Raiders: A brawl, a rain storm, a victory

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By Art Spander

OAKLAND — Where did Ken Norton watch the game? We know that for the first time in three seasons it wasn’t from the Raiders sidelines. We also know that the Raider defense, the one under the direction of Norton until early last week, on Sunday finally recorded its first interception of the season — in the 11th game — and Oakland played its best defense in a while.

How much did that have to do with head coach Jack Del Rio dumping Norton as defensive coordinator and replacing him with John Pagano? How much did that have to do with facing the quarterback-challenged Denver Broncos?

Maybe some of both. Maybe none of either. After all, the talk was that Del Rio really makes the calls on defense.

He or Pagano made the right ones on a rainy Sunday at the Coliseum. At least until the fourth quarter. It was Oakland’s game from the start, and then, whew, after a great call and maneuver on a third-and-eight from the Raider 15 with two and half minutes to go, Derek Carr to Cordarrelle Patterson for 54 yards, it was Oakland’s game at the end, 21-14.

It wasn’t the Patriots the Raiders were playing. Or the Redskins. Or even the Colts, teams that had beaten Oakland. But the victory cannot be dismissed. Especially with Kansas City losing again — five of the last six — and leaving the Raiders at 5-6, only one game behind the 6-5 Chiefs.

The teams play in two weekends at K.C., where Oakland never wins. Still, with the New York Giants coming to the Coliseum on Sunday, and even the 49ers beat the Giants, the Raiders would appear in better position for the playoffs than a few days back.

“Nice to be able to deliver,” said Del Rio, “and come out with a hard-fought victory.”

And he didn’t mean the near-brawl that began some three minutes into the game, when Oakland receiver Michael Crabtree, carrying a year’s grudge, went after Denver cornerback Aqib Talib, apparently because last season Talib grabbed a chain hanging from Crabtree’s neck.

Before anyone knew it, they and numerous others were punching and grabbing along the Broncos’ sideline. When the battling finally stopped, Crabtree, Talib and Oakland guard Gabe Jackson had been ejected. “We can’t afford to lose one of our top receivers and then our starting guard," said Del Rio. “I like to count on my guys to do the right thing.”

Which their teammates did on the field, on defense, Denver gaining only 51 yards its first 10 offensive plays, and on offense, the Raiders totaling 348 yards, 67 of those on 26 carries by the guy nicknamed Beast Mode, the local, Marshawn Lynch — who also caught three passes for 44 yards.

“We wanted to possess the ball,” Del Rio said — which definitely they managed to do, keeping it almost 36 minutes of the total 60.

“We wanted to run the ball,” he said. “I think I made a statement earlier in the week that Marshawn coming back from the one-game suspension, I feel like he’s come back with more purpose, resolve, whatever it might be. He’s come back operating in a way that’s good for us. Very decisive and very purposeful about his running and approach.”

You’d never find out as much from the subject himself. Lynch rarely talks.  

Crabtree was tossed, and Oakland’s other key receiver, Amari Cooper, was leveled in the second quarter by Darien Stewart on what was called unnecessary roughness. Cooper left with what was believed to be a concussion.

“It was a vicious hit,” Del Rio insisted. “The kind we’re trying to remove from the game. Those are the kinds of impact hits that don’t need to be part of the game. The guy is clearly defenseless and got targeted right in the head.”

The Raiders will learn more about Cooper‘s recovery and about Crabtree’s penalty as the days go. What they already learned was that, when needed, they can perform.

“We had all three phases contribute,” said Del Rio. “When you’re dropping four punts inside the 10 like we did tonight, that’s a good thing for field position. Offensively, when you‘re able to rush 37 times, that means we were possessing the ball.”

He neglected specifically to point out passing, quarterback Derek Carr going 18 of 24 for 253 yards and two touchdowns.

“I thought there was a certainty, decisiveness. Play fast. Play very fast.”

And, of course, win.

Newsday (N.Y.): Marshawn Lynch enjoys himself in home debut with Raiders

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By Art Spander
Special to Newsday

OAKLAND, Calif. — He scored a touchdown. He pitched back to the quarterback for a touchdown on a flea-flicker pass play. He blocked. He jumped around in what some might call a dance — the “Beast Mode Boogie?”

He left the field with 29 seconds left and climbed the steps to the Oakland Raiders’ locker room while his teammates still were on the field.

Read the full story here.

Copyright © 2017 Newsday. All rights reserved.

S.F. Examiner: 'Silent Mode' just a game Seahawks' Lynch plays

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By Art Spander
Special to the Examiner

PHOENIX — They weren't going to trap Marshawn Lynch. He would talk Tuesday on Super Bowl Media Day. He would sit there at his rostrum and declare, "I'm only here so I won't get fined."

Declare it 28 times before adding, "Time up."

Read the full story here.

© 2015 The San Francisco Examiner 

Marshawn's sounds of silence

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By Art Spander

JERSEY CITY, N.J. — He won’t talk. Rather, he doesn’t prefer to talk. For no other reason, Marshawn Lynch has become the Phantom of Super Bowl Forty-Eight — yes, XLVIII, but it’s so much more rhythmic when it's spelled out — replacing Seattle teammate Richard Sherman.

Who gained his position, temporary as it might have been, because he talked too much.

Lynch was at it again Wednesday, and because he felt the media again were at him, he fled another interview session, climbing over chairs when his exit route was blocked by two other Seahawks running backs, Michael Robinson and Robert Turbine.

If opponents couldn’t stop Lynch, the guy nicknamed “Beast Mode,” who ran for 1,257 yards and scored 14 touchdowns during the regular season, then why would anybody a press conference be able to do so?

Lynch calls himself a mama’s boy. Those words have long been tattooed across his back, shoulder blade to shoulder blade, in honor of the woman, Delisa, who raised Marshawn and three other children in a fatherless home in Oakland.

He was a star at Oakland Tech High School, also the alma mater of Rickey Henderson, Leon Powe, former 49er John Brodie, Curt Flood and actor/director Clint Eastwood, and then set rushing records at Cal, a few miles away in Berkeley.

"She made it to each and every one of our games,” Lynch told USA Today in April 2007. That was a few days before the Buffalo Bills made Lynch the second running back — behind Adrian Peterson — selected in that spring’s draft. And before Lynch turned silent.

“That was kind of hard,” Lynch said of his mom’s dedication, “because I'm playing, my little brother had a game and, probably later that night, my sister might have a basketball game. And she would still manage to go and be able to feed us and clothe us and pay the bills. She's just my Superwoman."

A failure to communicate with the media is hardly an indictable offense, but as the NFL season reaches its climax, that failure becomes a fineable one.

Only a couple of weeks ago, Lynch was nailed $50,000 for his months-long refusal to do interviews, which the league said would be rescinded if he showed up as required subsequently.

He therefore was going to comply with the league demand for attendance at Super Bowl sessions.

But he wasn’t going to stay long — under 6½ minutes Tuesday on Media Day, maybe a few seconds more Wednesday — and he wasn’t going to be enlightening or pleasant.

Lynch seemingly would have been happier in a dentist’s office.

Once again, that doesn’t make him a danger to society, but it does irritate the folks with the tape recorders and microphones, sent out to gather quotes and the like.

"I appreciate it," Lynch said of the media's presence and desire to speak with him. "But I just don't get it. I'm just here so I don't get fined."

As Duane Thomas of the Cowboys was there at Super Bowl V. He barely mumbled anything except short, uninformative sentences. Lynch, unknowingly perhaps, had his model.

Lynch Wednesday wore his earphones and a look of disdain. When he spoke, little was disclosed.

Asked what Beast Mode meant, Lynch responded, “It’s just a lifestyle, boss.” And what about the media attention? “I don’t really have much to say, boss.” On the Seahawks' running game becoming ineffective for a few weeks in midseason: “It doesn’t matter. We’re here now.”

Robinson, next to Lynch, maybe taking pity on all involved, volunteered, “I’m going to slide up in this thing to break up the monotony a little bit. If Marshawn ain’t able to say nothing to you guys, you can direct your questions to me.”

Thanks, but no thanks. It's funny, in a way, that Sherman, who went to Stanford, Cal’s rival, starts the week as the villain for his post-NFC Championship ranting and in a matter of hours is elevated to near sainthood because of Lynch’s stubbornness to say diddly.

 

“I’m just about action,” was one of Lynch’s more telling comments, because he is. Last March, at Cal to watch the annual spring game, Lynch was told a couple of running backs were absent, so he suited up and scored a TD. The Golden Bears' staff and players were enthralled. But they weren’t seeking quotes.

“He’s just a shy kid,” Delton Edwards, who coached Lynch at Oakland Tech, told the New York Daily News.

“He don’t like too many people. He’s been like that all his life. It’s very hard to get inside him because he has to really trust you. When you put trust in people and people let him down, he closes those doors.”

Lynch had what euphemistically were known as minor problems with the Bills, a speeding violation, then a firearms charge that drew a three-game suspension at the start of the 2009 season. A month after opening the 2010 season with a sprained ankle, Lynch was traded a month into the season to Seattle.

For the Seahawks, he’s done what was needed. Except communicate with reporters.

 

There are worse things in society. Much worse.