Coming to your home television on April 28:

“Hi, I’m Commissioner Roger Goodell, and welcome to the 2007 NFL Draft. The Oakland Raiders are on the clock.”

Rock bottom fittingly arrived in Week 17 Sunday when the Raiders closed out their worst season in history with a 23-3 loss to the New York Jets.

Meanwhile, the Detroit Lions were beating the Dallas Cowboys 39-31, giving them a 3-13 record, with the Raiders claiming the No. 1 pick in the NFL draft at 2-14.

There you go, Raider Nation. Sometimes you get what you deserve, and even the dastardly NFL is powerless to strip the Raiders of their unwanted but undisputed distinction as the 32nd ranked team in a 32-team league.

“I really can’t point out a game where the referees took it away from us,” running back LaMont Jordan said earlier this week. “I can honestly say we did a pretty much did a good job of losing games on our own.”

Without outside forces available to deflect responsiblity, the blame game begins in earnest.

The Raiders’ mission is clear enough _ keep a promising young defense intact while figuring out the best way to find a way to score points after a 16-game power failure of historic proportions.

Incredibly enough, the Raiders were worse on offense at the end of the year than they were at the beginning.

In Weeks 1 and 2, a 27-0 loss to San Diego and a 28-6 loss to San Diego, the Raiders could at least claim they were in their first two games with a new system and were playing elite-level teams, as evidenced by their status as the top two seeds in the AFC.

The Raiders scored their last touchdown of the season with 11:26 to play in the fourth quarter of a 27-10 loss to the Cincinnati Bengals on a 5-yard pass from Aaron Brooks to Ronald Curry.

That was on Dec. 10.

Oakland followed that touchdown with 33 possessions, 182 offensive plays and saw 191 minutes and 26 seconds of game time go past with zero touchdowns to close out the season.

The last three opponents, Kansas City, St. Louis and the New York Jets, went into the final weekend of the season ranked No. 15, No. 22 and No. 24 in the league defensively, so it’s not as if the Raiders were looking at the kind of defenses they saw in Weeks 1 and 2.

They finished with 168 points, and that includes four touchdowns scored by the defense.

The collapse was so total, the carnage so great, that sifting through it and determining what to keep will be much more difficult than what to discard.

The first impulse is to dump it all. Get a new quarterback, a new line, new running backs, get some new receivers to join Curry and an entirely new coaching staff to put it all together.

Rob Ryan and his defensive staff can stay. Everyone else, including coach Art Shell, should be told by Al Davis not to let the door hit them on the way out.

Because things couldn’t possibly be any worse.

The mass dumping theory, while it feels good at the moment, is neither practical nor realistic. As bad as it was, some of these players will go on to have productive years _ maybe even with the Raiders.

Like it or not, Davis may not fire Shell, opting instead to find an offensive coordinator looking for a quick fix to advance his career.

Think any coordinator worth his salt wouldn’t want to under Shell?

Guess again.

There’s a defense in place that can win, and even a moderate improvement on offense could mean giant leap in the won-loss record. Succeeding with the Raiders looks good on the resume, and offensive coaches have historically been given a longer leash than defensive coaches under Davis.

Even if a new offensive direction is identified, the Raiders must sort out their personnel matters. Some of them appear pretty clear cut. It’s hard to believe Aaron Brooks, due a $5 million roster bonus in March, will be back. Andrew Walter returns, although his status as “quarterback of the future” isn’t nearly as secure as it was a year ago.

Running back LaMont Jordan has an upcoming $4.75 million roster bonus. The Raiders haven’t gotten their money’s worth so far, and if they’re seriously looking at someone like Adrian Peterson, he may not be a lock to stay.

Are the Raiders going to go through the same song and dance with Jerry Porter again? Seems unlikely, but Marcus Allen spent more than just a year in exile. What about Randy Moss? The Raiders would love to deal him, but if Davis is insisting on top dollar, good luck finding a trade partner.

Moss’ value has never been lower than it is right now.

And exactly who will be helping Davis with all these decisions? It seems unlikely personnel executive Mike Lombardi survives unless Shell goes. The personnel man who spends the most on-field time with Shell is Sean Jones, a former agent and ex-Raider.

Every one of these topics will be addressed and analyzed in due time.

Stay tuned.

Sunday’s news and notes:

– The one real moment of karma Sunday came when blitzing linebacker Eric Barton, an ex-Raider forced a Brooks fumble that was plucked out of the air by Bobby Hamilton, another ex-Raider.

– The Raiders were the only team in the NFL to play 16 games and not score a touchdown on their opening drive.

– Not hearing a lot of grief directed at the Jets Eric Mangini for being too stoic. Having Mangini and Shell was like having a cigar store Indian on each sideline.

The reason it isn’t a problem for Mangini is that the Jets don’t commit penalites. They ‘re so well organized they haven’t been called for delay of game this season.

Demeanor is not a problem where Shell is concerned either, but it’s a convenient thing to latch on to when the team stinks.

– Good line by analyst Dan Dierdorf regarding the Raiders offense: “They are No. 32 in the NFL only because there’s no No. 33, 34 or 35.

– Curry finished with 62 receptions for 727 yards, the latter the lowest figure for the Raiders leading receiver since Tim Brown had 693 yards in 1992.

– The final numbers are in on John Shoop’s trial run as offensive coordinator: 20 quarters, 20 turnovers (11 lost fumbles, 9 interceptions), two touchdowns, six field goals.

– Compared to what the Raiders have run out there this season on offense, the Jets’ Kurt Schottenheimer looks like Bill Walsh.

– Justin Fargas deserves credit for stepping it up the last two games, averaging 4.7 yards per carry after averaging 3.0 in his first five starts after Jordan’s injury. He’s still no more than a complementary back, however.

– The run-blocking looked good at times until the Raiders were forced to pass, and the playing time received by rookie guards Paul McQuistan and Kevin Boothe could prove beneificial.

– One member of the defensive staff who could be on the move is linebackers coach Don Martindale, who is being sought by Stanford as defensive coordiantor under new head coach Jim Harbaugh.

Harbaugh is a formers assistant, but did not work with Martindale. However, Martindale coached under Harbaugh’s father Jack at Western Kentucky and with Harbaugh’s brother John at the University of Cincinnati in 1996.

Martindale, by the way, would be a prime candidate to become Raiders defensive coordinator of Davis decided to make Ryan the head coach. He and Ryan are neighbors, drive to work together and share many of the same defensive philosophies.

One of Martindale’s colleagues at Cincinnati besides John Harbaugh was Rex Ryan, Rob’s twin brother and defensive coordinator of the Baltimore Ravens.

In four games with John Shoop as offensive coordinator, the Raiders have run more plays, had a better completion percentage and had more first downs per game than in the 11 games with Tom Walsh calling plays.

However, those in Raider Nation as well as the Raider locker room who thought integrating shorter drops and safer pass plays into the mix could improve the NFL’s most anemic offense have discovered the problems are much deeper than play-calling.

The only thing that happens when the Raiders run more plays is they have an opportunity to make more mistakes.

Oakland is turning the ball over more often and scoring less with Shoop than they were with Walsh.

The Raiders have scored two offensive touchdowns in four games under Shoop to go along with eight interceptions and nine lost fumbles _ 17 turnovers in 16 quarters.

In Walsh’s 11 games, the Raiders scored 10 offensive touchdowns with 11 lost fumbles and 15 interceptions _ or 2.4 turnovers per game.

Despite the safer pass routes, sack figures have improved only marginally, from 4.8 sacks per game under Walsh to 4.3 under Shoop.

Some other offensive comparisons:

First downs per game: Shoop 18.3, Walsh 14.4

Third-down conversions: Shoop 46.2 percent, Walsh 36.8 percent

Completion percentage: Shoop 63.7 percent, Walsh 49.3 percent

Rushing average: Shoop 21.0 carries, 81.8 yards, Walsh 26.1 carries, 100.2 yards

This isn’t to suggest Walsh should still be the offenisve coordinator or that elevating Shoop was a mistake.

Walsh had an entire training camp, a preaseason and 11 games to get his program up and running. Shoop is working on the fly, tweaking the existing system.

But it does underscore the belief held here that play-calling and play sequence is dwarfed in importance by executing plays that are called. Coordinators can draw up the greatest pre-game scripts and make wonderful halftime adjustments on paper, but they don’t mean anything if they don’t learn on the practice field how to execute them in a game.

The Raiders have been woefully weak in the second halves of games this year, with the coaches taking the brunt of the blame. They deserve their share, but isn’t there someone _ anyone _ other than Ronald Curry on offense that looks capable of making a play when it really matters?

Coach Art Shell insists the Raiders have been a pretty good practice team, one that has been unable to continue their good work on Sundays. I asked him Friday if he was a believer in the old coaching cliche, “You play how you practice.”

(Practices are closed to the media other than warmups and drills).

Shell said he agreed with the cliche, even if it didn’t necessarily apply to this season.

“It’s strange because the effort has been there as far as practice is concerned,” Shell said. “They’re doing the right things. They’re trying to do the right things. If we make mistakes out there we’ll repeat things. We won’t let it go, make sure we get it right.”

They’ve got one more shot.

Friday news and notes:

– RB LaMont Jordan and WR Jerry Porter were placed on injured reserve Friday, with S Hiram Eugene and TE Derek Miller getting the ball from the practice squad. Not sure what finally promoted the Jordan move _ it’s been fairly clear he wouldn’t play again for some time now.

Not sure why they finally pulled the plug on Porter, either, but it sure is convenient to leave him at home the last week of the season just in case he decided to vent a season’s worth of frustration to the assembled New York media.

– Having Miller on the roster gives the Raiders five tight ends. He joins Randal Williams, Courtney Anderson, John Madsen and James Adkisson. The only possible explanation for Adkisson’s spot on the roster all season is that he is on the same sort of Al Davis scholarship bestowed upon James Jett in his later years.

– QB Aaron Brooks practiced without pain in his neck for the third straight day and will start, Shell said. Zack Crockett practiced and will play. Randy Moss (ankle) will not play.