Las Vegas Raiders general manager John Spytek confirmed Tom Brady’s daily involvement in major decisions this week. Just as important, he explained the Pete Carroll move and outlined a disciplined roster-building vision built on accountability, cap space, and elite draft picks.
Spytek did not announce a revolution. He described a chain of command. Well, at least Raiders fans now know who clearly runs the team.
Ask him whether Tom Brady needs to be “in the building” more often, and Spytek reaches for the operating principle: “We’re in constant communication daily.” The line matters because it separates presence from power. Brady does not need a desk at headquarters to shape outcomes. If “any big decision” is routed through him, the building is not the center of gravity. The phone is.
What happened between John Spytek and Pete Carroll?
That context frames Spytek’s most revealing answer. It was the one about firing Pete Carroll.
Spytek said, “Everything was evaluated as the season went on and over the last couple days.” He also said he talked to Tom Brady “almost every day.” Then came the bottom line: “We made a decision that this was in the best interest of the Raiders.”
That is more than a quote about one coach. It is a window into how the Raiders say they will operate. Evaluate constantly. Keep decisions centralized. Keep the circle small at the top. The Raiders have confirmed Carroll is out after one season. They have also made it clear Spytek and Brady will steer football operations and the next coaching search.
Here is the tension Spytek cannot neatly explain away. The Raiders just fired another coach. It happened after another losing season. Now the organization is selling “culture” as the fix.
Culture is not a slogan you put on a wall. It is what holds up when the season goes sideways. It is also what gets tested when leadership keeps changing. Instability is not just a backdrop. It is part of the problem, and it is the part the Raiders must finally break.
Are you buying what the Raiders GM is selling?
Spytek’s Michigan callback—“The Team, The Team, The Team”—is a useful tell because it is an attempt to anchor the franchise to something older than the weekly churn of the NFL. He lists the pillars like a checklist: “discipline,” “accountability,” “work ethic,” and “team before self.” None of it is controversial. All of it is expensive. Because accountability is not what you demand from players after a 3-14 season. It is what you accept for the infrastructure that produced it.
Which is why his offensive line answer lands with more weight than it appears to at first blush. Spytek says the Raiders will approach the offseason with “an extremely open mind,” and that “anybody” who can help will be considered, citing “a lot of cap space” and “elite draft picks.” Then comes the sentence that should make Raider Nation pause: “We’re not going to begin with the end in mind.”
In roster building, the “end” is not a fantasy. It is the plan: the style of play, the quarterback timeline, the teaching system, and the way you win in December. Refusing to “begin with the end in mind” can read as flexibility. It can also read as the same organizational allergy to commitment that has kept the Raiders stuck in perpetual evaluation.
Spytek insists he and Brady “don’t see it the same” and have “discussions and disagreements.” Good. That is healthier than ceremonial agreement. But it also raises the only question that matters now: when the next decision fails—the next coach, the next quarterback, the next rebuild—who owns it?
Spytek’s quotes answer that, too. “He trusts me,” Spytek said of Brady, and “it’s up to us now to go find it.” The Raiders have placed the wager. The league will grade the result.
*Top Photo: Getty Images