You know a division needs work from top to bottom when there's not a single team above .500, when the last place team could have been the first place team if not for a blocked field goal in Week 16, and the division winner limps into the playoffs. Such is life in the AFC West in 2011. As if there wasn't enough drama within the division, now it seems the Oakland Raiders' proverbial house is on fire with some drama of its own as head coach Hue Jackson tore into his team today.
Hue Jackson says he is "pissed" at his team and says some changes are coming. The man who said he powered through the Carson Palmer trade continues to speak of wielding lots of power in Oakland, and so he might have to muscle to follow through on these emotions.
"I know one thing, this team needs an attitude adjustment," Jackson said. "The killer instinct has got to exist here. It's something I've talked about. When you don't finish games at the end like we haven't, this has been going on all year. I mean, this feeling I've had has been there all year and you try to change it, change it, change it and I haven't been able to get it changed. I know what needs to happen and we'll move forward."
While he does place some of the blame on himself, he also is quick to go right back to blaming the team's poor performance on the players in yesterday's game against the San Diego Chargers.
"We didn't get them stopped and we didn't make enough plays. Yeah, I'm pissed at the team. Like I tell them, I always put it on me, but I am pissed at my team because when you have those kind of opportunities, you've got to do it and we didn't do it."
The Raiders blew a chance in the final week of the season to make the playoffs by beating San Diego after the Broncos had already lost to the Chiefs. If anything, 2011 will always be known as the season that Al Davis died, that the team traded major future draft picks for Carson Palmer and that the team failed to capitalize on their chances. An already veteran team is not playing like it and perhaps that's what has Jackson so steamed.
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