It’s been a difficult season for anyone who enjoys talking positively about the Raiders, and the sooner the regular seasons comes to an end in Las Vegas, the sooner the organization can move forward with finding a franchise quarterback and building for the future.
But for now, the Raiders (2-9) are in the awkward position of trying to win games knowing that each win is going to lessen their chances, or at least raise the cost, of getting the quarterback they want in the draft.
So far, players are staying positive on social media and in media sessions, but the organization caught a few jabs from former players and a coach in Green Bay this week.
The offseason departure of Josh Jacobs has been well-documented, and a preseason report from The Athletic’s Dan Pompei said that Jacobs asked for a trade from the Raiders prior to the 2023 season.
Jacobs told Pompei he lost trust in the Raiders a long time ago, and it was a big part of the reason he chose to sign with the Packers.
There was an in-season report this year that the Raiders have lacked organization, and players sometimes ‘waste time’ at the facility, and maybe that’s some of what Jacobs was talking about this week when he referenced his former team.
“I came here because I’d seen them winning,” Jacobs said on Sunday after the Packers 38-10 win over the 49ers. “I haven’t won a lot in my career, and that was a big thing for me when I’m making a decision. But not only that, man, being around these guys and seeing how hungry they are, seeing how much of pros they are on a day-to-day basis and how much it means to them, man, it makes me want to play harder, it makes me want to give everything I have.”
That’s a much different tone from Jacobs than the way he described his final year with the Raiders.
“I wasn’t really mentally there, not happy to be there,” Jacobs said about the Raiders in August.
Former Raiders interim head coach Rich Bisaccia is now with the Packers as their special teams coach and he has a strong relationship with Jacobs, who currently ranks third in the NFL in rushing yards.
Bisaccia was passed over by the Raiders for the full-time job with the team and has been a class act since leaving the organization.
Bisaccia was asked this week if he and Jacobs sometimes compare the differences in culture between the Packers and Raiders. Bisaccia sent an obvious message without taking a shot at anyone.
“We’ve had conversations about that… I’ll leave it at that,” Bisaccia said with a pause and a nod.
Last but not least, All-Pro kick returner Keisean Nixon played for the Raiders from 2019 to 2021, and he talked this week about how it’s a different culture in Green Bay compared to what he had with the Raiders.
“As soon as [Jacobs] signed, they put us in a group chat and we was talking,” Nixon told The Athletic. “Josh actually called me before he even signed where he was going. He was like, ‘Man, I wanna play with you,’ and I told him that ‘it’s gonna be a big deal when you get here; it’s (not) gonna be like what we came from.’ We both came from the same organization. But it’s just something — it feel a little different when you put that ‘G’ on.”
It’s easy to take shots when the Raiders are down, but it’s fair to wonder if the culture is really different in Las Vegas under head coach Antonio Pierce.
Pierce deserves some patience considering the Raiders didn’t invest in a franchise quarterback in the offseason and the team has been decimated by injuries. But considering the changes within ownership that happened this year, there’s a chance minority owner Tom Brady is going to want a different voice leading the team next year, especially considering there will probably be a first-round quarterback in the building.
Outside of Mark Davis, no one is expected to have a stronger voice than Brady within the organization next year and there’s a chance that Davis will hand the football side of operations to Brady similar to the way he did with Jon Gruden in 2018.
If that ends up being the case, hopefully Brady has learned from his predecessor and doesn’t trade away the leader of the locker room and one of the best pass rushers in the league.
And if the ‘Patriot Way’ is coming to Las Vegas again, is it too much to ask someone to do the job a little better than Josh McDaniels?
x: @raidersbeat
Al was the one who burned down everything he built after he gained majority ownership and went mental. Every HC was a puppet. And players knew that. Cover zero. Period. One moment stars aligned. Young Chuckie, and Gannon with a collection of driven vets. Hosed on a bad call in NE. Next season callajoke running the same identical scheme as Gruden. Even the terminology. And the party was over. Mark has made bad decision after bad decision. Giving Gruden GM status in part two was a huge mistake. Mayock was a scape goat for Grudens incompetence. Antonio Brown exemplifies that.
M D mentally disturbed … he moved the team out of California… picks up players that made a name for themselves with other teams… pays them a huge amount of money with nothing in return… let’s good players go that are starting to develop just to pick up one used up superstar here and there… had a great iterm coach with rich… someone’s giving him bad advice… he can’t that stupid or maybe he is i don’t know the man… Vegas is not a football town no home field advantage… it’s an adult amusement park with lots of distractions… makes me appreciate the AL DAVIS years so much more… he kept the Raiders in California…
The Raider’s team culture is bad. It will take a special coach to get them to be relevant again. I don’t think the current HC is the one that can do that. Hopefully Brady can throttle Davis’ bad decisions?!
There are only 32 quarterbacks in any given year starting in the NFL. That means there’s been fewer than a thousand of them in the last 30 years. How many of them are now successful general managers and/or successful coaches?
As near as I can tell they make great announcers. But there is nothing that leads me to believe that Tom Brady has any better chance at being a successful general manager or successful head coach or a successful Whisperer of such now that he’s a minority owner of a National Football League franchise. I think we should all remember that the Patriot Way failed at the departure of Tom Brady. There was no Brain Trust left in New England that could continue their success. So I’ve got to say that I didn’t like the idea of becoming the Patriots West in 2021 and I like it less now.