Trade rumors around Maxx Crosby got off to an early start in December when he dropped a podcast on Christmas Eve voicing his concerns with the Raiders’ direction as an organization.
At the time, it wasn’t clear what the Raiders were going to do with their head coach and GM, and the team still didn’t have a franchise quarterback.
The arrival of Pete Carroll and John Spytek seemed to ease Crosby’s concerns, but according to Spytek, there were teams trying to “steal” Crosby from the Raiders very early in his tenure as general manager.
“There’s plenty of people who, you’re a new GM, and they want to see if they can shake your trees and see if they can steal somebody from you… maybe or maybe not Jason Licht tried to get him before I even got a jet to Vegas,” Spytek said on the 3 and Out with John Middlekauff.
Licht, of course, was the Tampa Bay Buccaneers GM that Spytek worked with from 2016 until he took the job in Las Vegas.
Sports Illustrated insider Hondo Carpenter has talked in the last few months about Crosby’s trade value and he believes the Raiders turned down significant offers ahead of free agency for their 27-year-old edge rusher.
In his conversation with Middlekauff, Spytek also addressed the quarterback position.
Prior to trading for Geno Smith, Spytek hinted that he tried to trade for one or more of the top quarterbacks in the league.
“Remember that opening press conference? Feels like two years ago now,” Spytek said. “Pete [Carroll] and I weren’t just blowing smoke. We meant it when we said we’d look ‘everywhere’ for a quarterback. We called teams just to see. I’d be embarrassed to tell you some of the players we probably called and asked to trade for, but you just never know.”
As it turned out, Smith was a consolation prize everyone is Las Vegas seems to be enthusiastic about and Spytek was careful to point out that the former Seahawks quarterback didn’t come cheap.
“A third-round pick,” Spytek said. “That’s not a nothing pick.”
The Raiders had several opportunities to bolster their quarterback room in the months after trading for Smith and it seems clear in hindsight that the decision makers in Las Vegas are committed to him – even to the point of not adding any significant competition to the quarterback position in free agency or the draft.
Spytek and Carroll didn’t draft a quarterback until the sixth round, and it was a little bit of a surprise that they didn’t take Ohio State quarterback Will Howard.
It was rumored that offensive coordinator Chip Kelly, who was Howard’s offensive coordinator at Ohio State, really wanted the Raiders to draft Howard. Additionally, Sports Illustrated insider Hondo Carpenter said the Raiders had Howard a little higher on their draft board than North Dakota State quarterback Cam Miller, who they ended up drafting.
If that was the case, is there a chance Carroll understood the relationship between Kelly and Howard and wanted to avoid a potential situation where his offensive coordinator might not be quite as ‘all-in’ on Smith?
x: @raidersbeat