Report: Raiders Targeted Head Coach Not Named Ben Johnson Before Pete Carroll

Ben Johnson was at the center of head coaching rumors in January, and no team was connected to him at that time more than the Las Vegas Raiders.

There were reports that the Raiders might be the front-runner to get Johnson, but that narrative was squashed a few weeks later when Johnson’s agent admitted the Vegas rumors were essentially a leverage play to get more money from the Chicago Bears.

Not only did Johnson choose the Bears, Sports Illustrated insider Albert Breer reported the former Lions offensive coordinator was aggravated that Tom Brady and company requested to interview him in the first place.

By most accounts, the decision makers in Las Vegas pivoted to Pete Carroll after losing Johnson to Chicago, but according to The Athletic’s Mike Jones, there was another head coaching candidate in the mix – seemingly ahead of Carroll on the list.

“The Raiders wanted Liam Coen to be their head coach, but wound up with Pete Carroll, who — given the state of the franchise — is probably better suited for the job anyway,” Jones reported last week.

Coen was ultimately hired by the Jacksonville Jaguars, and he wasn’t publicly connected to the Raiders during their head-coaching search. Coen has a history with GM John Spytek from their time together with the Buccaneers, but if the sides were interested in one another in January, they did a good job of keeping it quiet.

If the decision in Las Vegas came down to Coen and Carroll, it would seem they made the right choice.

With Carroll’s resume as a coach, there’s an argument to be made that he was a better option than Johnson.

For what it’s worth, Sports Illustrated insider Hondo Carpenter said an AFC executive told him the Raiders “dodged a bullet” when they didn’t get Johnson, and even compared him to Josh McDaniels.

“I got a message from an AFC executive last night, after the news broke that [Johnson] was going to the Bears, who said he believed the Raiders had ‘dodged a bullet,’” Carpenter said on his Las Vegas Raiders Insider podcast in February. “Not because of character, not because of his ability to coach, but because Ben is very introverted. He is very much an offensive genius. That’s factual. But remember when Josh McDaniels came [to Las Vegas], people used the word ‘savant.’”

“I can attest to you that Josh McDaniels, the man, is a good man,” Hondo continued. “Players liked him away from the building and nobody wished him ill will. But Josh was not a leader of mean that the head coach as to be. He’s more introverted, more quiet, more to himself. A lot like Ben Johnson… and this person who knows Josh very well and knows Ben Johnson very well… felt the Raiders dodged a bullet and called him Josh McDaniels 2.0.”

History will be the judge of Carroll and Johnson (and Coen, too), but right now there is excitement in all three cities for their new head coaches – with maybe a little more cautious optimism in Jacksonville.

x: @raidersbeat