The Oakland Raiders entered Super Bowl 37 against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers with one of the best offenses and football and real shot to win that game.
The Raiders were subsequently blown out 48-21 that day, and now some 10 years later according to Pro Football Talk, Hall Of Fame finalist Tim Brown is putting former Raiders coach Bill Callahan on blast, and suggesting that his former coach “sabotaged” the Raiders that day.
“We get our game plan for victory on Monday, and the game plan says we’re gonna run the ball,” Brown said Saturday on SiriusXM NFL Radio, which provided us with the audio. “We averaged 340 [pounds] on the offensive line, they averaged 280 [on the defensive line]. We’re all happy with that, everybody is excited. [We] tell Charlie Garner, ‘Look, you’re not gonna get too many carries, but at the end of the day we’re gonna get a victory. Tyrone Wheatley, Zack Crockett, let’s get ready to blow this thing up.’”
Brown says Callahan then blew the whole thing up, and switched to a pass heavy game plan.
“We all called it sabotage . . . because Callahan and [Tampa Bay coach Jon] Gruden were good friends,” Brown said. “And Callahan had a big problem with the Raiders, you know, hated the Raiders. You know, only came because Gruden made him come. Literally walked off the field on us a couple of times during the season when he first got there, the first couple years. So really he had become someone who was part of the staff but we just didn’t pay him any attention. Gruden leaves, he becomes the head coach. . . . It’s hard to say that the guy sabotaged the Super Bowl. You know, can you really say that? That can be my opinion, but I can’t say for a fact that that’s what his plan was, to sabotage the Super Bowl. He hated the Raiders so much that he would sabotage the Super Bowl so his friend can win the Super Bowl. That’s hard to say, because you can’t prove it.
“But the facts are what they are, that less than 36 hours before the game we changed our game plan. And we go into that game absolutely knowing that we have no shot. That the only shot we had if Tampa Bay didn’t show up.”
I’m not sure what to say at this point. Is Brown who is a Hall of Fame finalist trying to get himself some attention as all the Super Bowl festivities start?
Is Brown potentially ruining his chances of being name to the Hall of Fame this year with such negative talk? He stopped short of saying Callahan basically gift wrapped Jon Gruden a Super Bowl, but you can see what he was saying.
My question is why now?