Al Michaels Speaks Inconvenient Truth About the Raiders and Al Davis

Longtime Oakland Raiders boss Al Davis is and forever will be one of the most iconic figures in the history of football. He's done many great things, and he's done many not-so-great things, but it goes without saying that Mr. Davis has left his mark.

These days, however, Mr. Davis' influence on the Raiders is, shall we say, a little on the questionable side. Some will tell you he's as valuable to the organization as he's ever been. Others will tell you that the Raiders are doomed to fail as long as he's in control.

One of these people just so happens to be veteran NFL announcer Al Michaels. In an impromptu interview (I use the term loosely) with a TMZ cameraman, Michaels was asked if he thinks the Raiders will ever win a Super Bowl while Davis is still alive.

Michael's response: "No."

To help explain his answer, Michaels did acknowledge the fact that the 82-year-old Davis is both getting up there in years and not in the best of health, the implication being that Davis is not going to be the dictator in Raider-land for much longer anyway.

This is true. Nevertheless, the camera operator kept pressing Michaels, asking him whether or not he agrees that Davis is a genius.

"If you had a team that lost 11 or more games seven consecutive years," replied Michaels, "would you say a genius ran the team?"

Not exactly a nice thing to say, and there are no doubt a lot of Raiders fans out there who are never going to forgive Michaels for saying it.

But you know what? This is also true. Despite all the great things Davis has done for the Raiders throughout his tenure, it suffices to say that 2003-2009 was a rough patch. Make no mistake about it, Mr. Davis was largely responsible for it.

Let's face it. It's just plain hard to establish consistent success when you hire five different head coaches in seven years, waste draft picks on players with fast 40 times, and just generally refuses to adapt to the modern landscape and conventions of the National Football League.

Sure, things got much better in 2010, and the Raiders promise to be a respectable team once again in 2011. This sense of progress would seem to contradict the notion that the Raiders are not going to win another Super Bowl any time soon.

Let's not kid ourselves. There's a big difference between being respectable and actually being contenders, and there are very few reasons to believe that the Raiders will be just that this year. The Raiders are headed in the right direction, but a Super Bowl victory is probably not going to be had in the immediate future.

Will the Raiders win a Super Bowl again? Of course they will. The competitive balance in the NFL is never the same year in and year out. The stars are going to align for the Raiders at some point down the road.

But in the context of this discussion, the question is whether or not Mr. Davis will be there to witness it.

For that, I will defer to Michaels:

"How much longer do you think Al Davis is gonna live?"

Not a happy thought, to be sure. But hey, he's just saying what we're all thinking.