The vibe in the Las Vegas Raiders locker room seems much lighter heading into the 2024 season after the regime change.
Dave Zeigler and Josh McDaniels are out, and Tom Telesco and Antonio Pierce are in. Telesco and Pierce have spent the offseason rebuilding the roster according to their vision, and so far, the early returns have been encouraging.
Despite taking Brock Bowers with their first-round pick in the 2024 NFL Draft, Michale Mayer is expected to take on a larger role in the offense. Mayer had a relatively quiet rookie year but showed some signs of improvement down the stretch of his rookie year.
Entering the 2024 season, Mayer admitted he’s in a better place mentally via Matt Ehalt of New York Post:
“My mentality, my attitude this year — nothing wrong with last year, but it’s different this year. It’s different. I’m way happier, I’m more positive, I love to be here out on this field. I love to play football, man, it’s what I do, it’s my job,” Mayer said. “I’ve definitely flipped the script a little bit.
“Last year, maybe there were some days I didn’t wanna come in or something was going down — I flipped the script. It’s time to dig down, play some ball, win some ball games and do what I need to do for this team. Rookie year is over. That’s way in the past. I’ve already reflected on it, I’ve already put it behind me, I don’t even think about it anymore.”
Regarding his fit with Bowers, Mayer is confident that the tandem will be a handful for defenses:
“How are you going to stop [us]?” Mayer said. “Brock has a lot of speed … I’ve gotten a little bit faster, and I think there’s a ton of things — No. 1, in the run game, Brock will be able to help me out with, too, blocking. But then No. 2, who’s going to guard both of us? If you put a ‘backer here, put a small safety here? I’m a big body, Brock’s a big body, so it’s going to be a lot of fun.”
Mayer sounds like a second-year player ready to take a leap, and it’ll be exciting to see how he develops alongside Bowers.
Raiders head coach Antonio Pierce calls Brock Bowers most dynamic tight end in college football
Although Las Vegas had other needs on its roster, it was hard for them to pass up on a prospect like Bowers. Pierce threw heaps of praise on his new tight end when he said that he was the most dynamic tight end in college football.
