Cable Guy KO's Assistant

1 Crazy Commish

New Member
According to a report Monday on the Web site National Football Post, Raiders defensive assistant Randy Hanson was punched in the jaw by another member of the team's coaching staff during an Aug. 5 altercation at Oakland's training camp headquarters at the Napa Valley Marriott.

Multiple NFL and Raiders sources have confirmed the victim of the alleged assault was Hanson, a third-year assistant who is in his first season with the team under the title "assistant coach-defense." Two NFL sources have told FanHouse the attacker was Raiders' first-year head coach Tom Cable, and "that Hanson never saw it coming."

Neither Hanson nor the coach who threw the punch were identified in a Napa, Calif., police report taken Aug. 6 at Queen of the Valley Hospital. But one well-placed NFL source told FanHouse of the attacker: "It's a well-known coach. Very well-known."

Pressed to confirm the identity of the attacker, the source said, "It was Cable who hit him."

According to Napa Police Lt. Brian McGovern, police followed procedure in responding to the downtown Napa hospital when Hanson arrived to receive treatment for what was described as an injured jaw.

X-rays were taken. The results are not known, although one NFL source told FanHouse Hanson sustained a fractured jaw as a result of the punch.

Hanson told police the alleged assault took place at the Raiders' training camp site the day before, but he refused to name the attacker, which is hindering a police investigation into whether misdemeanor or even felony assault charges may be filed. A jaw fracture could warrant felony charges, but the fact the victim is unwilling to pursue the matter criminally is not surprising, given the cloistered nature of the tight-knit NFL coaching fraternity.

The police report is not public record, McGovern said, because of concern for privacy rights of the alleged victim.

"The victim didn't even want any police action taken," McGovern told FanHouse, "but we were following hospital policy that authorities be contacted in cases where there may have been an assault."

McGovern said Napa Police consider the matter closed at this point, "unless we are re-contacted by the victim, and the victim changes their mind that they want us to follow through and pursue an investigation. At this point we're not doing anything else with it."

Another NFL source told FanHouse that Hanson was in the middle of a conversation with defensive coordinator John Marshall when the alleged attack occurred.

Hanson previously served under former Raiders coach Lane Kiffin as an assistant defensive backs coach. The two clashed famously in Sept. 2008 when Hanson was suspended by Kiffin after the defensive assistant openly questioned the Raiders' game plan following a 41-14 season-opening loss to the then-Mike Shanahan-coached Denver Broncos.

"It's a good thing that Shanahan didn't have our players," Hanson reportedly blurted out in the presence of other coaches, "or else he would have beaten us 1,000-0."

Kiffin suspended Hanson for five days, causing a rift among a divided Raiders coaching staff that caused owner Al Davis to intervene. By that time, Kiffin and former defensive coordinator Rob Ryan were openly battling over defensive philosophy. By Week 1 of the '08 season, Davis already was compiling a dossier to document reasons to dismiss Kiffin. The Hanson incident was one more page for the report.

Asked about the Hanson outburst, Kiffin said last September, "Randy had some personal issues going on. Randy still did some work for us, but he spent some time at home to get some things straight in his personal life."

Raiders senior executive John Herrera told the National Football Post that Cable would address the latest Hanson controversy following the team's practice on Sunday, but that did not happen.

The Raiders have a single 3:30 p.m. PT practice Monday, after which Cable is expected to answer questions about the alleged assault.
 

1 Crazy Commish

New Member
According to what I heard on this last year with Kiffin was that Hanson is very vocal about what he thinks regardless what the subject is. Davis took favor with Hanson during the incident last year and not the head coach Kiffin. Let's see what happens this time at Big Al's farm of renowned.
 

cctekguy

Staff member
Either way, you just don't bust the chops of a fellow coach.

Soooooo glad I didn't draft any Raiders. What a mess.
 

Miller

Who Dey
Administrator
Cable is a joke of a head coach, period! Only Al Davis would have resigned him.....
 

1 Crazy Commish

New Member
I'd love to see the next episode of this fiasco with Al Davis taking the place of George Costanza's father on Seinfeld, walking into the locker room and yelling "You want a piece of me!" :rofl:
 
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derringer007

"Its An Outrage"
I heard on a Bay area sports radio show tonight at work that Cable flipped or pushed a chair over that Asst. Coach Hanson was sitting in and Hanson's jaw made contact with a piece of furniture, i think a table was mentioned.

Sometimes i really hate being a Raider fan :sadbanana:
 

1 Crazy Commish

New Member
NAPA, Calif. (AP) Tom Cable went on the defensive Tuesday and the NFL said it would investigate reports that the Oakland Raiders coach got into a fight that sent one of his assistants to the hospital.

NFL spokesman Greg Aiello said the league is looking into the situation to try to determine the facts of what happened.

A day after calling it "an internal issue that we are dealing with," Cable denied anything transpired at all with defensive assistant Randy Hanson earlier this month. Cable allegedly punched Hanson in the jaw.

"Nothing happened," Cable told a large swarm of reporters Tuesday when asked about it following a joint practice with the San Francisco 49ers. "Listen, you want to talk about this football team and the players on this football team, I'll talk all day. Otherwise, I'm not getting into it."

A report filed with the Napa Police Department describes an unnamed 41-year-old Raiders assistant coach being treated at the Queen of the Valley Hospital for a jaw injury, which the victim alleges was caused by an unidentified member of the Raiders coaching staff on Aug. 5.

AOL Fanhouse reported that Cable was the coach who caused the injury.

Cable also declined to comment on the NFL investigation.

"I respect that," Cable said when told it was only fair to give him chance to respond. "You have to respect I want to talk about my team."

And his team really didn't want to talk about him, either. Cable hasn't told the players anything.

"That's for you guys to talk about. I have no idea what happened, if anything happened. I could really care less," left guard Robert Gallery said. "I worry about winning games. Until you know or the truth comes out, rumors can get spread real fast. You could start one now and it could change tomorrow."

The Raiders are used to this - constant drama, controversy, potential distractions.

Lane Kiffin, Cable's predecessor, was fired last September for cause after what owner Al Davis described as acts of insubordination and lying. Kiffin filed a grievance and is seeking two months pay for the time he was unemployed before being hired at the University of Tennessee.

The Raiders sent a letter to Tennessee in January, explaining how they believe Kiffin breached his contract, violated NFL rules and was insubordinate despite warnings from Davis.

Cable replaced Kiffin four games into the 2008 season.

In 2003, Raiders linebacker Bill Romanowski punched teammate Marcus Williams during practice, shattering Williams' jaw. Williams later filed a civil lawsuit and was awarded $340,000 in damages.

Also, there was former coach Bill Callahan calling his players "the dumbest team in America" in 2003, Randy Moss quitting on his team during his two-year stint in Oakland, and former coach Art Shell benching and then suspending receiver Jerry Porter for insubordination.

"It's just another day around here," running back Justin Fargas said. "Things wouldn't be normal if there wasn't some controversy."
 

Mike

Administrator
Internal issue? That is BS.

If the league is going to suspend players for something like this, the league needs to check this out and handle it the same way. Players, coaches, and owners, all treated equally in this conduct policy, or at least that is what we were told.
 
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