I’m going to assume Tim Brown and Bill Callahan won’t exchange Christmas cards this year after Brown accused Callahan of sabotaging Super Bowl XXXVII.
Brown was specific in his interview with Sirius XM and gave in-depth examples as to why he felt his Raiders were doomed from the start against the Buccaneers.
“We get our game plan for victory on Monday, and the game plan says we’re gonna run the ball,” Brown said Saturday on SiriusXM NFL Radio, which provided us with the audio. “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.’”
In hindsight that would’ve been a great way to attack Tampa’s speed-based defense but Brown says Callahan changed his mind and announced a new game plan on 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.”
I would love to hear the coach’s side on this because it does look rather fishy for a coach to make such an unprecedented game plan change last minute.
I’m also curious as to the timing of Brown coming out with this information over 10 years later a week before his hall of fame candidacy is voted upon.
We may never know if Callahan sabotaged the Raiders but we’ll find out next week if this salvo further damaged Brown’s chances of being voted to the Hall of Fame.
