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By the time Las Vegas Raiders coach Josh McDaniels was fired, players were reportedly fed up with his leadership in the locker room.

Fox Sports insider Jay Glazer on Sunday revealed a key moment that seemed to have been the final nail in the coffin for the head coach. McDaniels was fired late on Oct. 31 — or early on Nov. 1 for the East Coast — after a disappointing 3-5 start to the season. Team owner Mark Davis decided to completely clean house with the move and also fired the general manager and offensive coordinator.

The firings came after weeks of outside pressure. Raiders fans have been vocal with their displeasure and even demanded the firing of McDaniels to Davis in person.

According to Glazer, days before he was ultimately fired, McDaniels faced the full fury of his team during a meeting.

“Last Thursday, there was this big ‘airing of the grievances’ meeting,” Glazer said, “and players just unloaded on Josh McDaniels — from captain to captain, to player to player. Finally Josh McDaniels had Antonio Pierce get up and speak on behalf of him and the coaches.”

Pierce, Glazer continued, spoke of the team needing to shift its culture. That’s when McDaniels took issue with his comments.

“When Antonio Pierce got up there, he said, ‘Look guys, we have to have our own culture. It’s gotta be about culture here,'” Glazer said. “And

he brought up the old Giants team that beat the Patriots, Josh McDaniels’ team, in the Super Bowl in the 2007 season. He said, ‘No matter who we played, we thought we could beat them. We had a game plan that we could beat them. We had to believe that, and that’s not here. We have to believe it here at the Raiders (that) we can beat anybody.'”

“When he finished up that speech, everybody thinks they’re great — except for Josh McDaniels. Josh McDaniels then goes over to him and says, ‘Don’t ever talk about the Patriots like that,’ and then you really saw how divided that building got.”

At that point, Davis decided to side with Pierce and fire McDaniels.

During all the years of success for the Patriots, the term “Patriot Way” was coined to describe the strict culture of discipline that was instilled within the organization. In the aftermath of McDaniels’ firing, many have theorized his insistence on bringing the “Patriot Way” to the Raiders resulted in him losing the locker room. With the revelation that he went out of his way to still defend his old team while with a new one, those theories appear to be at least partially accurate.

Watch above via Fox

Tags: Antonio Pierce, Josh McDaniels, Las Vegas Raiders, NFL