Oakland Raiders: One Offseason Move That Should Have Been Made
By Kevin Saito

The Oakland Raiders are struggling through a disappointing season, but one offseason move they didn’t make, could have made a big difference to this team.
Sitting at 4-5, it’s safe to say the Oakland Raiders have been one of the league’s bigger disappointments through the first half of the season. This is a team that went 12-4 last season, played in their first postseason game in just about a decade and a half, and seemed to be on the rise in a big way.
But, then came the offseason, the time when organizations do all of their tinkering in an effort to build upon the momentum of the previous year – or just burn it down and start over.
The Raiders are no exception as they did a fair amount of tinkering over the offseason. Most notably, letting former OC Bill Musgrave walk away when his contract expired and promoting former quarterbacks coach Todd Downing to take his place.
But the one move that could have and should have been made, a move that could have elevated this team and possibly helped carry them through some of this season’s struggles, they inexplicably, failed to make.
Worse than that, they never even entertained the idea.
As for Downing, it’s hard to argue with the logic behind the move. Given Downing’s role in the development of Derek Carr, and his growing reputation as something of an innovative offensive mind (at the time), GM Reggie McKenzie and HC Jack Del Rio were faced with a tough choice.
Stick with Musgrave, who, despite running a bland and sometimes predictable offense, still got results. Oakland had the league’s sixth ranked offense in 2016. The offense was explosive and looked to be on the way to being one of the league’s elite.
But, given that it seemed fair (at the time) to think the unit had hit its ceiling with Musgrave at the controls, it made sense to elevate somebody (Downing) who looked like he had the chops to take this offense to the next level.
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And given that his name was being bandied about for various gigs around the league, you can’t fault McKenzie and Del Rio for wanting to hang on to him.
Granted, it hasn’t worked out that way, and we’re still waiting for the high-octane, explosive offense Downing promised. But, at the time, the logic for elevating him was sound.
What defies logic though, is the fact that on the other side of the ball, McKenzie and Del Rio stood pat and opted to not make a change – despite the fact that the defense has been the team’s Achilles Heel ever since Ken Norton was named to the position.
In Norton’s first year at the helm of the defense (2015), the Raiders were the league’s twenty-second ranked unit in yardage, and twenty-second in points allowed. The following season (2016), the defense took a step back from even that low bar, ranking twenty-sixth overall, and twentieth in points allowed.
This season? Although it’s had some solid moments, overall, the defense has been an absolute dumpster fire. Again. On the season, Oakland’s defense ranks twenty-sixth overall, and twenty-first overall.
On Norton’s watch, the Raiders defense, despite the presence of All-World superstar Khalil Mack, as well as the likes of Bruce Irvin and Mario Edwards Jr., has failed to develop any sort of a consistent pass rush, has been at the bottom of the league in sacks and doesn’t generate much in the way of interceptions — zero through nine games this year, if you’re scoring at home. Which, by the way, is a dubious NFL record.
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Under Norton’s direction and leadership, we have not seen this defense improve. Not one iota. This defense is not making any forward progress, is not getting better, and has turned formerly solid players like Sean Smith, into absolute garbage.
It’s like Norton has the reverse Midas Touch. Everything he touches doesn’t turn into gold, but into flaming heaps of – well, something not suitable for a family-friendly forum such as this.
Knowing all this, what should chap the hide of every Raiders fan out there is that they could have made a change that could have potentially turned this defense from dumpster fire into something respectable. Perhaps, even something dominant.
And that change was removing Norton from his post and hiring Wade Phillips to run the defense.
It could have happened. Phillips was out there. He was looking for a gig. But, so far as we know, McKenzie and Del Rio didn’t even have a conversation about bringing him in. Never even entertained the idea.
Phillips, as we all know, landed with Sean McVay and the LA Rams. Overall in 2017, the Rams have the league’s sixteenth ranked defense and ninth ranked scoring defense. They are also third in the league with 10 interceptions, and are tied for fifth in the league in sacks, with 25.
More than that though, go back through Phillips’ very lengthy, well documented history as a defensive coordinator, and you’ll see that he has a – well – very length, well documented history of success in the position.
He’s put together top-ten defensive units more than twenty times throughout his career. And perhaps his greatest achievement is the fact that his defense – given a very sub-par and less than effective Denver offense led by Peyton Manning, who was on the last leg of his career (literally) – single-handedly won Super Bowl 50 by shutting down Cam Newton and the Carolina Panthers.
A Panthers team that came into the Super Bowl with the league’s top offense, if you recall correctly.
Phillips has always run a hyper-aggressive, see the ball, hit the ball, in your face style of defense. He keeps it simple, allowing his players to do what they do best and make plays. He doesn’t try to shoehorn his players into something they’re not good at – a la Norton.
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Norton so desperately wants this Raiders defense to be the Seattle Seahawks, that he’s running schemes that do not play to the strengths of his players. Not even close.
Smith excelled as a man-to-man corner. He excels as a physical, bump-and-run ball in Kansas City.
And yet, Norton, rather than adapting his scheme to fit his personnel, is having Smith and the rest of Oakland’s corners running off-man and zone coverage schemes.
And the results, over the last two-plus years now, have been utterly disastrous. Oakland has fielded one of the most porous secondaries in the league – a secondary that gets torched all too often.
A secondary that gives up so many yards and so many points, that it puts the offense in impossible positions week in and week out.
Demoting Norton (or just canning him outright) and installing somebody like Phillips, who has a proven track record of success, would have paid immediate dividends, and very likely would have made this defense an asset and a strength, rather than the liability and weakness it currently is.
Del Rio is loyal to his guys. No question about it. He’s unfortunately, loyal to a fault. His loyalty to Norton is crippling this defense and by extension, is hamstringing the entire team.
And if something isn’t done, either changing Norton’s schemes, or bringing somebody in (like Phillips) who can run a scheme that plays to the strengths of his players, it’s going to continue to be a problem moving forward.