The Raiders need a QB. Quite frankly, they probably need two.
After a year of watching Gardner Minshew and Aidan O'Connell (and I guess Desmond Ridder for that one moment there), Raiders fans at least know what they don't want from the position. It's part of why – alledgedly, at least – Mark Davis decided to fire Tom Telesco after just one year in charge as the team's GM; with a new coach and a shot at drafting a franchise QB in play, Davis wanted to get everyone on the same page about who comes next.
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According to ESPN, that's Sam Darnold. In their latest round of offseason predictions, Jeremy Fowler presents *the* most Raiders of all Raiders predictions: that Vegas is going to basically big against themselves for Darnold and end up paying him a ton of money. Like, a ton.
ESPN predicts the Raiders end up giving Sam Darnold close to $100 million
"All it takes is one suitor to drive Darnold's market to the point where it's cost prohibitive for Minnesota to retain him. And the numbers favor Darnold -- at least five teams selecting in the top 10 of the NFL draft need a quarterback during a year when the supply doesn't meet the demand. Darnold is the clear-cut No. 1 quarterback in free agency. Enter Las Vegas, which endured arguably the league's worst quarterback situation in 2024 ... Las Vegas is slated to have nearly $100 million in 2025 cap space, more than enough to pay a veteran passer. Most execs polled believe Darnold belongs in the Geno Smith/Baker Mayfield class of contracts, somewhere in the range of three years and $100 million."
[Deep sigh] I mean, sure, I guess. Whatever. Darnold is unquestionably a better option than Minshew or O'Connell, but I feel like we all saw a little glimpse of what he'd look like in Vegas over the Vikings' last few games of the year. You can do worse, but also, Kevin O'Connell isn't coaching the Raiders, and they certainly don't have the Vikings' offensive line or playmaking pass catchers. Basically, they're kind of like the Vikings except for literally everything that makes them a good football team. But otherwise!
Darnold's season earned him a big ol' contract, but I assumed the whole point of letting Telesco go was to make sure the Raiders were no longer the team who did that sort of thing. Maybe that was naive.