The Raiders will host the Cleveland Browns on Sunday at Allegiant Stadium, and as everyone knows by now, they will face the quarterback many believed they were going to draft seven months ago.
As it turned out, the Raiders passed on Shedeur Sanders seven times in the 2025 draft before the Browns took him in the fifth round, and many are confident the Raiders’ disinterest in Sanders came at the direction of minority owner Tom Brady.
Former Raiders offensive lineman Richie Incognito talked about Sanders on Friday, and he believes Brady had a heavy hand in the decision to avoid Sanders. Incognito was equally unimpressed by the team’s decision to give up a third-round pick and $66 million guaranteed for Geno Smith.
“Tom [Brady] did have a close connection with [Shedeur] and he is calling the shots. The Raiders are idiots and they went with Geno Smith and so they have their starter,” Incognito said on The Arena podcast this week.
“This is a great matchup [for Shedeur]. Stick it to Tom. Stick it to the Raiders. The Raiders team is just in shambles,” Incognito continued. ”[Tom] has major input there. Mr. Davis is 1, he’s 1A. He’s calling a lot of shots there. The close personal relationship [Tom] has with Shedeur, they could have saved him. He went in the fifth round. They obviously need some help at quarterback because our backup is Aidan O’Connell.”
”Brady is calling the shots. I know so. Brady is running the show and I know that Mr. Davis is running a lot of stuff by him, he has a close personal relationship with [John] Spytek that goes back to Michigan, they won a Super Bowl together in Tampa. I do think there is some credence to Tom passing on [Shedeur] several times. They could have spent a fourth. They could have spent a fifth.”
Safe to say, Brady won’t appreciate Incognito’s comments even though his own head coach said in January they were going to lean on Brady “like crazy.”
Remember, it was Brady who coincidentally ran into Matthew Stafford at a ski lodge in Montana (while the Raiders were trying to trade for Stafford), and it was Brady who put the full court press on Ben Johnson to take the Raiders’ head coaching job.
Brady doesn’t want people to believe he is actively involved in personnel decisions
“I wasn’t a part of any evaluation process,” Brady said in May, but Sports Illustrated insider Albert Breer reported in August that Brady secretively made a trip to Las Vegas to discuss the team’s offseason quarterback options.
“Even if [Brady] isn’t in there every day, and he’s very sensitive about that, and a story I heard [was] he helped with their quarterback evaluation because obviously, who wouldn’t want Tom [helping in a quarterback search]?” Breer said on the Rich Eisen Show.
“So he flew in incognito for a day to sit down with the front office and the coaches to go through quarterbacks and look at quarterbacks on tape, and left, and no one knew about it,” Breer continued. “My understanding is the reason why is because he knows if he shows up, he takes all the oxygen out of the room. He knows if he shows up… he doesn’t’ want the perception out there… that he’s lording over everything. But he certainly has an influence of the types of players they are bringing in.”
According to The Daily Mail, Brady took offense to Skip Bayless and others saying he was a big part of the decision-making process on Sanders.
“Tom thinks that Skip Bayless is an idiot for thinking he had anything to do with Shedeur’s downfall in the NFL Draft,” an anonymous source told the Daily Mail in April.
“Tom has limited say in what players the Raiders pick in the NFL Draft or whomever they sign. Pete Carroll (head coach) and Mark Davis (owner) have the final say on everything with the team. Will they talk to Tom for his advice? Absolutely, but Tom had no sway on getting Shedeur or staying away from him…”
“Now that Tom is in the media himself and has had to deal with Skip forever, it is just another ridiculous accusation that Tom isn’t going to give any life to for Skip’s benefit. It is just stupid banter.”
x: @raidersbeat
Team needs to fire Chip Kelley hire Brian Daboll then bring in a young player. Maybe even Shedeur. This offense is unimaginably pathetic
This is really Davis’ mess he made the huge error of turning over football operations to a guy, Brady, that had zero experience in building a team. I’m convinced that as long as Davis is making the call on who is running the team it will never be relevant. Davis is just lacking in common basic sense when it comes to these decisions, he is too easily convinced by smooth talkers. He needs to hire qualified people to run the team.
You are right on the money!
Did Davis go to the Donald Sterling school of decision making?
First mistake was hiring coach Biden.
FIRE BRENNAN CARROLL!
One terrible decision after another
Are offensive line misses you richie!
The Masque-Raiders!!!