After a four-month run that included trading for Geno Smith, hiring Pete Carroll, and drafting Ashton Jeanty, the Las Vegas Raiders haven't been this well-positioned to lose a heartbreakingly close game to the Chiefs in years. Eight wins have never felt so exciting.
You probably don't need some national media outlet to convince you that the Las Vegas Raiders had a good offseason, but it certainly doesn't hurt.
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And despite training camps arriving as early as next week, we're still in the final stages of that glorious part of the summer where you get to gloat about all the great moves the Raiders made without actually having to watch how they play out. There's only so much time to take your last victory laps of the summer, so every second counts. Fortunately, CBS Sports showed up with a brand new reason to get running: a league-wide 'triplets' ranking, which is just a fun, fancy new way of sorting teams by how good their best QB-RB-Playmaker combo is. The piece features a bunch of nice words about the Raiders, which will take some getting used to.
Raiders earn a surprising amount of praise from CBS Sports for major offseason changes
QB: Geno Smith, RB: Ashton Jeanty, TE: Brock Bowers
"It's a big leap for the Raiders from 28th to 18th thanks to their two major additions and their second-year superstar. Smith is an absolutely massive upgrade over Aidan O'Connell, as is Jeanty over Zamir White. It was easy to see a bump coming for this time just from those two changes alone. But then you add in Bowers (in place of Jakobi Meyers, who is still on the team but no longer looking like the top target) coming off an all-time tight end season, and you have the recipe for a major step forward in perception."
10 spots! It's actually kinda wild to read some of the names mentioned in that blurb and think back to a time when the Raiders thought it was going to work. Turns out an Aidan O'Connell-Zamir White-Jakobi Meyers core isn't that great? Coulda fooled me.
What a fun offseason this has been. New quarterbacks! Top 5 picks! Love from the national media! Raiders fans could get used to this. Now, all we need from training camp is a Christian Wilkins cameo or two, and we'll really be in business.