This afternoon's Oakland Raiders game against the 49ers would look a lot different if San Francisco had hired Hue Jackson as their offensive coordinator in 2009.
Jackson was passed over for the gig, and now he's the Raiders' offensive coordinator instead.
The Raiders, under Hue Jackson's tutelage, have gone from being the league's second-worst scoring offense in 2009 to being almost a top ten scoring offense in 2010. The Raiders are four-tenths of a point behind the Atlanta Falcons for the No. 10 spot in offensive scoring per game.
The 49ers blew off on Hue Jackson in favor of Jimmy Raye in 2009. It's the 49ers who now have the second-lowest scoring offense in the NFL, they haven't won a game yet this season, and Raye was unceremoniously fired in a storm of controversy that might cost 49ers coach Mike Singletary his job.
So, yeah, good hire there, Mike Singletary.
Jackson bears no ill feelings about being passed over by the 49ers. Of course, that's always easier when the guy who did get the job ended up embarrassing himself in a total train wreck.
"It was a position I seriously did consider. It just didn’t go right at the time," Jackson told the Oakland Tribune. "Obviously they went in a different direction."
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It has been alleged that Jackson turned down the gig after his second interview, but he disputes this.
"No, no. That was their call at the time," Jackson insists. "And that’s OK. I feel I’m where I’m supposed to be now, here with the Raiders getting this organization where it needs to be."
With a win on Sunday, this Raiders organization would be .500 coming out of week six. That would be their best record at this point in the season since the Super Bowl team of 2002.
Joe Kukura is a freelance writer who imagines we might hear "We Want David Carr!" chants in Candlestick Park again this Sunday.
