By now everyone knows how I feel about Tom Cable. He was a great position coach but I didn't think he had what it took to be a head coach. To everyone's surprise, Tom progressed through the year and proved to fans that he wasn't just some big dumb glut.
It's not as if I blame Cable; there isn't a coach in the NFL that would turn down a head coaching job. Al put Tom in a very compromising position when Al decided to make him head coach. Al has burned bridges with just about every well known coach in the NFL and doesn't have much to chose from. Al is famous for micro-managing his coaching staff to the point that it has become a well known fact throughout the NFL.
By the end of the 2009 season, most players felt that Tom was Al's personal hand puppet and didn't want anything to do with him. But when the 2010 season kicked off I was very impressed by the confidence and talent the Oakland Raiders coaching staff had generated during the off-season.
Not many were totally convinced that Tom was the man for the job; I wasn't until I spoke to several of the players in the preseason. A large majority of the team had a good feeling about the 2010 season mainly because Tom had made so many positive changes during the offseason.
I was also surprised to hear that Tom had stood up to Al on many occasions during the offseason on the behalf of the players. When a coach can step into the position that Tom did and gain the respect of the most elite athletes in the world, he must be doing something right.
Since Cable was fired, Al has been in fr...
Article Source: Bleacher Report - Oakland Raiders
