Jon Gruden’s Evaluation Methods Have Created Tension
Reports last week suggesting that 2018 would be Raiders GM Reggie McKenzie‘s last with the organization were hardly surprising. Once Oakland hired Jon Gruden to be its new head coach, it was clear that Gruden would be the primary decision-maker with respect to roster construction, which owner Mark Davis confirmed back in April. As such, most assumed that Gruden and McKenzie would not be coexisting for too long.
But regardless of how one feels about McKenzie’s and Gruden’s relative abilities to evaluate talent, a report from Ian Rapoport of NFL.com this morning regarding Gruden’s evaluation methods may be a cause for concern for Raiders fans. Per Rapoport, Gruden essentially has his own staff that helps him judge talent and make decisions, and he listens primarily to those within his circle (none of whom are scouts and evaluators weaned under McKenzie).
That setup — which Gruden currently has no plans to change, even in 2019 and beyond — has created a disconnect in the building that several sources say they have never really experienced before. It appears that there is a close-knit group of “Gruden’s guys,” and then there is everyone else, and while the factions do come together to make sure all voices are heard, those outside of Gruden’s circle believe they are not really being listened to.
It was Gruden and his group that spearheaded the signing of several older free agents, the jettisoning of many previous draft picks, and the much-debated trade of Khalil Mack, which has only intensified the feelings of disconnect. And it appears that Gruden’s most trusted confidant is Director of Football Research Dave Razzano, a longtime NFL scout who became a controversial Twitter voice with hot takes like “Jake Locker should be the No. 1 overall pick in the draft” and “Von Miller will be a bust.”
McKenzie reportedly turned down a chance to interview for other GM jobs this past offseason, and even if he does not secure a GM post in 2019, he will surely be working in someone’s front office. The real question is whether Gruden’s approaches to the game after a long absence, which have raised more than a few eyebrows, will ultimately lift the club to new heights or send it spiraling into another extended period of questionable leadership and mediocrity.
Minor NFL Transactions: 9/16/18
Here are today’s minor moves:
Seattle Seahawks
- Promoted from practice squad: S Shalom Luani
Seahawks LB Mychal Kendricks Suspended, Has Appealed
The NFL has suspended new Seahawks linebacker Mychal Kendricks, per Adam Schefter of ESPN.com. However, Kendricks has appealed the suspension — the length of which is not yet known — and will therefore be eligible to play until the league makes its ruling. The appeal is expected to be heard within the next 10 days or so.
Kendricks, of course, was suspended for violating the league’s personal conduct policy, as he has pleaded guilty to insider trading and has a sentencing hearing scheduled for January 2019. He is reportedly facing 30 to 37 months in prison.
The Browns signed Kendricks back in June, but Cleveland quickly released him after news of the insider trading charge broke in August. Seattle head coach Pete Carroll, however, said his team did all of the research it could before signing Kendricks, whom Carroll believes is entitled to a second chance.
Carroll said, “We had done a lot of homework on it. [The insider trading] happened four and a half years ago, so it’s a story that’s been worked on for a long time. There’s a lot of good information. We’ve come to learn who he is and what he’s all about and how remorseful he was and how he admitted to his mistake a long time ago.”
As Schefter observes, the NFL — which was considering placing Kendricks on the commissioner’s exempt list before Cleveland released him — will have a tough decision to make. Kendricks made immediate restitution and has no criminal record, so the league must figure out what to do with a player involved in a white-collar crime who has tried to make amends for the situation.
Kendricks will make his Seattle debut tomorrow night against the Bears. He will likely see a lot of playing time, as the Seahawks have already injured linebackers Bobby Wagner and K.J. Wright.
Martavis Bryant Permitted To Play During Appeal Of Suspension
Although we have not heard an official announcement from the NFL, it appears that Raiders WR Martavis Bryant has indeed been handed a one-year suspension for allegedly violating the league’s substance-abuse policy (we heard last week that Bryant was facing such a ban). However, Adam Schefter of ESPN.com writes that Bryant has appealed the suspension, and the NFL will allow him to play until it makes a decision on the appeal.
Just two days after we learned that Bryant was staring at another suspension, the Raiders re-signed the talented but troubled receiver, whom they cut on September 1. Oakland, which traded a third-round pick to the Steelers to acquire Bryant during this year’s draft, would like to get something of a return on its investment, and ESPN’s Dan Graziano tweets that the Raiders were comfortable with bringing Bryant back into the fold because it will take a little while for the NFL to rule on his appeal (it also helps that Bryant’s contract pays him on a week-to-week basis).
The appeal is expected to be heard within the next couple of weeks, which could buy Bryant a few games on the Raiders’ roster. Of course, if the appeal is resolved in Bryant’s favor, he could spend the entire year on the roster, which would go a long way towards getting his NFL career back on track.
Schefter reports that Bryant’s camp is confident in his chances to win the appeal, and Graziano says Bryant has retained New York attorney Peter Ginsberg to represent him in the process. For now, Bryant will slot into a receiver group that includes Amari Cooper, Jordy Nelson, Seth Roberts, and Brandon LaFell.
The Raiders take on the division-rival Broncos later this afternoon.
Latest On Aaron Rodgers
After his remarkable comeback during the Packers’ season-opening win over the Bears last Sunday night, Green Bay quarterback Aaron Rodgers assured a national audience that he would be playing in Week 2. The fact that he practiced with the team yesterday all but confirmed as much, even though we also learned that the star signal-caller is still dealing with swelling in his left knee.
The situation remains generally murky. Adam Schefter of ESPN.com reported earlier this morning that Rodgers does not have any ligament damage, but Jay Glazer of FOX Sports tweets that Rodgers does indeed have a ligament sprain, to go along with a deep bone bruise. Rodgers also has what one of Schefter’s sources called a “pretty unusual injury that would keep most people out awhile,” which Glazer agrees with. Another of Schefter’s sources added that Rodgers probably should not have returned to the field after suffering the knee injury last week, and that he will likely be kept on a short leash as he continues to recover.
His recovery, per Schefter, could take another couple of months. Schefter says that Rodgers sustained a “compression injury from blunt force while bent,” and he will simply have to play through the pain. As we saw last week, though, even a hobbled Rodgers is still about as good of a quarterback as there is, and Green Bay has no hope of contending for a playoff spot without him.
Ian Rapoport of NFL.com (video link) indicates that Rodgers will indeed play today, but that despite A-Rod’s bravado, his game status was no sure thing earlier this week, as he was “swollen and hurting.” Glazer says Rodgers is still experiencing a great deal of pain and swelling, and he is wearing a very large brace on his injured knee today. We can probably expect a lot of shotgun formations and quick passes from Rodgers for the next few weeks at least.
Seahawks Have Not Approached Russell Wilson About A New Deal
The Seahawks have not approached star quarterback Russell Wilson to discuss a new contract, and there are currently no plans to have such a discussion, as Jason La Canfora of CBS Sports writes. Wilson is under club control through 2019, and while Seattle generally does not redo deals that have multiple years remaining, the team has made a few exceptions to that organizational philosophy in the past, and one might expect that Wilson would be a player for whom the Seahawks would make such an exception. Indeed, he has as much time left on his current contract as Aaron Rodgers had when he signed his recent massive extension with the Packers.
However, we did hear earlier this year that negotiations between Wilson and Seattle — if they do end up happening at some point in the future — are not expected to be pretty, and Wilson himself said that he expects to be hit with the franchise tag in 2020. But as La Canfora points out, going year-to-year with the franchise tag for a player like Wilson is probably not the best strategy, and allowing him to enter the final year of his contract at a time when contract values continue to soar and the cap continues to increase significantly may not be the wisest move either.
It could be that Seattle simply does not plan to hang on to Wilson beyond 2019. The team is no longer the powerhouse it was earlier this decade, and Bob Condotta of the Seattle Times recently wrote that the Seahawks’ performance in 2018 could go a long way in determining the futures of both Wilson and head coach Pete Carroll in Seattle. Although Condotta acknowledged that it would be difficult to imagine the Seahawks not making every effort to keep Wilson, he noted that the franchise’s future looks as unclear as at any time since Wilson arrived in 2012.
It is also worth noting that the Seahawks were at their dominant best when Wilson was playing under his rookie deal, so if the club does choose to rebuild, it could seek to leverage Wilson as part of those efforts. Indeed, La Canfora says that some GMs believe Seattle could get up to three first-round picks in exchange for Wilson if it puts him on the trading block.
Injury Notes: Wentz, Bosa, Mariota
Ian Rapoport of NFL.com reports that Eagles quarterback Carson Wentz could be cleared for contact this week, and that may put him on track to make his 2018 debut in Week 3, as was suggested last Sunday. But Rapoport says the team is in no rush to have Wentz return to game action, because it is more concerned about the next 10 to 15 years, not the next 10 to 15 minutes. As such, if the Eagles need to keep Wentz out longer to make sure he is fully recovered from his torn ACL and LCL, they are fully committed to doing so.
However, Adam Schefter of ESPN.com reports that Wentz is indeed on track to be back under center for the Eagles against the Colts next week, and he suggests that Philadelphia will have no issue in deploying Wentz as soon as he is cleared for contract.
Now let’s take a look at a few more reports concerning injuries to some of the league’s biggest names:
- This is not much of a surprise given a report from earlier this week, but Schefter reports that Chargers DE Joey Bosa is expected to be sidelined until at least October. Bosa is continuing to rehab his foot with the hope that the swelling goes down and the foot stabilizes, but surgery is still very much in play if that does not happen.
- Titans QB Marcus Mariota has not yet regained complete feeling in his fingers, per Rapoport (Twitter link). Schefter adds (via Twitter) that Mariota is still unable to grip the football normally as a result, which means that Blaine Gabbert may be starting under center for Tennessee for at least Week 2.
- Jaguars RB Leonard Fournette is unlikely to play against the Patriots today, per Schefter, but it sounds as though Fournette is making good progress in his recovery from the hamstring injury he suffered last week. Even if the second-year back is unable to suit up today, he could be back in action next week.
- Rapoport confirms (via Twitter) a report from Tuesday that Panthers TE Greg Olsen is hoping to return much sooner than was originally anticipated when he fractured his foot in the team’s season-opening win over the Cowboys. Rapoport says that Olsen hopes to be back on the field in four to five weeks, and he will have the foot — the same one he broke last year — reevaluated after the season.
- We received a status update on Packers QB Aaron Rodgers earlier today.
Jameis Winston May Not Immediately Start Upon Return
While this may seem like overreaction to one strong performance against a suspect defensive unit, Ian Rapoport of NFL.com reports that Ryan Fitzpatrick may remain the Buccaneers’ starting quarterback even when Jameis Winston returns from suspension after the team’s Week 3 matchup against the Steelers.
But that may have more to do with logistics than anything else. The Week 3 game is a Monday night contest, so Rapoport suggests that the Bucs could simply keep Fitzpatrick as the starter for Week 4 rather than have Winston make his 2018 debut on a short week.
However, Rapoport does say that Fitzpatrick’s run as the Bucs’ starting signal-caller could last for as long as he is playing well, and if he continues to perform as he did in his season-opening mastery of the Saints — which resulted in NFC Offensive Player of the Week honors — that would give Tampa Bay time to ease Winston into the flow of the season.
It is important to note that the Bucs continue to view Winston as their long-term quarterback. Obviously, the veteran journeyman Fitzpatrick is no threat to dethrone Winston on a permanent basis, and Tampa Bay is excited to see what Winston can do when he does return to the field with a talented set of receivers and new play-caller Todd Monken.
Rapoport also writes that Winston’s $20.9MM fifth-year option for 2019, guaranteed for injury only, will not have any bearing on when he returns. The Bucs will not keep their former No. 1 overall pick on the shelf to avoid triggering that guarantee, and they fully intend to reinsert Winston into the starting lineup as soon as they feel it is in their best interest to do so (which may still be in Week 4).
Several Teams Have Inquired On Josh Gordon
Shortly after the Browns announced their plan to release Josh Gordon yesterday evening, we heard that rival clubs were already calling Cleveland to inquire about trading for the troubled wideout before he hits the open market. Mike Florio of Pro Football Talk lends further credence to those reports, writing that a few teams have indeed discussed a trade with the Browns.
It is not surprising that teams would be interested in the tremendously-talented Gordon from a pure football perspective, but it would be surprising if a club surrendered draft capital to acquire him if there were truth to the speculation that Gordon had suffered a relapse in his battle with substance abuse. However, Ian Rapoport of NFL.com reports (via Twitter) that the Browns’ decision to part ways with Gordon is not drug-related, though he did injure his hamstring during a team photo shoot. Given Gordon’s history, of course, it is fair to be skeptical of the circumstances surrounding his impending departure, and one league executive said, “if [the Browns] are letting him go, something is up” (Twitter link via ESPN’s Josina Anderson).
But assuming that Gordon has not run afoul of the league’s substance abuse policy, we could see the Browns strike a deal to send him elsewhere, though there are no concrete reports as to which teams have expressed interest. Florio speculates that the 49ers, Patriots, Seahawks, and Cowboys could be in the running, but Calvin Watkins of The Athletic tweets that he does not expect Dallas to make a play for Gordon.
Matt Miller of Bleacher Report, citing the 49ers’ previous interest in Gordon, says he would not be surprised if San Francisco were one of the clubs willing to trade for him, though he suggests that any trade would include only conditional compensation (Twitter link). Any team that does trade for him would take on the balance of Gordon’s $790K contract this year — a bargain if he can stay on the field — and would have the right to keep him under club control with a a restricted free agency tender in 2019.
Rapoport tweets that Gordon himself is most interested in the Cowboys and 49ers, and Adam Schefter of ESPN.com reports that the Browns intend to trade Gordon to an NFC club (Twitter link).
Minor NFL Transactions: 9/9/18
Here are today’s minor moves:
Indianapolis Colts
- Waived/injured: WR Krishawn Hogan