The Las Vegas Raiders drafted one of the most productive tight ends in football in Brock Bowers, a fact plenty of teams around the league already knew on draft night.
The only thing that made the pick curious at the time wasn’t Bowers’ talent, it was the Raiders’ own roster. Taking a tight end at pick No. 13 in the 2024 draft came just one year after Las Vegas had used a second-round pick on Michael Mayer, and on paper, doubling up at the position that high wasn’t the likely move.
The Raiders also had other glaring needs at the time, including their offensive line and secondary. But two years later, no one is criticizing the pick.
According to the California Post’s Vinny Bonsignore, the Bowers pick didn’t just surprise fans and media, it genuinely upset rival front offices who had their eyes on the Georgia tight end.
The longtime Vegas insider shared an account from one executive in particular (possibly someone within the Rams organization?)…
“I remember Brock Bowers, when they picked Brock Bowers, he was a little upset because there were a lot of people that loved Brock Bowers,” Bonsignore said on Raider Nation Radio’s JT the Brick Show.
“There were a lot of people, trust me, I talked to about four or five people from other teams that [Bowers] was their guy. They didn’t think that the Raiders were going to draft him that high because they had just drafted Michael Mayer. So there were some cuss words after that one, after Brock Bowers, because his team was one of the teams, one of the many teams that were drafting right behind the Raiders that wanted him.”
Bowers was widely considered too talented to be sitting on the board at 13, and former GM Tom Telesco refused to pass on the value in front of him regardless of positional need.
That confidence has since proven out.
Bowers wasted no time validating the frustration of rival evaluators, shattering rookie tight end records in his debut season with 112 catches for 1,194 yards.
Even in his second season, while slowed by a knee injury that cost him five games, he led the Raiders in both receptions and touchdown catches and earned his second straight Pro Bowl nod.
Two years removed from the pick, the tight end room the Raiders built with Mayer and Bowers looks less like a redundancy and more like a foundation. What read as a luxury selection has turned into one of the best value swings of the 2024 draft class.
It’s funny how many people say what a disappointment Mayer is. He’s probably better than 28 other teams tight ends. He’s just played on a terrible offense and behind the best tight end in the game right now.
So I wonder why the team hasn’t gotten a good trade offer for Mayer?
Maybe because the team is smart enough to know that if Bowers goes down, they have a significant backup. The same reason why they haven’t gotten rid of Aiden.
Or maybe they plan to run a lot of too tight end sets? Which would be a good thing for the run game, especially in a zone run blocking scheme.
Yes, we had a plethora of needs. But I for one was not unhappy with the pick.
Jeanty on the other hand………..not happy. Paying a running back that hasn’t played one snap in the NFL more money than every other, running back in the NFL with the exception of one, isn’t smart. Even when you have a ton of Space. We had the worst offense of line in the league last year. And it was safe to say it wasn’t going to be good.
It’s why I wanted to keep Telesco. No “my guy” mess, he looked at positional value but then realized I can’t let a HOF player go past me. He knew the right balance & Brady canned him