Oakland Raiders: Recent General Manager Power Rankings Are Absurd
By Kevin Saito
If the Oakland Raiders had a nickel for every heaping helping of disrespect and garbage being thrown their way just this offseason – let’s not even talk about the last decade plus – the organization would have literally ALL the money. Seriously. All the money. Like, there would be no more money for any of us because the Raiders would have it all.
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The latest round of double middle fingers flashed at the organization came courtesy of Kristopher Knox of the Bleacher Report.
In his latest article, in which he power ranks all 32 NFL GM’s based on their 2015 offseason performance, Knox slots Raiders’ GM Reggie McKenzie in at number 25. That’s right, in Knox’s inestimable opinion, GM’s like Ray Farmer of the Cleveland Browns, Mike Brown of the Cincinnati Bengals, and even John Elway of the Broncos had better 2015 offseasons than McKenzie.
Farmer’s big offseason acquisition was QB Josh McCown – that alone, should disqualify him from ranking above Oakland in any poll. Aside from bringing in Green Bay castoff A.J. Hawk and bringing back Tampa Bay free agent bust Michael Johnson, Mike Brown of the Bengals didn’t do much else to upgrade his team. And Elway of the Broncos seemed to do little more than hemorrhage players this offseason, losing the likes of Rahim Moore, Orlando Franklin, Terrance Knighton, and Julius Thomas. Yes, Elway brought in Shane Ray, but he’s most definitely not going to come close to plugging all of the holes on an aging Broncos roster.
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While it would be ludicrous and an extreme cases of homerism to say that McKenzie had the best offseason of any NFL GM, slotting him in at number 25 is equally as absurd. McKenzie had a very busy offseason in which he tremendously upgraded his team at a number of positions.
While other GM’s undoubtedly had solid offseason performances, there is a very strong case to be made that McKenzie’s own performance was within the top ten in the entire league – he made his team a hell of a lot better in a lot of different ways than some of the GM’s Knox has slotted well ahead of him in his power rankings.
Raider fans should probably be thankful that Knox saw fit to rank McKenzie ahead of his Bay Area counterpart, Trent Baalke – but only by one position at that. Given the nightmare offseason the San Francisco 49ers have had thanks to an incredibly poorly handled divorce from HC Jim Harbaugh, as well as a rash of free agent departures and retirements – a run that saw them lose a number of very key players – a case can be made that Baalke had the worst offseason of any NFL GM and should be slotted at the bottom of the rankings.
But there Baalke and the 49ers sit in 26th position, just behind McKenzie and the Raiders at 25. It boggles the mind, doesn’t it?
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Knox counts center Rodney Hudson, DT Dan Williams, RB Roy Helu, and WR Amari Cooper as the team’s biggest and best offseason additions. While those are absolutely key acquisitions for the team, the additions of Curtis Lofton, Nate Allen, Malcolm Smith, Clive Walford, Michael Crabtree, and Mario Edwards Jr., are equally as important.
Knowing the Raiders had a really difficult time against the run last season, McKenzie went out and got proven run stuffers in Williams and Lofton to correct that problem. Combined with Justin Ellis, Khalil Mack, Sio Moore, and surprisingly enough, Ray Ray Armstrong, there is no question that Oakland is going to be incredibly stout against the run this season.
After having had a couple of down years, McKenzie had to make the decision to upgrade the center position by letting Stefen Wisniewski walk away as a free agent, and poaching Rodney Hudson from division rival Kansas City. As one of the top two or three centers in the league, the Raiders got a lot better at the position – the anchor of that offensive line – while at the same time, weakening a division opponent.
Oakland’s offense was catastrophically bad in 2014. Though Derek Carr showed tremendous poise and potential last season – showing that he has the ability to be a franchise quarterback – he had no weapons to work with.
His running game, in the form of Darren McFadden and Maurice Jones-Drew, was worse than pathetic, and by the time an inept coaching staff began feeding Latavius Murray – the only Raiders back to provide any sort of spark out of the backfield – the ball, it was too little too late to save the season. Murray and Marcel Reece are still in the fold, and he brought in Helu and Trent Richardson. Though we don’t yet know how the Richardson experiment is going to unfold, the early signs are positive.
As far surrounding Carr with viable weapons, McKenzie brought in Michael Crabtree – an upgrade over the likes of Andre Holmes and Brice Butler – and former number one Rod Streater is back and healthy again. McKenzie also drafted two very big weapons for Carr to utilize to devastating effect – Cooper and Walford.
With Bill Musgrave running the show and promising to install an up-tempo attack that incorporates elements of Chip Kelly’s system – and with powerful weapons all around him, Carr will flourish and the Raiders’ offensive attack has the potential go from last in the league in 2014 to a top ten team this season.
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And let’s not forget what might be the organization’s most important move this whole offseason – bringing in Jack Del Rio to coach the team. Del Rio brings a blue collar, no nonsense attitude to a team in desperate need of both things. He also brings a coaching staff who, when combined, have more than a century’s worth of experience in the NFL. This is a coaching staff that intimately knows the history of the Raiders, who has a reputation for being able to get the best out of their players, and who is going to bring back the Raider way of doing things.
This is not to say that everything McKenzie has done is golden. He’s made his fair share of mistakes and should be called out on them. After posting just 22 total sacks in 2014 – a mere seven by their defensive ends, Oakland came into the 2015 offseason desperate for an edge rusher who could put consistent pressure on the QB.
That is a need that is still largely unfulfilled – though if the whispers are true, Mack may be moving around the defense with the sole purpose of getting to the QB. And it’s possible that second round pick Mario Edwards Jr. could get significant playing time, and develop into a nice complement to Justin Tuck on the other side. And let’s not forget Max Valles who might see the field here and there, and who had a knack for getting to the quarterback.
The other point against Mckenzie is that he made the decision that it was time for Oakland’s young corners, D.J. Hayden and Travis Carrie to sink or swim. McKenzie said goodbye to Carlos Rogers and Tarell Brown – though the latter played pretty well for Oakland last season. Oakland’s secondary is pretty thin, especially after the cornerback spot.
So while McKenzie has struck a few sour notes this offseason, the vast majority of his moves look to be pure gold. The vast majority of his moves have made Oakland a far better team in 2015 than they were last season.
Power rankings usually aren’t worth the paper they’re written on. And in many cases – such as this, it only serves to reinforce the fact that Oakland is a team that will continue to be disrespected by some at every turn. Nothing they do will ever be good enough in the eyes of some.
After all, if McKenzie’s performance this offseason are only good enough to make him the 25th best NFL GM out of all 32 teams, we’d really hate to see what he’d have to do to move that needle up for himself.