MOBILE, Ala. — The Raiders were an enigmatic team in 2020. They were capable of beating the AFC champion Chiefs in a shootout and losing to the 4-12 Falcons in a 37-point blowout.
They looked like a surefire playoff team through the first half of the season, then lost five of their last seven games and finished 8-8. While that was an improvement over their 7-9 campaign in 2019, they still missed the playoffs for the fourth consecutive season.
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Obviously, the goal is to end that postseason drought in 2021. That’ll require significant internal improvement, but also key additions through free agency and the draft.
Las Vegas started the latter piece of that equation by sending representatives to this week’s Senior Bowl. General manager Mike Mayock is leading the Raiders’ efforts and spoke to The Athletic on Tuesday from Mobile.
Mayock recapped last season, reflected on his ongoing tenure as general manager as he enters his third year and provided a preview of what’s to come. The following conversation has been edited for clarity.
How would you evaluate the 2020 season for the Raiders from a football perspective?
I thought it was a disappointing and frustrating end. We were 6-3 and playing real good football on offense and getting by on defense, and then we did poorly down the stretch. I think, from our perspective, we felt like we were a top-10 offense, which we were in scoring offense. I’m very happy with the way that went. I thought we played pretty well. Some guys emerged. Defensively, I think we felt like had we been a middle-of-the-pack defense we would’ve been a playoff team. And we were not a middle-of-the-pack defense. So, we’ve got some work to do there.
Where do you feel you need to improve this offseason collectively?
Well, you have to start on defense. And, to be honest with you, it’s all three levels. We’ve got to rush the quarterback better; we’ve got to play better at the linebacker position and our young defensive backs have got to be more cohesive and play better. You can make excuses, which I don’t want to do. We’ve got a really young defensive backfield. It was a COVID year. I think we had a bunch of injuries. John Abram did not practice much all year. Our first-round pick, (Damon) Arnette, had a couple concussions and COVID. We just never got it going on the back end. Some of those guys were drafted high and they need to play better.
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How have you grown and what have you learned during your first few years in this general manager role?
I think, No. 1, you’ve got to trust the people that you work with. I think we’ve got a really good scouting staff both on the pro and the college side. You hired them for a reason: You empower them and you trust them. I think that’s something that we’ve got to do a good job with. I think our coaches and our scouts get along well. And I think, philosophically, that’s the important thing is that we understand what they’re looking for. And the way I look at it is we serve them. We’re trying to provide the coaching staff with what they’re looking for.
We’ve been talking about defense and we’ve got a new defensive coordinator (Gus Bradley) and predominantly a new staff (linebackers coach Richard Smith and defensive backs coach Ron Milus) and we’re just trying to get to know them now and exactly what they’re looking for so that we can serve them both in free agency and the draft.
I know that COVID-19 also impacted things leading up to last year’s draft, but what’s it been like navigating this scouting cycle with the entire thing taking place during the pandemic?
Note: The 2021 NFL Scouting Combine won’t feature in-person workouts. All workouts will take place on the individual pro days on college campuses. For a limited number of prospects, an in-person medical examination will take place in April and teams will be allowed to send one physician and one athletic trainer to conduct the exams. Prospect interviews and psychological testing will be done virtually.
It’s been a year of trying to adapt to different things and having to learn how to do new things. As long as all 32 teams are playing under the same set of rules, it’s fair. I think we were all hoping that this offseason here would be a lot of different and that we could get back to normal. But, at this point, that’s not the case. We’re very grateful that the Senior Bowl found a way to get this done this week. And Jim Nagy, their executive director, is unbelievable. I mean, he pulled this thing together. All the players, coaches and scouts get tested every day. It’s a big-time operation and this is gonna be our best evaluation period for this offseason. We’ve got some of the top players in college football here and we’re gonna get a chance to interview all of them and watch them practice three days in a row and then play a game Saturday.
So, the Senior Bowl is business as usual. The combine is gonna be different, Tashan. Really, I think the biggest difference is that all of the workouts are gonna get pushed to on campus. So, instead of one unified event in Indy, it’s gonna be a bunch of mini regional events all over the country. I think myself and all the scouts are fired up to get out there. More than anything, the virtual stuff is fine, but it’s not like being together talking about prospects and watching them work out in person. Nothing can really substitute for that.
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Does that make your job more difficult?
I think you still have to gather all the same information. It makes it more difficult when you can’t sit down across from them. Just to give you an example: A pro day this year, say you go to a big-time school and you’ve known six of the coaches there for 20 years. In a normal year, you’d be going in a day early, maybe grabbing dinner, maybe meeting them in their offices, talking about the guys that are gonna be working at the pro day the next day and getting as much information as you can. You might be able to have dinner with a couple of prospects. You might be able to sit down and watch film with a linebacker or an offensive lineman. All of those things, you can’t do this year.
You go to the pro day, you watch them work out and you’re really not allowed to have personal interaction with anybody. Again, we’ll be there, it just makes it more difficult to figure out what makes a kid tick. And I think that’s the most important thing in the whole process: What really makes this kid tick? And if you figure that out, I think we can do a good job with the film, it really comes down to what makes the kid tick.
How do you balance identifying needs you want to fulfill through free agency as opposed to the draft?
Note: According to Spotrac, the Raiders have $197,810,360 in cap commitments for the 2021 season.
I think the hardest thing, Tashan, is that in most years we’ll know what our budget is economically. We’ll know what the salary cap is and we’ll know how much cash we have to spend against it. This year, we don’t know anything yet. Just to give you an example, the salary cap this year fell at $195 (million) to $200 (million). In a typical year, we would jump up to about $220 (million) to $225 (million). This year, we’re looking at a floor that was negotiated a year ago between the union and the league at $175 million.
So, worst-case scenario, we could be looking at a $175 million cap when, in a normal year, we’d be at two and a quarter. You’re looking at a $50 million differential, worst case. Now, that could get re-negotiated with the league and the union and it might get higher. I hope it does. But, to answer your question, against that backdrop it becomes more difficult than any other year. Because you really don’t know, at this point, what budget you’re working with.
We’re running a whole bunch of different hypotheticals. What if the cap is this? What if it’s $10 million more or what if it’s $10 million more than that? We’re prioritizing our free agents. We’re prioritizing and grading every free agent in the league. We’re trying to understand who might be cap casualties and who might be traded. It’s a typical year except for the fact that it’s made much more complicated by the uncertainty of the budget.
However this offseason plays out, what would you consider to be a success in the 2021 season?
Bottom line, I mean it’s pretty easy: We need to get a lot better on both sides of the ball, we need to get way better on defense, we need to be a playoff team and we need to go chase a Super Bowl. I mean, every team in the league, that’s the ultimate goal: Win the Super Bowl. Now, we had some success this year against good football teams. We beat Kansas City, we beat New Orleans, we beat Cleveland, but we weren’t able to take care of business coming down the stretch.
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It’s frustrating. It’s disappointing. We’ve got to get better on defense, we’ve got to get more depth so that we can sustain a full season and we’ve got to compete amongst the better teams in the league every week, not just on occasion.
Given this is the third full year of you and Jon Gruden working together, how important is it to achieve that mark when it comes to staying on track with your long-term goals?
It’s a critical year, I think, for the entire organization. And I think Jon and I are joined at the hip philosophically. We both know how critical the year is and we fully expect that we’re gonna take a jump this year. We’re disappointed it didn’t happen last year, but it needs to happen this year.
(Photo of Mike Mayock: Kirby Lee / USA Today)
Tashan Reed is a senior writer for The Athletic covering the Las Vegas Raiders. He previously covered Florida State football for The Athletic. Prior to joining The Athletic, he covered high school and NAIA college sports for the Columbia Missourian, Mizzou football, men’s basketball and women’s basketball for SBNation blog Rock M Nation, wrote stories focused on the African-American community for The St. Louis American and was a sports intern at the Commercial Appeal in Memphis through the Sports Journalism Institute. Follow Tashan on Twitter @tashanreed
