Oakland Raiders: Signing Richardson To Offer Sheet Makes Little Sense
By Kevin Saito
The Oakland Raiders just signed who?
While it’s true that GM Reggie McKenzie still has more than $20 million to spend to reach the salary cap floor, now it seems like he’s throwing money around just for the fun of it. We half expect to see him standing outside of Raiders HQ, laughing maniacally as he tosses stacks of cash into the air, screaming that he’s “making it rain.”
At least that’s the impression one might get after learning that the Raiders became the first team this year to sign another team’s restricted free agent to an offer sheet – in this case, backup safety Sean Richardson of the Green Bay Packers.
The Packers had given Richardson a low restricted tender of $1.542 million for one year. McKenzie, apparently showing that he wasn’t messing around, upped the ante by offering the fourth year pro a one year deal worth a reported $2.55 million.
Green Bay has until Monday to decide whether to match the offer sheet or not. If not, Richardson will officially be in Silver and Black, and cashing a paycheck that is roughly a million dollars more than returning veteran safety Brandian Ross, who just signed his restricted free agent tender with the team.
It’s a signing that, on the surface, doesn’t make a whole lot of sense. Along with bringing the seemingly immortal Charles Woodson back for another year of service, the Raiders brought in former Eagles safety, Nate Allen to play alongside him. Oakland also still has Jonathan Dowling and Ras-I Dowling on the roster, as well as Ross and Larry Asante, after both signed their free agent tenders on Tuesday.
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Richardson suffered a neck injury five games into his rookie season in 2012 that required fusion surgery. He came back in 2013 and played in six regular season games, as well as the postseason, recording 15 total tackles. He appeared in all 16 regular season, plus two playoff games for the Packers last season, totaling 27 total tackles.
But with so many bodies in the defensive backfield already, what was the need to bring Richardson in, when he figures to be the backup to the backup’s backup? $2.55 million seems like an awful lot of money to pay a special teamer.
One theory is that with Oakland relying so heavily on young cornerbacks D.J. Hayden and Travis Carrie in 2015, they may slide Ross over to help man the corner as insurance against injury – especially in Hayden’s case – or ineffectiveness. Both Hayden and Carrie have shown flashes of promise, but both have battled some injuries, and are largely unproven as of yet.
Ross filled in on the corner for Oakland a bit last season, recording two interceptions, 55 total tackles, six passes defensed, and a forced fumble on the year. With Keith McGill, Neiko Thorpe, and the recently signed James Dockery as the primary backups to Hayden and Carrie, moving Ross from safety to corner as an insurance policy makes some amount of sense.
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And in that case, if Green Bay declines to match Oakland’s offer sheet, having Richardson on the roster also makes a certain amount of sense.
Of course, that theory may be entirely wrong, and McKenzie may be just throwing as many bodies into the safeties group as possible. It would be somewhat understandable after the Raiders got caught short handed when former starter Tyvon Branch went down with injury early in 2013 and again in 2014.
Once bitten, twice shy and all that.
Perhaps McKenzie and his scouting department see something in Richardson that nobody else has seen yet. Though he’s officially been on the Packers’ roster for three years, it isn’t necessarily a good sign that he has yet to start a game for the team. With almost $18 million in cap space of their own to play with, the Packers have the means to keep Richardson – if they want him.
ESPN’s Bill Williamson perhaps, said it the best when on Tuesday, he Tweeted out:
Ted Thompson is king of keeping his own, building within. If #Packers let Richardson walk with means to keep him, could be telling #Raiders
— Bill Williamson (@BWilliamsonNFL) April 7, 2015
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On the surface, trying to acquire Richardson doesn’t make a ton of sense for the Raiders. If they are simply attempting to add some depth at safety, they could do it through the draft, or through the crowd of undrafted free agents. They would likely get somebody without Richardson’s injury history, or his price tag.
This seems like one of those bizarre, head scratching moves that nobody really gets that McKenzie foists upon the Raider faithful now and then.
But, perhaps McKenzie is playing chess while the rest of us are playing checkers. Perhaps he’s seeing the bigger picture while the rest of us are just looking at snap shots. Or perhaps, we really will find him outside of Raider HQ, standing in the back of a Brinks truck, “making it rain.”
We suppose that we’ll know more by Monday.