Tim Brown says coach sabotaged Super Bowl
Written by Adrian Gregory Glover // January 22, 2013 // NFL, Oakland Raiders // 6 Comments
Tim Brown just wants to state the facts.
Let’s be honest the latest edition of the Super Bowl is just around the corner. During the festivities those that vote on the Pro Football Hall of Fame will get together and pick the 2013 class.
Tim Brown was never a part of a Super Bowl winning class. Some feel as if his Hall of Fame bid could be hampered by this fact.
As you will see him say moving forward, I am not saying that is why he said what he said what you are about to read…I am just stating facts.
Brown told SiriusXM NFL Radio via Pro Football Talk that his former coach Bill Callahan may have rigged it so that the Oakland Raiders lost Super Bowl XXXVII to his buddy John Gruden and his Tampa Bay Buccaneers on purpose.
“We get our game plan for victory on Monday, and the game plan says we’re gonna run the ball,” Brown said.
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.”
According to Brown it got funky when their gameplan switched from a smashmouth approach to one that planned to “throw the ball 60 times,” on the Friday before the game.
“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.”
Brown went as far as to suggest that Barret Robbins’ now infamous disappearing act the day before the game was a direct result of Callahan’s alleged motives.
“I’m not saying one had anything to do with the other,” Brown said. “All I’m saying is those are the facts of what happened Super Bowl week. So our ire wasn’t towards Barret Robbins, it was towards Bill Callahan. Because we feel as if he wouldn’t have did what he did, then Barret wouldn’t have done what he did.
“Now, should Barret have manned up and tried to do it? Absolutely. But everybody knew Barret was unstable anyway. So to put him in that situation — not that he was putting him in that situation — but for that decision to be made without consulting the players the Friday before the Super Bowl? I played 27 years of football. The coaches never changed the game plan the Friday before the game. I’m not trying to point fingers at anybody here, all I’m saying is those are the facts of what happened. So people look at Barret and they say all these things, but every player in that locker room will tell you, ‘You’d better talk to Bill Callahan.’ Because if not for Coach Callahan, I don’t think we’re in that situation.”
Talk about shots fired. Will this new wave of drama actually hurt Brown’s Hall of Fame bid?
