Former Raider Boss Now Bengal Assistant
Hue Jackson has reached the mountain top. But now, it seems he’s walking through the valley of the shadow of death. Jackson has gone from being the Oakland Raider’s head coach and de facto general manager to what on paper amounts to being an assistant to two different assistant coaches with the Cincinnati Bengals.
In 2010, after bouncing around the league for the previous 10 years, and with 2 successful seasons as the quarterback’s coach under John Harbaugh with the Baltimore Ravens, Al Davis hired Jackson to spice up his offense in Oakland. And spice it up, he did. The Raiders shot up from 31st in the league in total offense to 10th. The sudden surge in offense translated directly into wins as the team went from 5-11 in 2009 to 8-8 and in the playoff mix for the first time in years in 2010. This was all Davis needed to be convinced that he had found the head coach for him, and for the Raider’s future.
Tom Cable all but sealed his fate with his famous last words: “we’re not losers anymore.” Not that the late Al Davis needed any more convincing, but he let go of Cable and gave Jackson the head coaching position. The meteoric rise to the top of the head coaching food chain would follow.
The 2011 season started harmlessly enough. There were a couple of wins, a couple of tough losses. Things you kind of expect throughout the course of a season. But, what was to follow was a whirlwind of events that nobody could have foreshadowed. The death of the owner/general manager/all around boss, the loss of his starting quarterback and all-world running back to season ending injuries, along with significant injuries to every skill position on the field throughout the season. Add Chuck Bresnahan leading the defense from it’s #11 ranking the previous season down to #29 and you have a recipe for disaster. The fact that this team made it back to 8-8 this season is remarkable, yet I see fans saying “good riddance” to Jackson as if he caused their demise.
When Al Davis passed away, there was no immediate structure in place to take care of the football operations of the club. Hue Jackson had to fill that void. So, in addition to dealing with the injuries and playcalling on the field, he now had to worry about every other aspect of the team as well. All of a sudden, he had to figure out what to do to salvage the season. To do this, he went back to his roots. Looked at places he was familiar with. Keep in mind, he has no experience as a GM in the league. One such place was Cincinnati, where Carson Palmer was just sitting back waiting to be let out of purgatory. Admittedly, Hue overspent by potentially giving up 2 first rounders, but again he’s not an experienced GM and he felt he was doing what needed to be done to keep a grip on the season. Hue Jackson was now head coach and general manager of the Oakland Raiders. Head coaches dream of having full control of team operations, and here he was in his rookie year as a head coach, doing it all.
All of this came crashing down on Hue at the end of the season when Mark Davis hired Reggie McKenzie. The former Green Bay Packer’s exec came in with guns blazing. He immediately fired Hue Jackson, simply stating that he wanted “his guy” in the driver’s seat. In essence saying that he was giving no consideration for what Jackson may have done with the team, or for the organization as a whole throughout the previous two years. He simply wanted somebody not named Hue Jackson coaching this team. Period. Though it seems a bit harsh, it’s the grim reality.
Jackson didn’t help himself much with his public persona. His bravado, and all of his promises made, started to ring hollow. Though he may just have just been trying to put up a brave face in the midst of so many things going wrong that were beyond his control, it seemed more like arrogance at times. In the end, not only did this help Reggie McKenzie in making his decision to part ways with Jackson, but it may have contributed to Jackson not landing a job until now with the Bengals.
Jackson’s official title with the Bengals is “assistant coach helping secondary and special teams.” Now, we all know that he has absolutely no experience on the defensive side of the ball. He’s a former college quarterback that has coached running backs, wide receivers, and quarterbacks, as well as serving as offensive coordinator for different teams. Not a single defensive line on his resume. What does this mean? Well, it most likely means that the Bengals are probably helping Jackson exploit some kind of loophole in his Raider’s contract that will allow him to continue to get paid by Mark Davis while working for Cincinnati. I would be willing to bet that Jackson will know the names of more offensive players than he will defenders on the Bengal’s team.
So, with Jackson finally moving on, and John Herrera no longer in the Raider’s front office, it seems like Reggie McKenzie has successfully purged all of the last remaining links to the late Al Davis. Does the Raider Nation approve?
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I think Jackson will eventually climb back out of the hole he has fallen into. There is no question that he is a talented coach. I was surprised as anyone the day he was fired, but looking back over the season, there were a lot of things that I felt he made huge mistakes on. While I think he would have improved this year, I have felt for a long time that we needed to have a defensive minded coach at the helm. I would rather that Al had hired one and kept Jackson at OC, but no telling how that would have worked. Bottom line, it is what it is and after hearing some of Hue’s comments since he has been fired, it reaffirms my belief that this was probably for the best, although it saddens me that Hue seems to have been blacklisted by the league. I am happy that he has found another position; he should have another OC job within a couple of years. I firmly believe he will make a great HC some day, but I think he has a long ways to go and a lot to learn in the meantime.
Thanks for the comment bud, I feel where you’re coming from. I think a lot of those mistakes were simple “rookie mistakes.” When you compound that with everything he had to deal with as a rookie coach, how can anybody fault him for not going 12-4? You go from trying to call the plays to trying to run a franchise while doing it, and that’s just too much for a lesser man to bear. I think he did a hell of a job given the circumstances, if not for how he handled the media, he would have had teams lining up for his services.