The Oakland Raiders will be moving to Las Vegas next season. It’s been a rough last few years, but things will get easier once they move to Nevada in 2020.
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Being a lame-duck franchise is never easy. It’s quite difficult in fact, and nobody should wish to lose a beloved team to another media market on anybody. It’s terrible, but it is the reality for the Oakland Raiders, who will move east to Southern Nevada to become the Las Vegas Raiders in 2020. Are easier times ahead for the Silver and Black once they arrive in Sin City?
On this week’s episode of Stacking the Box, FanSided‘s Matt Verderame and Josh Hill, along with former NFL offensive lineman Geoff Schwartz, look at if moving to Las Vegas will help the Raiders in both the long and short-term as an NFL franchise (37:47).
“They’ll get better from the standpoint that they go to Vegas, they’ll have an easier time getting free agents because taxes aren’t nearly as bad as they in California. Plus, people are going to want to play in Vegas” said Verderame.
He would go on to argue that eventually, the franchise will have to decide on if Derek Carr will be the team’s starting quarterback going forward. Verderame thinks they need to target a signal-caller that is willing to throw the ball down the field, something Carr has struggled with since breaking his leg on Christmas Eve 2016.
Verderame believes that things will get better for the Raiders once they move to Las Vegas because it can’t be as bad as it has been, right? He thinks that the Raiders will get back to playing around .500 ball once they move because of the allure Las Vegas will have in the free agency market. No state income tax will be a huge plus for the Raiders going forward in Nevada.
Schwartz disagrees with Verderame in that the Raiders won’t get better once they move to Las Vegas because he doesn’t trust Jon Gruden as a head coach or his ability to develop quarterbacks. Gruden is in the second year of a 10-year contract as the Raiders’ head coach. One thing is certain in that Gruden will be the Raiders head coach for the foreseeable future.
All this and more!
Here are a few other topics discussed on this week’s episode of Stacking the Box:
- The New England Patriots are better than the Kansas City Chiefs (4:00).
- The Los Angeles Chargers are already finished (7:45).
- Would you rather have Lamar Jackson or Baker Mayfield (43:04)?
- The Miami Dolphins aren’t going to win a game (45:00).
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