The Raiders fell to 2-10 after Sunday’s 31-14 loss to the Chargers, and they are now officially eliminated from playoff contention.
Without question there is a roster rebuild coming for the Raiders in the offseason and there could be major changes coming to the coaching staff, too.
It was reported this weekend that Carroll is on the ‘hot seat’ in Las Vegas and will need to show some level of progress in the final five games of the season to keep his job.
The reality, though, is that the Raiders were a disaster long before Pete Carroll was hired and Antonio Pierce said on Sunday that the decision-makers in the building need to start looking at themselves.
“I was there last year with the Raiders. We didn’t have a good offense. They still don’t have a good offense. The fan base is upset. You’re talking about long seasons? It’s probably going to take decades to fix this bad boy,” Pierce said on CBS Sports’ NFL Today.
“I’m just saying, one and done, one and done, done and done. Is there another coach gone? There’s going to be something I talk about a little later where everybody is pointing fingers. At some point you point there, the thumb points back.”
Pierce didn’t clarify who he was talking about, but he obviously believes someone above the head coach is responsible for the team’s ongoing failures on the field.
The only people on the football side of operations in Las Vegas that have more authority than Carroll are owner Mark Davis, minority owner Tom Brady and GM John Spytek.
It is possible Pierce was talking about Davis, but there is a growing sentiment that Brady has been given the keys to the organization from a decision-making standpoint.
Brady made a push to fire Pierce a year ago and Pierce has made comments acknowledging he is aware of that.
Most around the team don’t prefer to put Brady’s name on reports, but it seemed clear on Saturday who Sports Illustrated insider Hondo Carpenter was referring to as the figure looming over Chip Kelly and the coaching staff this year.
“Everybody has bosses,” Carpenter said on the Las Vegas Raiders Insider podcast, talking about Kelly and Carroll. “I’ve been saying this now since the season started and I think it’s starting to resonate with people what exactly I’m saying with that other than it’s extremely obvious.”
Carpenter has been critical of Kelly and Carroll, but he has been saying for a while that they have been answering to “bosses” on a number of key decisions this year.
Not everyone is pointing the finger at Brady, though
NFL Network’s Ian Rapoport reported this week on the power structure within the Raiders’ building and he has been hearing that Carroll was the “boss” who sabotaged Kelly’s plan on offense this season.
Kelly made mistakes, but Rapoport said the veteran offensive coordinator wasn’t running his own offense.
“Talking to people who know this offense very well, people who have studied this offense and played against it, they do not believe that it was Chip Kelly’s offense,” Rapoport said on Sunday.
“They believe it was Pete Carroll’s offense, Specifically, the Pete Carroll offense from Seattle [in] 2023. It sounds to me like if Chip Kelly could do this again, he would not have taken this job.”
The good news for Kelly is that he didn’t answer to any bosses on Sunday and he will walk away with $18 million in his bank account when the dust settles on his 11-game tenure in the desert.
Not a bad paycheck for 31st-ranked offense in the league.
x: @raidersbeat
I just want to say the plays I saw Caleb Rogers in there he looked good,why did they keep pulling him for Mafi? WTF!
Too many fingers in the pie. The O-line wasn’t bad last year. They drafted a darn good running back. Geno doesn’t have time. The run game sucks. Who is ultimately screwing things up? In my opinion, Mark Davis isn’t capable as owner/manager. He hooked up with Brady, and he has what going for him? Pete Caroll is past his better days. The culture must stink inside the organization.
The OL played better last year & JPJ was showing promise as a center but what’s Pete do? Pick a fight with him
We were ranked 32 in rushing offense, last season. The OL was bad and needed upgrading during the offseason, instead they stood pat and that’s why our season is off the rails, again. Piss poor talent evaluators on the Raiders.
At the end of the day the buck stops with Mark Davis. I do believe he wants to win, but so far he’s made consistently bad moves and is ultimately responsible. Continuing to just hire names isn’t working and I’m not convinced the Brady move is going to work. Being a great player doesn’t always translate to running a great organization…see Michael Jordan!
And Derek Jeter. Plenty of us were saying Brady would be a disaster. Saw a stat today that we were more competitive under AP last year than Pete
It doesn’t need anywhere near deacdes to fix. Rebuild the O line. Trade Maxx and acquire more assets. Draft wisely.
Yep, problem is you need a smart GM & staff willing to take lumps to do that. Mark is too stupid to identify talent. He’s interviewed Ed Dodds like 3 times and won’t hire him.
Mark got played by Ron Wolf to hire Reggie and has never learned
Most winning organizations have a franchise QB. Geno is more like the QB you found at the dump. He’s horrible and if the Raiders want to start winning, they have to find their QB. This is among the worst teams in Raiders history and Pete keeps trying to sell us trash. This is his team, he put the pieces together and it failed miserably. He’s done and we all can see it. He doesn’t want to bring along young players because he wants to win before he gets shown the door. I look forward to that day. With FA and the upcoming draft, this team can be on a winning road next year. Just get rid of Geno and get a franchise QB
Brady has allies in the media that will defend him & act he’s blameless, but Brady is vindictive POS who fired AP/Telesco for this crap sandwich. Of course Mark Davis is the only person dumb enough to make a former player a part time NFL team president.
Mark needs to sell, but he’s a vindictive POS too so he won’t
Why I haven’t we heard from Spytek? I don’t need him to be Jerry Jones, but it’s weird that I don’t ever see anything attributed to him. I’m not sure if that bodes well for Pete, or maybe its’ if you don’t have anything nice to say……..
There have been some bad Raiders teams, but this has been the worst. I don’t even want to lose out and get the top pick, because I no confidence in the organization, it will probably be more embarrassment. Remember we were going to swoop in and steal Ben Johnson from the Bears? We were going to sign Matt Stafford away from LA? what a f’n joke, the dump ashes in the front office were played for fools.
Carol and staff bus go find a young head coach like Shula, we are looking at having the number 2 or 3 pick, with three QBS coming out Ind QB Vanderbilt QB, Ohio State QB Alabama, Oklahoma who will be coming out so whoever that’s going to be in charge you better do your homework cuz if you pass on a quarterback again you’re going to lose a lot of fans get it right Davis TB you say you know football but do you know how to run a team ???
The last mistake the Raiders made was firing AP who had the locker room players playing hard for him all he was lacking was a QB you fired them all and you passed on Jaxson Dart and could have got one of the two running backs out of Ohio State and you passed on them all for, as our running back u can’t get a good evaluation because of the mess of the offensive line
Contracts based on performance, Contracts that have limited guaranteed money, Contracts
that require certain statistics to be extended etc.., The football organization makes financial
profits in spite of the losing etc.., The days of old time football is long gone.
I still want to know why we are trotting out Geno when we should be looking at Kenny Pickett (at least Bech and Thornton got a bit of a go vs the Chargers). Use people who might have a future with the organization and stop screwing around with old ideas that are amply proven bad. Reminds me of Jimmy G who can’t throw downfield. C’mon, we need some hope here. I realize that it’s not fair to Pickett given the OL but at least he can scamper around back there and maybe create some plays for WRs and Bowers. Also, throw the ball more to Jeanty! He is a weapon in more ways than one.
The line was improving last year. Coaching matters.
Jordan Meredith played well as a Guard in 2024. As a center in 2025 he is awful
JPJ played well as a center in 2024. For some reason incomPETEnt picked a fight wth him – played a terrible alex cappa over him at guard and now hes on IR
DJ Glaze has regressed to the point where he is a liability after a promising rookie season
Miller of course is hurt and my Gawd Stone feet Forsythe is awful.
The offensive line coach this season is not helping and should be terminiated immediately with anyone else named Carrol. Build the trenches. We have two third rounder – play them to see if they have potential.
There’s one consistent problem folks………….
Mark Davis and his father before him. Time to sell. Maybe Bezos, Musk, or hell even the Saudis would buy them. At least they’d hold people accountable. I’m so sick of them losing, drafting **** players, etc. 2 playoff appearances in the last 23 years. I can remember my fellow Raiders fans complaining about the late 80’s and most of the 90’s. Those years were a Golden Age compared to the last 20.