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Raiders' Gruden could look elsewhere
Posted: Sunday November 21, 1999 01:52 PM
Sports Illustrated senior writer Peter King spoke with CNNSI anchor Bob Lorenz prior to the start of games of Week 11 of the NFL season: Bob Lorenz: With Al Davis as the owner, the coaching situation with the Raiders is always interesting. He's often making moves. But there are rumors now about the coach considering a move -- what's the story there? Peter King: Jon Gruden is a highly-regarded offensive mind, both in college and pro football. And so one of the guys LSU will target for its vacant coaching spot is Gruden, the 36-year-old Raiders' head coach. Now why would Gruden be interested in this? Well, because he could have total authority over the entire program at LSU instead of having Al Davis look over his shoulder at all times. I talked to Gruden on Saturday and he said, "Look, I love my job. I'm not interested in adding to any of the speculation. We'll see what happens." So I don't put it out of the realm of possibility that Gruden could emerge as a serious candidate in a month or so as the coach down in Baton Rouge. BL: The Redskins defense continues to struggle; it gave up 35 points in the loss last week to Philadelphia. What's the latest on Norv Turner's "make the playoffs or else" saga? PK: Redskins owner Daniel Snyder has told me that Turner has to make the playoffs impressively -- not just by sneaking in -- to keep his job. I talked to Snyder this week and he is not going to fire Turner during the season; that will not happen. But after the season I'd expect him to look for a defensive-minded coach to come in to try and straighten out this defensive mess. With six former first-round draft choices and eight jillion dollars in defensive tackles with Dan Wilkinson and Dana Stubblefield, they're still last in the league against the run. Look for Marty Schottenheimer or Bill Belichick, or maybe they'll even reach into the college ranks to Nick Saban, a solid defensive coach at Michigan State, to come in. BL: We've talked about potential future changes for the Redskins, but there is already a change on Sunday: the changing of the name of their stadium to FedEx Field. What does this mean for what they do on the field? PK: Starting in the year 2000, Federal Express is going to pay the Washington Redskins $7.6 million a year to have their company's name on the outside of that stadium. What this means is very simple. Chasing free agents is a cash business. Next year the Redskins are going to be in line to get a huge pass-rusher. The best guy, by far, who's going to be out there is Simeon Rice, the NFL's sack leader who almost certainly will not be re-signed by the Cardinals because he'll ask for too much money. This will be an easy signing for the Redskins: I look for Rice to become the first $8 million pass-rusher in football. BL: The Cowboys get Emmitt Smith back on Sunday. But the question isn't who will play, but who won't be' PK: The big issue in Dallas right now is when Troy Aikman will be coming back after having suffered two concussions in eight days. I talked to Jerry Jones Saturday night; they're not saying definitively but there's no question the Cowboys expect Aikman to play Thursday against Miami. The other big question around the Cowboys revolves around Deion Sanders, who's been nursing a strained groin. Even of more concern, though, is that Deion is considering playing baseball again. His agent has been in discussion with the Cincinnati Reds, and what concerns the Cowboys about this is that Deion cannot stay healthy for football season. He has not been totally healthy for the last three years in the NFL and he's thinking about baseball? This is going to have a huge impact when his contract is re-opened after this season. There's no question he's going to have to re-do his contract because he's got a $10.5 million cap number next year. If he decides to play baseball, his money in football will go way down. BL: Damon Huard gets the start again this week but what's going on overall with the Dolphins' quarterbacking situation? PK: For the first time since Damon Huard has been with the Dolphins, he got hit with both barrels from Jimmy Johnson this week in practice. Johnson felt that Huard was throwing to receivers instead of throwing to a spot, which is really what you're supposed to do. Johnson is trying to get the receivers to run real disciplined pass routes. He screamed at Huard and said, "You throw it to that spot. If they miss it, it's their fault, it's not yours." So there's a little bit of tension now because Huard really hasn't put enough points on the board for Miami to win. That brings us to Dan Marino. Marino has yet to practice full-go in a scrimmage with the Dolphins since injuring his neck over a month ago. I think what you're going to see is that on Monday, Dan Marino will attempt to practice at full speed. If he can do it, practice Monday and Tuesday and he's okay, he will play Thursday against the Cowboys. But if he still has weakness in that neck, forget it: he's off until December 5 against Indianapolis. BL: Bill Walsh told Dick Vermeil after the Rams' win over San Francisco in October "You guys are going all the way." These two teams play each other again Sunday. The Rams' future seems bright while the Niners' future looks pretty bleak, doesn't it? PK: The bad part about the Niners right now is you've got Bill Walsh coming out this week and basically saying that the team is planning for the future without Steve Young right after Young tells coach Steve Mariucci that he'll be back in 2000, that he'll definitely be playing. I sat down with Jerry Rice on Friday and one of the things he told me was that he went into the team meeting after last Sunday's loss to New Orleans and told his teammates, "I don't want to go out like this. You guys have got to grow up and be better players." There's a lot of dissatisfaction, bordering on dissension, with this team.
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