With the COVID-19 debacle this week, we didn’t even know until today whether to expect the starting offensive line to be able to take the field. At this point, it appears they will be on the field and the game will go off on Sunday afternoon, after being moved out of the Sunday Night Football slot.
Jon Gruden vs Demons
This match-up is about history. And it’s two-fold. Gruden coached his last game for the Raiders in his first tenure in 2001. That was the Tuck Rule game. Arguably the worst call in NFL history stole a forced fumble away from Charles Woodson on a play that would have won the game for the Raiders. It was ruled from the booth after the fact as a Tuck Rule situation. The Patriots would win and go on to hoist their first Lombardi Trophy.
The following offseason, Al Davis traded Gruden to Tampa for two first-round picks. The next year, the Raiders would make the Super Bowl and face Gruden’s Bucs as if right out of a movie. Then Gruden got his ring and the Raiders did not.
So, Gruden is facing the quarterback who fumbled the ball away and still got a Super Bowl out of it and the team to which Gruden got his ring and coached for eight years. As much as this the game in Arrowhead before the bye meant to Derek Carr, this one holds similar implications for Gruden. Last week Carr pulls some tricks out of his bag, so we’ll see what surprises Gruden as in store for this one.
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