The Athletic Football Show: A show about the NFL - Raiders fire HC Josh McDaniels and GM Dave Ziegler

Episode Date: November 1, 2023

The NFL world woke up on Wednesday to the surprise news that Raiders owner Mark Davis relieved head coach Josh McDaniels and GM Dave Ziegler of their duties. The Athletic Raiders beat writer Tashan Reed joins Michael Beller to discuss why the team made the move now, and what's next for the franchise, on this emergency episode of The Athletic Football Show.Follow Tashan on Twitter: @tashanreedFollow Michael on Twitter: @MBellerSubscribe to The Athletic Football Show...AppleSpotifyYouTube Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This is the Athletic Football Show. Hello everybody and welcome into the Athletic Football Show. I am Michael Beller, your emergency host for this emergency edition of the Athletic Football Show. Robert Mays, Zach Kiefer, Mike Sando, who you would typically be hearing in this spot, but all of them indisposed for one reason or another. So that is why you hear my voice right now. We could not let the day pass without touching on the huge, huge and unexpected news coming out of Las Vegas, Josh McDaniels, Dave Ziegler, fired, relieved of their duties as head coach

and general manager, respectively. The offensive coordinator, Mick Lamarty, also let go to help us tackle this big piece of news coming from Vegas. We bring on one of our Raiders, writers, at The Athletic, to Sean, thanks so much for being with us here today. Thanks for having me, ma'am. So from the outside looking in, this appears to be a huge surprise, at least in terms of the timing. You obviously are on the ground. You are there every day. Did it come as that big of a surprise to you?

Absolutely. I think the end result isn't surprising. You know, especially coming off of last season, going six and 11 in their first year on the job. And then getting off to a rough start this season, you could tell the pressure was there for them to turn it around and start picking up some wins. But, you know, only eight games into the season,

you know, it hadn't really been determined if they could. could turn it around, right? I mean, they're three and five, but they're going into a two-game home stretch against the Giants and the Jets, which, you know, aren't the toughest teams in the world. And so realistically, they could have got back to 500 and put themselves back in contention, but, you know, owner Mark Davis just decided that he had seen enough and didn't feel like waiting to give them a chance to turn it around. He wasn't confident in the plan and the results that he's seen so far were obviously pretty terrible through 25 games. And so he pulled the plug on the entire operation. And so that's something that we knew was possible, but the

timing of it. I mean, McDaniels had literally had a press conference, you know, that day coming off the loss to the Giants on Monday. And so it was a surprise to everybody involved. Certainly, not exactly what we were expecting to wake up to on Wednesday morning. You mentioned the two games they have coming up. They're coming off a two-game stretch where they lose on Monday night football in front of a national audience to a very good Lions team, but the score not as close, the game, excuse me, not as close as the score might have indicated week before, embarrassed by a not very good Chicago Bears team. Do you get the sense that there was a final straw involved here?

I know we're about an hour away from you being at a press conference, so most everyone out there will hear this after you attend that press conference. But in advance of that, was there something that feels like a final straw that had Mark Davis pull the plug right now rather than giving them those two games, you thought they maybe would get to get back to 500? I think the final straw was actually a move they made in the offseason, and that was signing Jimmy Garoppolo to be their next quarterback. Obviously, last year they inherited Derek Carr, who was the Raiders long time starter at

quarterback, gave him an extension, brought in Devonte Adams and expected there would be fireworks on offense. And while the offense was good, it wasn't good enough. And the team's performance was awful. And they made the understandable decision after the season to move on from Derek Carr. And that's something that Davis himself obviously signed off on, you know, for them to release him and not even get anything back for him in a trade. but that can't be your replacement.

You know, a highly paid veteran quarterback who you handpicked, who you had familiarity with your system. And he's arguably been like the worst quarterback in the league this season. I mean, he's missed 10 quarters of action and still leaves the league with nine interceptions. He's been ineffective, unwilling to push the ball downfield. Looks like he has happy feet in the pocket. And the thing is, like, they have plenty of opportunities not to do this. I mean, they have plenty of cast space and draft resources this offseason. And then even when they did make the decision to sign Jimmy Garoppolo, they had another chance to get out of it because he failed his physical because the broken foot that he suffered with the 49ers last December hadn't properly healed.

And they could have just vetoed his deal. But even still, he signed him anyway, passed on, they had the number seven pick in a draft and passed on trying to draft a quarterback there or trading up to potentially grab another quarterback. And they wrote with him as their guy. And it couldn't have gone worse, you know, through the first eight games of the season for them. And I think that combination of getting the quarterback wrong, all the other missteps they made throughout their tenure with the franchise, the results on the field, the lack of urgency. There was just a lot of talk, you know, from GM Dave Ziegler and coach Josh McDaniels about patience and billing for the future and this long term range. And it just wasn't a plan. This team has no direction, you know, and something I said on the show a couple weeks ago talking was Zach Kiefer, like there is no direction.

And Mark Davis felt that. And I think that in combination with the quarterback missed up, it was just too much for him to bear. A couple of things there that I want to follow up on first. Let's go to a quote from the column of your colleague, Vic Taver, wrote about the fire rings here. This is right at the top of the big story, which you can see if your subscriber to the athletic. The rope that brought the curtain down to McDaniels and Ziegler sooner than either ever imagined was there misplaced and empty confidence. Well, he surely played some kind of role in the New England Patriots' Six Super Bowl wins over the years. how much became more and more of a question to Davis with every misstep they made the last two years.

Pretty damning assessment from Vic there and pretty fair assessment, it seems, because as you say, there have been quite a few missteps over just these last two seasons. Yeah, I mean, even, you know, their initial evaluation of a situation that they took over. His team made the playoffs in 2021, despite, you know, former head coach John Gruden resigning in the middle of the season in response to the email scandal. they rally around interim coach, Rich Bessaccia. They go through a bunch of other off-to-field issues, make the playoffs somehow. You don't typically take over a playoff team. And they thought that the Raiders team that they inherited was at a pretty good place.

And that with a few extra moves, they could push them into a contending team. That was a mis-evaluation. I mean, a team, you know, won a bunch of close games. You still have to give them credit. But there was a lot of luck involved with that team. And the core of the roster wasn't that good because the previous regime of Gruden and general manager Mike Mayak had some of the worst drafting you could possibly ever see. And so they made all-in moves that said we're right there, you know, trading a first and second round pick for Devante Adams,

signing an aging pass rusher and Chandler Jones to a huge three-year $51 million contract. Giving everybody in their mama an extension and Derek Carr and Darren Waller and Max Crosby and Hunter Renfro. Like these are all moves where it's like we're winning right now, year one, we're going for it. And then you go six and 11. that that just can't happen, but it did. And it put them in a weird situation where they realized, okay, we're not as good as we thought we were, but we've already made all of these moves like we are that good. What do we do now? And the answer to this offseason was basically nothing. I mean, they released Derek Carr. They traded Darren Waller to the Giants. You know, they brought in

Jimmy Garoppolo as a replacement. But outside of that, like they didn't really make any splashes in free agency. They didn't make any major trades. In the draft, they, they picked up guys that were more developmental for the future, starting with their number seven overall pick, draft and edge rusher Tyre Wilson, who they expected to be a backup behind Chandler Jones before he ultimately, you know, ended up getting released after a series of off-to-field issues on his end. And so pretty much nothing that they tried to do worked out. They put themselves in a weird no-man's land where they weren't tanking and rebuilding, but they also weren't anywhere close to intending they were just sort of existing and spending a lot of money and resources while doing so.

And that's a quick way to get fired. I mean, it was a quick leash. Obviously, only 25 games. You don't see that all that often. But it's hard to say that it wasn't justified. I mean, let's go over those moves again, just to really drive this home. Last year, you get an extension for Derrick Carr. You get an extension for Darren Waller.

You get extension for Hunter Renfro. You get one for Max Crosby. Max Crosby, that one's worked out all right. But Derrickar gets cut. And Derrickar walks with that no trade clause that was included in his conference. Darren Waller gets traded to the Giants. Hunter Renfro is still there, but effectively benched doesn't even seem to have much of a role in the passing game this year. You go back another 24 hours from before this. They can't even find a trade partner for him. You make that win now move for Devante. Everyone loves Devante Adams, but it costs you a first round and second round pick, and you're clearly not quite ready to win now. 32 million guaranteed for Chandler Jones, 33 million guaranteed for Jimmy G. You had Jared Stidham in the building. You would have had to resign him. You let him walk. He goes to Denver. He's He played, I don't know, well enough if you're going to accept a rebuilding season. He played well enough last year in those couple of games he started and placed at Derrick Carr.

And then you get into the game of brinksmanship with Josh Jacobs over the offseason after he led the league in yards from scrimmage. As you have said more than one time, it just feels as though this is a team that did not have a coherent plan going into last year, going into this year. And maybe that's ultimately what cost them. It did. And I mean, you know, along the way, as I said before, there wasn't, there didn't seem to be a sense. from the regime that like, you know, we need to hurry up and figure this out. You know, they felt like they had, I mean, Josh McDaniels signed a six-year contract and that's fully guaranteed. And so I guess I can understand how he could come to that conclusion. But, you know, they thought that they would

have pretty much to the end of this year regardless of what happened this season. And that going in the year three, if it didn't work out and they weren't good this season, if they could take another step back and reassess things. And I think, you know, as Vick said, that's a certain level of arrogance there to think that your owner is basically just going to put up with whatever and why you kind of spin around on this rudderless wheel with the franchise and it didn't work out obviously. And, you know, I think for the Raiders, you know, there needed to be a more honest assessment of what they were after last season. Like, it's fine to go for it coming off a playoff berth. I'm not going to act like it would have been easy for them to just tear it down and

give up after making the playoffs. Like, that would have been a really tough sell to... Keep the bangles all they can handle to that first round game. You almost beat the bank. angles a team to make the Super Bowl. You couldn't really tear it down after that, especially your first couple of years in a new market in Las Vegas, a franchise that has been through everything twice over in their history. But once you see that, you're not good, just sort of towing the middle line this offseason just made zero sense. I mean, especially because they had the resources to pivot. I mean, you have the number seven overall pick. You had other draft resources. You had players who you could have traded to add to those resources. Like even, I'm

not saying that Jared Stidham is like a future all pro or anything of that nature, but you could bring him back as a cheap, solid guy who could be a spot starter and draft a quarterback. I mean, there were plenty of quarterbacks in this draft. They were locked in on Bryce Young. They thought that that was the only quarterback that they were willing to hitch their future to. They tried to trade up with the Bears for the number one overall pick before they ultimately dealt that pick to the Panthers. But I mean, C.J. Stroud has been lighting the world on fire with the Texans. Anthony Richardson with the Colts before he got hurt was playing really well. I mean, even Will Levis, you know, who fell to the second round. And he came in his first start and threw four touchdown

passes. And so their evaluation that Bryce Young was the only good quarterback in his draft class seems to already have been proven wrong. And they were positioned to get one of those guys. And they not only didn't do so, but they hitched their wagon to an aging veteran, expensive quarterback who was injured when he signed with them. They knew he was injured. And he's been awful. And it's just that you can't do that. Like there is no coming back from that. And that's ultimately what Davis, you know, made the decision about. Let's read the statement from Mark Davis that came out with the announcement of the firings of Josh McDaniels and Dave Ziegler.

After much thought about what the Raiders need to move forward, I have decided to part ways with Josh and Dave. I want to thank them both for their hard work in which them and their families nothing but the best. So pretty boilerplate from Mark Davis there. Antonio Pierce linebackers coach taking over as the interim head coach. But, you know, that's just, you know, basically playing out the string for the rest of this season. No offense to Antonio Pierce or anyone left there. DeShon, where does this team, this franchise go from this point? You and I discussing this before we got rolling here,

Jimmy Garapolo's got a little bit more than 28 million of Dead Cap next season. And that's if they do it before June 1st. They could spread that out over a couple of seasons if they go after June 1st. But it just seems like this could be a multi-year process for a Raiders team that is, left where it is right now after the firings of McDaniels and Ziegler. Yeah, it's time to blow it up. I mean, whoever they pick, you know, as their new head coach GM tandem, that needs to be the edict that they're given.

I mean, this team isn't close. They're not going to be a contender with this current roster. And it's time to tear it down and start over. And I know that's a tough pill to swallow for the Raiders and their fan base. Like this franchise has just been stuck in this purgatory for my entire lifetime, basically. with, but it's really the only rational decision. I mean, you have to take calls in this offseason to the inquiries about Devante Adams. You know, Josh Jacobs is going to be a free agent. He's likely going to walk elsewhere. You have to try to move Hunter Renfro. Max Crosby would be tough.

That would be tough, tough sell. But like, if you get a crazy offer for him, you might have to listen to that too. This has to be a complete tear down, in my opinion. You have to cut your losses, move on from the mistakes that the previous couple of regimes made and give your new GM and head coach tandem a clean slate to work with to have some semblance of hope of this team turning around in the future. And that's a rough place to be in, but that's their reality, and that's what they need to embrace. Very surprising move, as you emphasized off the top,

not necessarily the result, but the timing of this. Josh McDaniels, Dave Ziegler, both out in Las Vegas. Josh McDaniels and his tenure, which was supposed to last six years, or at least was a contract for six years, with a 9 and 16 record as the head coach of the Las Vegas Raiders. That's Deshaun Reed, one of our great Raiders, big writers here at The Athletic. Dishan, thanks again for joining us today. Thanks for having me, Mike.

I was going to do it for this emergency edition of the Athletic Football Show. Robert Nate, back with you tomorrow, maybe later today, depending on when you're listening to this, with our week eight preview for the Athletic Football Show. Until then, thanks for listening. We'll talk to you soon. This was the Athletic Football Show.