Dysfunction and the Las Vegas Raiders go hand in hand, joining other franchises like the Cleveland Browns and Washington Commanders. The Silver and Black’s offseason has been nothing but quiet. The latest developments to add to the never-ending saga: Fox Sports’ Colin Cowherd and New Orleans Saints tight end Juwan Johnson chiming in this week for one.
Cowherd, a master at making waves, made easy work of the Raiders recently. Truth be told, given all the dysfunction, it’s not that difficult to do so. Johnson, for his part, believes former Raiders quarterback Derek Carr is in the best situation of his career.
Are the las Vegas Raiders a volcano ready to erupt?
Colin Cowherd went off on the Raiders during his Wednesday show as he gave his thoughts on the Josh Jacobs situation. However, the radio host went deeper into the organization as a whole.
“[The Raiders are] basically a volcano with a logo,” Cowherd said on “The Herd with Colin Cowherd.” “They’re always bubbling under the surface. So, a story today is Josh Jacobs, their star running back, could hold out. This after Jimmy Garoppolo failed a physical. This after the head coach, in his first year, had to meet with the owner behind closed doors.”
“A third of it is in annual perpetual chaos. I mean, Aaron Rogers could be prickly and, at times, a little passive-aggressive, not a lot of drama. There was no chaos in Green Bay. Be careful about leaving. Boring and predictable because Cleveland, the [New York] Jets, Washington, Raiders, Houston [Texans], Arizona [Cardinals], [and] Chicago [Bears], there’s drama always bubbling right below the surface.”
Along with the Garoppolo and Jacobs cases, Vegas made questionable decisions regarding Carr and Darren Waller.
Have the Raiders made “questionable” decisions?
Regarding Carr, the Raiders extended him to a three-year, $121.5 million contract in 2022. However, the franchise cut their signal caller one year into that extension to save money.
Cutting the 32-year-old allowed the Raiders to get off the hook for $40.4 million. If Carr were still with Vegas, they’d have to pay him his full $32.9 million salary for 2023, which would have become guaranteed. Additionally, $7.5 million of his $41.9 million salary for 2024 would be guaranteed too.
Moving on from Carr after one season into a new contract is confusing from Vegas’ perspective. It allowed the Raiders to waste a year on a guy who wouldn’t be their franchise quarterback.
As for Waller, the 30-year-old suffered the same fate. The Silver and Black inked him to a three-year, $51 million contract extension before the 2022 season. Waller was dealt to the New York Giants not even a year after signing that deal.
It’s been a questionable decision after a questionable decision. For the fans’ sake, the Raiders have to hope that the Garoppolo signing works out despite offseason foot surgery. Meanwhile, Vegas has to find common ground with Jacobs and have their star running back for 2023.
Juwan Johnson takes an indirect swipe at the Raiders…
Carr recently opened up about his exit from the Raiders and mentioned the lack of success. The new Saints signal caller stated that the rotating chair of head coaches hurt any chances of establishing a winning culture.
The veteran quarterback is now in a new situation with New Orleans. His new tight end also believes that the Saints are offering Carr the best offensive roster of his career.
Carr had various weapons during his time with the Raiders, including Davante Adams. Despite players like Adams, Johnson fired off the hot take, likely backing his new quarterback after Carr’s recent interview.
“I feel like with Derek, there’s a lot of things you can do,” Juwan Johnson said in a recent interview with SiriusXM NFL Radio (h/t Pro Football Talk). “He’s been in an offense where he’s had Josh McDaniels, Jon Gruden, so he has a lot of that he can bring over to our offense. Obviously, we have a lot of pieces on our offense — which I think he’s probably never had before. So that’s something that he can use a little bit.”
The NFC South is a wide-open division, and Carr is likely the best quarterback in the division. Taking the Saints to the playoffs will be a way for Carr to stick it to the Raiders. Still, if he fails, then Vegas is going to look smart for moving on from him.
*Top Photo: Scott Winters/Icon Sports Wire via Getty Images
James Jones Tells Raiders to Pay Josh Jacobs as Hold Out Could Be Looming
Carr was not good this year. He played scared and his 3 int’s against the Steelers sealed it. They saw enough to know he wasn’t the qb they wanted. Waller was hurt and more interested in his rap music. So they saved over 50 mil getting rid of them.
The Raiders office is the blame the owner doesn’t know a damm thing about football he was just waiting to inherited the team for the money but hell he’s the poorest owner in the NFL needs to fire the GM ,and the head coach and loose every game this season get #1 picks and rebuild with # 1 QB Williams and new coaching staff cause if they don’t and keep this the Raiders will never be close to be back to the Silver and Black of old just win baby bo know baby that what I’m talkin bout
We do not care about either one of those guy’s opinion! The Raiders’ Carr experiment did not work. I like Waller but he’s not stopping the run or covering receivers. So the team’s problems were not going to be
fixed if Waller stayed in Silver and Black. Defense must be addressed!!
Defense is a big problem yes but the GM and Head Coach is the main he sucked the first time out this Raiders is just New England West 5.QB’s they could’ve traded up for they didn’t think about it remember we had the chance to get Lamar and passed the front office is the problem give a good coach a chance to turn the team around ? not 1 year and fire them we had some good coaches and let them both to another team and they come away winners right yes but what we have now is a joke I’m 61 yrs old been a fan since the age of 4,5 every since I started playing jr.all American we need to do a Miami dolphins look where there at get rid of front office and coaching staff Q.willams or NC state Qb either one and rebuild Defense and offense