Lane Kiffin, coach of the Oakland Raiders, proved once again that NFL coaches either don’t watch gamefilm, or if they do, obviously do not have a clue as to strategy. Let’s look at some of his decisions:
- Despite knowing he is playing a bear team with no offense, he declared early in the week that he would kick to Hester. Knowing the bears offense could not move the ball or beat them, he decided to give the bears’ special teams a chance to beat them. Late in the game, with the score tied 3-3 and the bears obviously doing nothing offensively, he kicked to Hester again, who returned it over 60 yards. Fortunately, a penalty wiped out the return, but what could Kiffin possibly have been thinking? The bears had 3 points and were not an offensive threat, but Hester is always a threat.
- With Oakland leading 6-3 with about 3:30 left, Grossman completed a 59-yard bomb to Berrian to give the bears the lead and the game. I said all last year and all this year that Grossman likes to go deep on first down, almost always to Berrian. If coaches watched gamefilm, they would understand this. This play was largely responsible for the bears’ win over Seattle in last year’s playoffs. The only team to ever understand this was the Colts in the Super Bowl. This quote from Sports Illustrated shortly after the Super Bowl is exactly what I’ve been saying all along: “He likes to go deep on first down, ” Indy defensive coordinator Ron Meeks said, “so we let him throw into our Cover Two, sometimes even a three deep with the corners back and a safety in the middle. That…made it very rough for him.” With the game basically won, Kiffin did not understand this, and played a defense that allowed Grossman to complete the fly pattern to Berrian. How many times does this have to happen on first down until coaches realize this, especially in a case like today where it was late in the game and the game was on the line.