Raiders fired Jack Del Rio on his way to postgame press conference

Mark Davis wasted no time in firing Jack Del Rio so quickly that the coach broke the news at his postgame press conference.

The biggest story entering Week 17 wasn’t that there were a handful of playoff scenarios we needed to sort out. Instead, it was that the Oakland Raiders were so desperate to hire Jon Gruden away from ESPN that Mark Davis was offering a share of ownership.

One hangup was that the job Oakland wants Gruden to have already had someone watching the post. Jack Del Rio entered Sunday as the head coach of the team but that isn’t the way the day ended.

Davis wasted no time in firing Del Rio, telling him almost immediately after the game was over. The timing of his firing came between the end of the game and his walk to the podium for his postgame press conference.

In fact, Del Rio opened his presser by announcing he had been fired.

Here’s the Zapruder film:

The writing was on the wall for this one, and now we move to the next logical thought: when does Jon Gruden get the job?

Earlier on Sunday, it was reported that Gruden was vetting coordinators and former players to take spots on his coaching staff. One of these guys was former Raiders quarterback Rich Gannon, who Gruden beat in the Super Bowl.

There’s a chance that Gruden doesn’t take the job, but you have to believe that Davis doesn’t make the move to fire Del Rio unless he has some pretty concrete feelings. We don’t know what will happen but it’s looking like this domino falling so quickly lines up with Jon Gruden stepping in with a return to Oakland sometime soon.