The Las Vegas Raiders were able to shore up some quality depth under center with the addition of a former No. 2 overall pick in Marcus Mariota in free agency.
There has been plenty of speculation regarding Mariota’s role as the backup to quarterback Derek Carr, who failed to take the Raiders to the playoffs again in 2019, which spurred general manager Mike Mayock and head coach Jon Gruden to seek out other alternatives this offseason.
In many ways, their search came full circle after signing Mariota considering they had both shared plenty of praise for him when he was a prospect entering the 2015 NFL Draft. It seems their opinion of him has not changed much over the years.
In his pre-draft conference call, Mayock says there is plenty of evidence proving his and Gruden’s admiration of Mariota’s skill set although they still feel that there is work to be done, via Raiders.com:
I think the whole thing with my background and Jon’s background is a lot of things we said and did in our past in public. So, if you’re Marcus Mariota and you want to know what the General Manager of the Raiders thought about him before he came out, or what Jon Gruden thought about him before he came out, all he’s got to do is go back and check public record. I mean, he went through Gruden’s quarterback camp on television. I had him as the top quarterback in that draft. He knows that both of us believed in him coming out and still believe in him. He’s got to get healthy. We got to rebuild him a little bit to get his confidence back. Build him up from the ground up. It’s going to take a little while I think just to get him healthy and where he wants to be, but we’re excited about the quarterback room.
And I thought Marcus did a great job with the first couple interviews he had, just talking about where he was, which is he wants to support Derek [Carr] and he wants to become the best version of Marcus Mariota that he can become. And that’s the way we look at it. Let’s see who the best Marcus Mariota is, and, in the meantime, we love what we have with Derek Carr so we’re real happy with our quarterback room. We got Nate Peterman who played well until he was hurt. DeShone Kizer, a former second-round pick, so we feel like we’ve got a very strong quarterback room.
There are certainly no shortage of accounts detailing Mayock and Gruden’s opinion of Mariota before and after being taken by the Tennessee Titans with the second overall pick. They will notw have the opportunity to work with him first hand as the No. 2 option on their depth chart.
Of course, Mayock’s comments are still telling of the Raiders’ plans to explore all options on the table. Although Mariota may be coming into camp as the backup, Gruden could have no problem making a switch if he feels Carr is not up to the task. After all, he has always been adamant about securing a surplus of talent under center and he can now take advantage of the benefits that come with having two starting-caliber options.
At this point, the No. 1 spot still appears to be Carr’s to lose as they get set to kick off a new era at Allegiant Stadium in the 2020 NFL season. Regardless, it may not matter much which quarterback is named the starter unless Las Vegas can address their lack of firepower in the receiving corps through the 2020 NFL Draft.
