The Raiders would have loved to find their next franchise quarterback this offseason. It was their biggest weakness going into the spring and it remains their biggest weakness now. But unfortunately, things just didn’t fall right for them at that position this year.
The Raiders signed Gardner Minshew as a bridge quarterback and were hopeful that the right quarterback would fall to them at No. 13. But with six quarterbacks being picked in the top 12, that didn’t happen.
In a recent article by Brad Gagnon of Bleacher Report, he wrote about the five biggest offseason regrets around the NFL. That list included the Raiders not being more aggressive in finding their next franchise quarterback. Here is a snippet of his thoughts on the passive approach by the Raiders this offseason:
Six quarterbacks were taken with the top 12 picks of the draft. The Raiders picked 13th. Kirk Cousins and Russell Wilson moved teams as veterans. The Raiders wound up with Gardner Minshew II.
The Raiders are otherwise quite talented, but instead of investing in draft or market maneuvers to land a quarterback with an elite ceiling, they stood pat and went super conservative at the sport’s most critical position.
Gagnon believes the Raiders should have traded up inside the top 10 of the NFL Draft prior to that weekend, giving them a better shot of landing Michael Penix Jr. or J.J. McCarthy. Instead, they stood pat and watched all of the other quarterback prospects come off the board.
Time will tell if the Raiders made a mistake by not being more aggressive in targeting a quarterback this offseason. But it’s not hard to look back in hindsight and wonder if the Raiders should have done more in this area.