It’s not exactly front-page news that the Las Vegas Raiders haven’t been a preferred destination lately. They’re coming off a 3-14 season, and it’s been a while since the Raiders could be considered even respectable.
But the Raiders were preferred by one new arrival, and he’s the most important one of all. New head coach Klint Kubiak was “the guy” for the Arizona Cardinals, according to Connor Byrne of ProFootballRumors.com, but Kubiak chose the Raiders, and the Cardinals ended up going with new coach Mike LaFleur.
On the surface, this doesn’t make any sense. The Cardinals have a problematic quarterback, Kyler Murray, who costs a lot and has had some tough times, but Murray has also played at a high level and made the playoffs.
The Raiders, meanwhile, have no quarterback to speak of, given that they’re expected to move on from Geno Smith and are widely expected to draft QB Fernando Mendoza in a couple of months with the top pick of the draft.
But there is one other strong possibility here—the ever-popular “follow the money” storyline. The Cardinals are infamous for not paying their coaches, and that’s supposedly the main reason behind Kubiak’s choice.
That doesn’t necessarily mean Raiders owner Mark Davis paid big money for Kubiak, however. The better guess is that minority owner Tom Brady convinced Davis to pony up for a real head coach, and Davis has been doing just about everything Brady has told him to do since Brady bought a small piece of the Raiders at what was reportedly a discount price.
If this is actually true, it’s definitely newsworthy. It would represent a change in the business m.o. of the Raiders, and in that regard it’s actually somewhat stunning. Contract details from both teams will be hard to come by for the next few weeks at least, but those details will leak out to some extent, so it will be interesting to see what emerges.
The next step in this process is Kubiak’s staff. He’s rumored to be raiding the Seattle Seahawks for a couple of offensive coaches, and there’s a name or two on defense that’s been thrown around as well. It’ll be interesting to see if Davis ponies up for these coaches, especially since the Seahawks may be handing out some big raises after winning the Super Bowl.
The ultimate version of this will be to see what the Raiders spend to put a product on the field this year. Will they actually put all that cap cash to good use for a change?