Vic Tafur, now writing for The Athletic, ended the NFL combine with a list of observations he came away with during his week in Indianapolis.
He’s harboring more information than he offered in the column (stop holding out, Vic), but one piece of information that stood out was in regard to the state of the current roster.
According to Tafur, the Raiders (presumably meaning the owner, general manager, and coaches?) don’t view the current roster as close to competing for a Super Bowl.
If true, there is a long list of assumptions that can probably be made – or at the very least, questions that can be asked.
If the roster isn’t particularly impressive, is general manager Reggie McKenzie in good standing in terms of job security?
What a bizarre fall from grace that would be – to go from ‘league’s top executive’ to being unemployed in about 24 months.
If the roster isn’t ready to win a championship now, why hold on to aging veterans (and locker room sideshows) like Michael Crabtree and Marshawn Lynch?
Maybe the 2016 season was “a bit of a fluke” as Tafur insinuated in the column, but if Gruden is that much of an upgrade over Jack Del Rio, shouldn’t he be able to get the Raiders to at least 10 wins?
$100 million had better be worth at least that, right?
twitter: @raidersbeat
Man, I’ve been saying it for months now…..Reggie McKenzie is a joke! He absolutely nailed the 2014 draft….ok, great. However, his other drafts have been GARBAGE! Look, we don’t have a single player from the 2012 or 2013 drafts. I’m not going to comb through each of the drafts since then, but if you add up the “hits” since 2015, the list is VERY VERY short. Yeah, he picked up a few 7th rounders and UDFA’s that look pretty good, but you can’t blow the top end of every draft and say “Well, look, we have a UDFA starting on the D-line!” …… BULL !! You cant’ field a team of 7th rounders and UDFA’s and expect to be a championship-caliber team! WTF??
Go back and look at the trash he’s pulled in over the past 3 years. Most of them are either gone or could be cut at any time without the team skipping a beat. It’s pathetic! This team needs a HUGE influx of REAL talent and fast. McKenzie can’t blow yet another draft. I hope someone locks his dumbass out of the “war room” on draft day!
The drafts he failed on where the drafts that Jack Del Rio was involved in. Jack thought he could bring in raw, but talented college kids and mold them into superstars. Clearly that did not pan out.
Bottom line is, Reggie was money before Jack came in and put his two cents in. Hopefully Gruden will right that ship and let Reggie do his thing once again.
Don’t entirely agree. . .DJ Hayden/Menelik Watson/Sio Moore. . .Tony Bergstrom/Miles Burris (shall i go on)?! Those picks were prior to JDR, so you can’t use him as the scapegoat. There’s no way you can be competitive when you miss on your top draft picks. As Mike stated. . .a team of UDFA & 7th rounders is not something to brag about.
Now with that said, I believe Reggie can turn things around with this draft, BUT he has to hit on his early draft picks. And the 2015/2016/2017 draft picks still have time to pan out, but we definitely need some day 1 starters in the 2018 draft – AKA Roquan Smith / Tremaine Edmunds (hopefully one of them is there at #10).
No offense but this was a weak, poorly thought out ‘ditty’ and kind of a waste of time to read. Quoting Vic, a baseball writer, thinking that he knows what the owner, GM and coaches think. Pretty dumb. And if they really did think that they weren’t close to competing, they wouldn’t tell anybody and they sure as hell wouldn’t tell Vic.
You say “if this is true” which means that even you don’t think that it is, so why repeat it? Then you go on to attack McKenzie for no apparent reason… oh and firing him. Really? After that, you admit that you don’t know why veteran players are kept??? There are plenty of reasons, plenty. If you can’t come up with at least three, you should have done some research before trying to write this bit. But you are not finished yet, next you slam a 12-4 record as a Fluke? Twelve wins in the NFL is not a Fluke. Lastly you calling out a coach that, by all accounts in the NFL family that is actually in the know and think of him as a great addition to ANY team, saying that “he had better be worth at least that”… or what? That is just silly.
This whole article was nothing but negative hearsay and Raider bashing AND it was from raidersbeat…WTH?
Well said my boy!!
My thoughts exactly. This is the kind of garbage you’ll find during the offseason smh…
I agree. Could be passive aggressive route to oust Reggie, who apparently Mark Davis likes a lot. But the best point is if Gruden is all that, he should be able to coach this team up. Him and his staff. Just like players get called on the carpet for relationship of contract size to performance, coaches should too.
tatur is an idiot, we need to upgrade the talent of defense, have better play calling in place, another good rb and wr to the mix and we will be fine. other than with mack we tend to draft better on the offensive side than the defensive side, so i say draft best play available in the first round and give carr more weapons and pick up good defenders in free agency, and please resign bowman and get better linebackers and defensive lineman which in turn will help the secondary play to their potential.
every year is different but we’re not far off and anything could happen, i have faith with chuckie back more than ever before.
Like a Wr success is linked to his QB’s success the success of a GM and the coaching staff must be linked. A GM can bring in whoever the coach approves of but if the coach/staff can’t/don’t coach them up…. it takes skill to know you can draft Mack and still be able to get Carr in round two. It’s call knowing how a draft will flow and it only obtained through experience. However wants Reggie fired now do not love the Raiders. Must be here to help new staff learn players and prepare for FA and the draft. If Gruden tried to do that with an entirely new personnel staff he would have set himself for disaster.
The Press is so hard up for any Raider news and competing with vegas for news stories that they will write anything for readership. Fake news hell yes . No fact’s what so ever !
reggie is a horrible GM and awful at judging talent.
how he got the job is anyone’s guess
probably b/c al davis ruined the raiders rep so badly NO ONE would touch the raiders GM job.
reggie should be washing down the team bus or sweeping up the locker room. b/c he is lack of talent is jaw dropping.
this goofy looking goon needs to be fired asap.