The Raiders have been one of the most poorly run franchises in sports for more than two decades. However, that was not always the case. While they have not won a postseason game since 2002, before that stretch, the organization was one of the winningest teams in all of sports.
The last truly great year of Raiders football came back in that 2002 season, as the team made a run to the Super Bowl. The roster was filled with elite talent and had been knocking on the door for several seasons, catching multiple awful breaks along the way.
But appeared that they would finally break through in 2002. However, they were met by a familiar face in Super Bowl XXXVII: Jon Gruden, who had been traded by the then-Oakland Raiders to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers before the season, was standing on the opposite sidelines.
He recently revealed that the Silver and Black's chances of hoisting their fourth Lombardi Trophy in franchise history were doomed from the start.
Raiders had no chance to beat the Buccaneers in Super Bowl XXXVII
The Raiders appeared destined to win at least one Super Bowl with their stacked roster in the early 2000's. Their best chance came in 2002 when they won the AFC for the first time in nearly two decades, only to be met by Gruden's Buccaneers.
Plenty of conspiracies have surrounded the game over the years, with Hall of Famers Tim Brown and Jerry Rice going as far as accusing then-Raiders coach Bill Callahan of throwing the game. Oakland lost 48-21, and the franchise has never been the same since.
A separate theory is that the Buccaneers knew everything that Oakland was planning to do, as the latter did not change their audibles following Gruden's departure. Gruden confirmed that was exactly what happened during Barstool Sports' live show from Super Bowl LX.
"The Raiders did not change their audibles," Gruden said. "So, 358 cannon was a slant and go with a seam, and (Rich) Gannon would pump that slant and go, move the free safety, and he was hitting Jerry Rice and Tim Brown. He must've shredded teams with sluggo seam. So, we knew that was his audible against blitzes and single-high defenses. So, I swear to God, the first half, we hear him go 358 (cannon), and Dexter Jackson, the Super Bowl MVP, almost fair caught an interception. He got two of them."
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While Raiders fans had long suspected that the Buccaneers knew what was coming, hearing Gruden, who nobody in the fanbase wanted traded to begin with, admit that was the case still stings, even 23 years later.
The franchise has not gotten anywhere close to winning another title, as they haven't even won a postseason game since losing to their former coach. Gruden, of course, returned to the Raiders for a second stint as the organization's head coach before being forced to resign in 2021.
Raider Nation will likely never know if the comments from Brown and Rice about Callahan intentionally throwing the game are true. While there had long been conflicting reports about the Raiders failing to change their audibles, Gruden's recent claims confirm what the fanbase has figured all along.