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LAS VEGAS — The stark darkness gave way to a bright Bronx winter as 9-year-old Rich Bisaccia emerged from the stadium tunnel in search of his seat. In front of him, what he had only seen on TV, or heard about on the radio or through second-hand conversations, that famed Yankee Stadium frieze and surrounding buildings. Below, more than 100 yards of a brownish green expanse lined as a football field.
Bisaccia was attending his first NFL game with his favorite team, the New York Giants, playing host to the St. Louis Cardinals on Dec. 7, 1969, and the future football lifer was excited to get a real-life glimpse of his hero, Giants quarterback Fran Tarkenton.
“I swore I was Fran Tarkenton growing up,” Bisaccia said.
Born in nearby Yonkers, New York, Bisaccia had recently moved with his family to New Fairfield, Connecticut, after the passing of a grandmother and family matriarch. But his Giants fandom, passed down by his father, Nick, had only grown.
“My dad was the head football coach of the New York Giants,” Bisaccia said at his initial news conference on Oct. 13 as the Las Vegas Raiders’ interim coach. “He just never told anybody.”
Reporters and fans alike scurried to Google, Wikipedia, anything to confirm Bisaccia’s Giants bloodline. It was a joke. Nick was such a fan, the younger Bisaccia said, he thought he knew more than the likes of Allie Sherman, Alex Webster or Bill Arnsparger.
Thing was, upon Bisaccia’s elevation with the Raiders in the wake of Jon Gruden’s resignation amid his email scandal on Oct. 11, the hunt was also on to find out more about Bisaccia himself.
So, yeah, there was intrigue, especially after the Raiders won a pair of blowout games against the Denver Broncos and Philadelphia Eagles in his first two contests running the Raiders to make the team 5-2 going into their bye. Then receiver Henry Ruggs III was involved in a fiery car crash early in the morning on Nov. 3 that killed a woman and her dog and fellow first-rounder Damon Arnette, an…
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Source : espn
