Pete Carroll preached competition during his one season as the head coach of the Las Vegas Raiders. But after compiling a great coaching staff and going buck wild in free agency, the 2026 NFL Draft, and on the UDFA market, Klint Kubiak appears poised to actually bring that to Las Vegas.
And no position, perhaps this side of wide receiver, is more of an open battle than defensive tackle. Adam Butler figures to be a starter, but after that, it is anyone's guess who will play the majority of the snaps alongside him. The good news is that the Raiders finally have some intriguing options.
Jonah Laulu has shown promise through two seasons, Thomas Booker IV looked good after being traded to Las Vegas last preseason, and Tonka Hemingway is poised for a big Year 2 leap. Plus, veteran signing Benito Jones has made some noise as a potential option on the interior.
Lost in conversations about the defensive tackle room, however, is second-year man J.J. Pegues. With a strong training camp and preseason, he could give the Raiders a good kind of roster headache ahead of the 2026 NFL season and make the defensive tackle room even harder to predict.
J.J. Pegues can throw an even bigger wrench into Las Vegas Raiders' DT room
Pegues, like pretty much the rest of Las Vegas' 2025 rookie class, wasn't given many opportunities to showcase what he could do in his inaugural NFL season. He ended up appearing in nine games, seven of which came after Week 12, and recorded 137 defensive snaps and 21 on special teams.
In that limited action, Pegues fared just fine. He recorded 11 tackles, including one for a loss, and he recovered a fumble in the season finale. Pegues' Pro Football Focus grades weren't kind to him, but he flashed to the tune of four run stops and two QB hurries.
It is impossible to properly evaluate linemen during OTAs and mandatory minicamp, but Pegues apparently had a good moment or two this spring. The Athletic's Sam Warren mentioned in passing that Pegues had a would-be sack on Fernando Mendoza in minicamp. That's a good start.
What Pegues mainly has going for him ahead of training camp, though, is that he can slide to the nose tackle. Although he mainly lined up between the 3 and 5-technique at Ole Miss and during his rookie season, as the third-heaviest player in the room (behind Jones and Laki Tasi), he can plug the middle.
Butler, or perhaps Jones, will seemingly be tasked with that job in base formations if nobody else steps up. But that wouldn't be maximizing Butler's talents as a good pass-rusher, and Jones is hardly a lock to make the roster at this juncture. He, too, needs to prove himself worthy of a spot.
With his thick hips and strong frame, Pegues has the ability to eat up double teams, and his elite quickness should allow him to change directions in a hurry for his size and two-gap on the interior. Is he quite there yet? No. Pegues is an unfinished product. But DL coach Travis Smith can help with that.
And if Pegues starts showing more flashes of being the kind of high-upside player that the Raiders imagined when they drafted him, then Las Vegas may need to have some difficult conversations about not just who to include in the defensive tackle room, but how the rotation should shake out.
All eyes have been on Laulu, Booker IV and Hemingway, and understandably so. That trio should impress a lot of folks this preseason and beyond. But Pegues has the tools to be a difference-maker for the Raiders, so if he starts showing that, he'll make the DT pecking order even harder to predict.
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