure.
Strange story. And why now? Why not last year, or 5 years ago? What is the motivation for this?
I hate the Raiders, but as others have mentioned, winning a Super Bowl can be a once in a lifetime opportunity (just ask Dan Marino). So, unless Al Davis ordered the change, I see no motivation for Callahan to do anything of the sort. If he wins, he has a ring. Forever. He would always be introduced as super bowl winning coach Bill Callahan. That’s too great to pass up, I would think. Just look at how Bill Cowher and Gruden have parlayed their super Bowl wins to successful announcing careers.
Am I really the only one who remembers hearing about this just a year or so after that Super Bowl? 2004, maybe 2005. Probably after he was fired. I don’t think the story was “sabotage!” at the time, just a few players bitching that Callahan screwed them over by ditching the gameplan at the last minute.
As for Robbins, Tim Brown says he (Robbins) begged Callahan not to change the plan and that maybe the added stress is what set him off.
I think anyone who makes it into the NFL whether as a player or a coach is too much of a competitor to throw any game, let alone a Super Bowl where the world is watching.
Brown is obviously full of shit. As Zac Crockett pointed out, the game plan was changed after Robbins ran off to Mexixco, not before. Adam Treu knew the standard pass-happy calls, not the run-heavy plan Callahan ostensibly installed specifically for the Bucs.
The whole concept is just too stupid for words. If Callahan won, he could name his price with any other NFL team, and it’s not as though the Buccaneers needed help to win. We had the #1 defense in the league (first in yards per play by a mile, first in pass defense by almost 500 yards, first in overall defense by more than 600, first in scoring defense by nearly 20% over the next team).
Robbins was off his depression medication and had an undiagnosed bipolar disorder. I think you guys are looking for rational explanations for an inherently irrational decision making process.
To me the most reasonable explanation is that it was just circumstances.
Gruden set up a good system for the Raiders. They were 8-8 in the 1998 and 1999 seasons, 12-4 in 2000, and 10-6 in 2001. Gruden apparently deserves a lot of credit for this (the Raiders had been 7-9 and 4-12 in the two seasons before he took over and the Buccaneers had been 10-6 and 9-7 in the two seasons before Gruden took over and they improved to 12-4).
Then Gruden left the Raiders and Callahan replaced him. But the Raiders were not a team in terrible shape like a new coach usually takes over. Callahan may not have felt the need to make major changes with a team that was already doing well. So the Raiders played using essentially the same system through the 2002 season and got a 11-5 record and beat the Jets and the Titans in the playoffs.
And then Callahan may have realized the implications of playing against Gruden in the SuperBowl. The system that had been working against other teams was not going to work against Gruden who knew its weaknesses. So Callahan had to scramble to make changes right before the game. The result was a fiasco as the Raiders played a combination of a new system they didn’t know well and an old system their opponents knew too well.
So, yes, you can fault Callahan for being in that position. But in his defense, his decisions hadn’t been that wrong - keeping the old system had given him an 11-5 season and a spot in the SuperBowl. And that system would have worked well against fifteen out of the sixteen teams he might have met in the SuperBowl. He just had the bad luck to find out with just one week’s notice that he was going to be playing against that sixteenth team.
Coaches plan ahead, though. By the time they got to the conference championship they would have known there was a 50-50 shot they would play the Raiders if they reached the Super Bowl. The story that the Raiders changed their game plan after Robbins’ episode and not before make a lot more sense.
Gruden doesn’t really deserve credit for the improvement in the Buccaneers. The defense was all Tony Dungy’s (and holdover Monte Kiffin’s) and the offensive improvement was basically down to the addition of Brad Johnson.
Good point. However, isn’t it possible that there was a triggering event? Even if it wasn’t this, it seems possible that SOMETHING set Robbins off. Perhaps it WAS as simple as not taking his meds.
I certainly don’t, but it makes sense that if these guys thought it happened, it would have been brought up before now.
I just don’t understand how this benefits ANYONE by bringing it up now. Especially the players, who sound a bit out there with the idea that Callahan would throw the SB. Even if they were in a sexual relationship, Callahan wouldn’t throw the SB. Since the idea they were in a sexual relationship is absurd, what other possible reason could there be? MONEY, of course… But just how much money would it take to get Calahan to screw his own team, and who would pay? Not Gruden. Not the Oakland Raider haters club. Not the gamblers… So who?