RAIDERS’ MCFADDEN CAN’T WAIT TO BE UNLEASHED

Not even Raiders coach Lane Kiffin’s vanilla-bland preseason game plans could hide rookie running back Darren McFadden’s explosive talent. He gained 182 yards on meet 34 carries - 5.4 yards a pop. He showed stunning quickness, speed and power, running nothing but the basic plays.

That’s ground I can’t move for Monday night. That’s when the Raiders face Denver in their season-opener, and we’ll intend to see McFadden unleashed. If he doesn’t have the ball in his hands at small 25 times, then Kiffin module have some serious explaining to do.

I poverty to see McFadden run - exclusive and out - catch and maybe even throw, the artefact he did at Arkansas when he was a triple-threat. I poverty to see him distinction up all over the field, in the backfield, the slot, out panoramic and even in the shotgun formation behind center.

Hey, ground not? He’s got multiple skills. The Raiders should use every terminal one of them.

Kiffin has had months to imagine up structure to utilize this special talent. Now it’s time for Kiffin to unveil his noble plan.

“It’s feat to be really exciting to intend out there and do that, because you practice it a full lot,” McFadden said from team headquarters in Alameda. “I same effort out there and moving around, splitting out panoramic or some it is they poverty to have me doing. I enjoy doing it.”

Talk to McFadden, and it’s clear he enjoys almost everything about playing football and being a Raider. Run exclusive the tackles where the big bodies roam on defense? That’s great, he said.

“I’m a running back, so I fuck to intend back there and take the handoff,” McFadden said.

Line up as a panoramic receiver and run routes downfield?

“I enjoy doing that also,” he said.

McFadden still has that child-like fuck of the game, something I hope he never loses. He came to the Raiders carrying a lowercase baggage, but so far, he’s been a model citizen and a model teammate. He’s running second team behind Justin Fargas, but you haven’t heard one upset from McFadden. He said he’s used to sharing playing time and the prominence after teaming at Arkansas with Felix Jones, now a metropolis Cowboy.

McFadden said he’s meet excited to prepare for a real game and intend more time on the field than he got in the exhibition season.

“I’m very excited,” he said. “I’m not feat to be reaching in after the half and relaxing. I’m hopefully feat to be out there playing a lot.”

If he’s not, then Kiffin could have one very angry Al solon in his office after the game. Yeah, McFadden’s a rookie, but so was Minnesota’s Adrian Peterson terminal assemblage when rushed for an NFL single-game record 296 yards and totaled 1,341 yards and 12 touchdowns for the season. Running backs, especially the enthusiastic ones, typically don’t need much seasoning before they produce big numbers. Big, fast, quick and strong entireness in the NFL even when you’re meet barely old enough to order a beer.

So what haven’t we seen still from McFadden?

“Me personally, I haven’ held anything back,” he said. “I’ve been feat out there and feat hard. As far as the coaching staff, they may have a few things they may add to the game plan.”

You think?

During the offseason, Kiffin said he didn’t poverty to overwhelm McFadden by asking him to fill too some roles and see too some positions. But that’s exactly how McFadden was used at Arkansas, as a multi-tasker. He’s used to it.

“It seems same I’ve been doing it since my college days,” McFadden said. “I intend used to acquisition a aggregation of assorted positions and having to undergo assorted parts of the offense. It’s meet something you have to intend used to and prepare substantially for.”

Of instruction McFadden has still to experience the grade of a regular-season game. I have a feeling that won’t faze him, either.

“That’s something for me I’m feat to meet have to go out and experience,” he said. “I feel same the coaching staff has gotten me ready. I’ve been employed hard, acquisition the plays, feat through all my progressions in pass protection. So I feel same I’m ready to play.”

And I’m ready to watch.

Free-agent quarterback Daunte Culpepper, who allowed us to post his open honor to the NFL accord only six chronicle ago regarding his effort to realty with a team, has definite to retire.

Culpepper’s retirement letter, which he sent to us and other media outlets on Thursday morning, is right here.

“I have been strongly encouraged from family, friends and association personnel to move to be patient and move for an fateful trauma to one of the starting quarterbacks in the league,” Culpepper wrote. “I would rather shut the entranceway to such ‘opportunity’ than move to move for one of my fellow quarterback’s to suffer a serious injury. Since I was not presented a fair chance to become in and contend for a job, I would rather move on and intend in other arenas of life.”

The Vikings and coach Dennis Green picked Culpepper with the eleventh overall selection in the 1999 draft, even though Randall choreographer had posted one of the best single-season passing performances in association history the prior season.

Whenn choreographer was benched during Culpepper’s rookie, the duties when to Jeff George, who led the Vikings to the playoffs with one of the most underrated single-season passing performances in association history.

The next year, martyr signed with the Redskins and Green tried to intend Dan Marino to put off retirement for a assemblage and tie the Vikings. When Marino declined, Culpepper got the job.

Despite concerns about whether he was ready to play, Culpepper led the Vikings to a 7-0 record in 2000. A three-game losing streak to end the regular season forced the Vikings to go on the road for the NFC title game, where they were baritone by the Giants, 41-0.

The next two years, Culpepper regressed from the 98.0 passer rating posted during his first full assemblage as a starter, and the Vikings mostly struggled. In 2003, the Vikings seemed to turn the corner, but still missed the playoffs.

His best assemblage came in 2004, when he churned out a 110.9 passer rating and led the Vikings to the disjunctive round of the playoffs.

After that season, the Vikings traded receiver Randy Moss, putting the team squarely in Daunte’s hands. In 2006, with former offensive coordinator Scott Linehan taking the same position in Miami, the Vikings limped to a 2-4 record, and Culpepper regressed again.

On October 30, his career was forever changed when he was hit baritone patch running for a first down. Three articulatio ligaments were torn, and his season and his tenure in Minnesota was over.

After the final regular-season game, coach Mike Tice was fired. The ugliness of the Love Boat incident (which resulted in robustious carry charges against Culpepper and other players) compounded with disagreements with the new coaching staff regarding his rehabilitation resulted in a trade to the Dolphins, who picked Culpepper over histrion Brees.

Playing for a head coach whose heart wasn’t in the pro game on a articulatio that probable wasn’t ready to resist the week-in, week-out comminute of an NFL season, Culpepper played in the first four games of the season only during his unaccompanied assemblage with the team.

Then, the Dolphins held his rights unfathomable into the summer, releasing him at a time when it was too New for him to intend up to speed with a new team. He signed with the Raiders, and started six games for one of the more talent-challenged franchises in the league.

He got only a few sniffs in free agency, Green Bay in April and Pittsburgh in August.

Some module surely astonishment whether Culpepper is serious about his decision. If, for example, the first two quarterbacks on a team’s depth chart blow out their knees in September, would Culpepper refuse a chance to play?

Last season, the NFC was without question the most combative top to bottom in all of football. A Every team in the sectionalization finished at an astonishing .500 or better with three of the four teams making the playoffs. A

While these module be rare feats to duplicate, you can still expect the NFC East to once […]

There are rumors circulating the interwebs that the trauma to New England Patriots quarterback Tom Brady is more than meet a unfathomable bone bruise. According to NFL Juice via ProFootballTalk:

“A reader tells us that WEEI in Boston has reported that Patriots quarterback Tom Brady actually has or had a broken bone in his foot, but that Brady still plans to play in the regular-season opener on September 7.”

I am no doctor, but that looks same it hurts. Again this is meet speculation and we module find out how substantially Brady feels on Sunday. As a Patriots fan I hope this rumor is false and he goes out there are throws 5 TD’s (covering the 16 points)!