ST. LOUIS – Some NFL owners are making a very strong statement this year . . . win now or pack your bags. The first victim of the axe, which was five years overdue, was Detroit Lions GM Matt Millen.

During Week Three, Mike Martz and the San Fran 49ers threw a can a’ whoop-ass on Millen’s Lions. A few days later, with a little coaxing from his son, Bill Jr., Owner William Ford gave the dysfunctional Millen his walking papers.

For years, Millen put bad teams, followed by worse teams onto the field, drafting an assembly line of wide receivers and first-round flops.

Yesterday, the St. Louis Rams followed suit and fired their third-year coach, Scott Linehan. The Rams are the only team that may be worse than the Lions this year and after starting 0-4, Linehan got the axe.

Oakland Raiders Coach, Lane Kiffin is another coach that is sitting on a white-hot burner right now. Kiffin’s Raiders lost to the Chargers Sunday to drop to 1-3 putting his job in more jeopardy than last week. One of the hottest rumors around the league, prior to this loss, was that Kiffen was getting the boot from Owner Al Davis.

Payrolls and overhead have gotten out of hand and owners have such huge investments in their organizations, they expect a return. With a short 16 game season, a slow start out the gate can put these owner’s “investments” in an improbable position for finding success.

With Kiffin hanging on by a thread and other coaches like Marvin Lewis, Rod Marinelli and Romeno Crennell struggling to put a team on the field that even remotely resembles an NFL squad, expect a few more coaches to be ducking the axe early in this NFL season.

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