2026 Las Vegas Raiders Preview: Roster, Odds & Win Total

Welcome to the acclaimed podcast The Deep Dive featuring your esteemed hosts Andy Monitor and Drew Dinsick, powered by Betz Burs. Welcome to The Deep Dive, it's Raider Danny. The wind is changing, the murs winding down, cool breeze. I don't even think I did a great job of that music. I knew exactly what I was doing. No, I think you actually nailed the horns. That was very, very clearly Raider horns. And yeah, the autumn wind is a Raider and it's going to be an interesting rebuild for this team in 2026. Probably not a lot of winds on this schedule for the Raiders. But yeah, we're covering the AFC West this week. And it is going to be a roller coaster. These are kind of four fun teams to talk about. And the order that the market has them in is wrong. Yeah, we both. The Raiders are right. But I had the I was texting Drew because we didn't really talk about it last week. I'm like, hey, I'm assuming we're jumping into the AFC West. We'll go Raider's Broncos day. When you text it back, I had to look it up, meaning I had to look up who the third choice was. And yeah, me too, because it's pretty close. It's it's snug in there. And like you mentioned, too, one and one and two might flip at some point here. Yeah, my foot before we get to them on Wednesday, but we are doing Raiders and Broncos today. And we start with Las Vegas who came off of a it was a it was a whirlwind of a it was a whirlwind of an era. Pete Carol era in the desert Andy lasted all of six months. When it was the official like first practice he held June. And then he was he was it was over by January seven months. What would you yeah, I mean, it was quick. What would you rate it one out of 10 for the Pete Carol era? I would give it a 10. I get that 10. I give it a 10 out of 10. I mean, we didn't know this. And maybe they didn't know this either. But you weren't winning last year. Not only, you know, we're the chief still. I mean, you still were in a tough, tough division. You weren't winning last year. Things weren't going to magically turn around with Pete Carol at the home. And then magically another team in your division turned out to be even better than anyone thought in the Broncos. So you're extra screwed. But we've we've done this what seven, eight times now where we've talked about a team whether it's this year or last year, the year before, where it's like man, they could have what a should have tanked, played badly, and set their franchise up with a high draft pick. And instead they want a couple of games at the end. I can't look at you. I mean, there's a couple teams that have done that multiple times. And they had the Cardinals this kind of Cardinals. And like, it's like, oh, you were so close to resetting with a quarterback. And I'm, you know, obviously I watched more Mendoza than a lot of other college quarterbacks because he was in the big high profile games at the end. I don't know if it's going to translate perfect to the NFL and he's going to save this franchise. But at least you have a chance. I'm so high, you know, yeah, it wasn't the Cardinals who won the last two. It was the Giants. The Giants were for the first overall. And then they won their last two and they end up with the fifth pick instead of the first. But yeah, no, it was a 10 out of 10 like you're saying because it had entertaining moments. It had phenomenal failures. And the, you know, it was, it honestly is like, when you're a decision maker in terms of hiring a coach in terms of rostering a quarterback. And you strike out as aggressively as the Raiders did in year one with Pete Carroll and Geno Smith. I think we ought to applaud them for ripping off the band-aid and starting over. Correct. Like the hubris, the ego of, well, I didn't make, you know, it was just, it was on lucky circumstances that it failed so poorly. Like, let's give them another run. No. Like rather than waste time, you, you ripped off the band-aid. You presumably had a pretty good hiring process. At least you got a candidate that I think a lot of teams were interested in. And you get the first overall pick in a draft where there was one quarterback. So you did yourself a favor in terms of a quick rebuild. The issue was, you know, like, I guess I, maybe they were a little bit too enthusiastic getting into last year in terms of like how quickly they were going to compete, right? Like they did a poor job of self-evaluation what they had in terms of talent across that roster and deciding that they thought they were going to be competitive last year and going and getting Geno Smith and Pete Carroll to presumably pursue a playoff spot. But yeah, it was, it was good lesson learned. Good start over, hit the reset. And I think in general, you know, kind of hopeful that we have some meaningful fun Raiders games against the other good teams in this division in the next couple of years. I hope Fernando Mendoza absolutely is a top half of the league quarterback by year three. And we get awesome, you know, chiefs Raiders games on Christmas and shit like that. That would be awesome. Raiders Broncos games used to be, you know, really fun to tune into. And we haven't had that rivalry. It hasn't mattered in a long time. Raiders Chargers, you know, you have three good and nucleus well-run teams in this division to compete against. And so if the Raiders ultimately become good at some point, it's going to, it's going to rock for us as football fans. So I'm hoping that it works. The holes. And that's the fun part of it. Yeah, there's still plenty of holes. It's not a good team. It won't be a good team most likely. But the fun part about, you know, the Mendoza and he's not starting to start the season, but Mendoza eventually playing is a bad team can have an awful good day if the quarterback plays good that day. Where, you know, they're going to be big underdogs in some of these spots. But if he turns out a favorite week one. Yeah, that's fair. That's a bad game. Well, and it's not Mendoza starting. That's true. I think there's a higher grade on a different quarterback in the roster, even though that's obviously not the long-term solution to anything ever. But, you know, when you end up as this huge dog down the road because it's an incomplete roster with a young head coach and a rookie quarterback, if he has good days, it turns into a lively game. And maybe they don't win those lively games. And ideally, you don't win those lively games. You leave from them and every coach hates the moral, you know, it was a moral victory, like, yeah, but that's a real thing. That's a real thing. It's like, hey, we, we win in there and we played top against a team that's going to the playoffs, a team that's getting deep into the playoffs. And at the same time, we also didn't screw it up for drafting next year because that we, what's the difference during getting four and five wins? Whether or not Fernando Mendoza is throwing to Jeremiah Smith next year. That'd be fun. Yeah, that's my favorite figures crossed. Let's get Jeremiah Smith and Brock Barters in the same offense with Mendoza, you know, throwing some nice stuff over the intermediate middle part of the field, that'd be great. No, the, the, I think the, a lot of positives take ways that this is going to be a fun rebuild. I was critical. I think, I'm not really critical, but like, I think Collie, Collie, I got a little bit too much of the credit for the success of the Seahawks offense last year. And it was maybe a lot of factors that really kind of fueled that. And so I would like, I'm kind of curious. I'm going to, I'm going to be evaluating him. This preseason and into the early part of the season, just to see if like, you know, if they're, if he, is he like a, you know, is there's, there's a long list of offensive play callers who, you know, had a hot year and partly that into a coaching job and they just weren't up to the, you know, they weren't up to the task. And I don't know that I have high confidence and click kubiak will be up to it, but I'm excited to evaluate him. I think so far, we got to talk about the, kind of the key part of their, you know, their, the discussion around the Raiders right now. Like, do you think they're doing the right thing by bringing, do you think they did the right thing by bringing in Kirk cousins? And do you think they're doing the right thing by kind of steadfastly committing to him being the starter week one? You know, is this the right thing for the like the proper getting up, you know, giving yourself the best possible outcome of Bendoza being the guy. Is this the right path? I don't think there's like a a tried and true. This is the path everyone has to take. You know, it's, it varies by team to team. And the more I thought about this, because I've thought about this a lot and how it should go and what the what the right answer is. It's it's great. It's a great area. And I think if it were like an established head coach and established offense that, you know, this paid, it's been a good team for years. They had a couple down years. We're bringing in a rookie quarterback. We drafted him, you know, hi, obviously, maybe that's not a first overall pick. Let's throw him in there. We know what we're doing. We have our processes in place. We're an established organization with grown-ups in the room that have been doing it year in and year out. Let's just, we can throw this rookie out there. But there's so many moving pieces with the new coach, new play collar, a bunch of new pieces kind of all over the place, trying to figure out they're making a defensive swap for how they kind of how they run their defense after a few years running it one way. There's so many different things going on. I kind of don't hate it here where it's just like, hey, Kirk Cousins, super high floor low ceiling. We got kind of know what we're getting with this guy. If he's 100% healthy, he can go out there and win games against teams where he can compete against, which is fun for the fans. And he's a good probably a good mentor. He's not going to be the he's do you think he's that? So I don't I don't I mean, I don't want to use the the small sample size of the Falcons just because it was kind of a weird spot. But I think he understands where he's at. Just the quotes coming from him. He understands where he's at. He knows, hey, I'm going to it's not taking the kid under the wing. At least he can learn from him watching him prepare for some of these because he's been around the block. I mean, he's pretty old at this time. So I kind of like it. I like where that said I don't want it to drag on to half the season. Need to get the kid. I'm you know, I have been like this for years. Need to get the kid out there. See what you got? Yeah. No, surely. Do you think that Cam Ward's growth development was stunted by last year's Thornham, Thornham, you know, kind of handing him the job week one and Thornham out there? Yeah, I mean, it is like it is a big step up. I mean, there's people that even say it's a different sport, you know, it's not quite the same sport, especially depending what kind of, you know, some of the especially for the guys that aren't coming out of pro style offenses, you know, that's a whole different kind of jump. But again, yes, situation by situation, if you're getting thrown to the wolves and it's a whole a mix of new coaches and new offense and everything, everyone else is trying to figure out 100 other things at the same time. Then yeah, I think that can be detrimental. It's almost like a cookie, like when you when you have all four burners going both ovens, the microwave, you get the rice pot, the instant everything's going and you're scrambling. It's the same kind of thing whereas like, you know, an established team, I got the slow cooker going, rice is cookie, you know, just there's not much going on in the kitchen. I can focus my time on this. Like there's so many different things to focus on with this Raiders team or some of these teams that are making wholesale changes. It's gotta be tough. And it's obviously they know it's the number one thing. It's the number one thing you have to sound, but do you think it's tough? Do you think Drake Maze Development was aided by not getting the job and having to eventually take forces way into taking over Fabrisa? That was a complete, I'm giving you two examples where it was tried one way. There may be some negative signal. It was trying the other way to make some positive signal. Both of these, both of those examples, the coach was just a complete nutter should show. Yeah, that's and that's the thing. There's no like we're trying to we're trying to make these one-to-one analogs. I'm just trying to get a temperature from, you know, like like because part of me wants to kind of part of me wants to dump on them for this. Like for Nando Mendoza did not look like a guy that needed six weeks of seeing Kirk Cousins and how does he prepare for being the starter to be able to do the job? You could just watch that episode. Yeah, sure. I don't know. I'm actually part of me wants to like two or three weeks. Like I said, I don't want to strike out to have the season. Yeah, and I guess like I I kind of want to start the clock as quickly as possible with the quarterback who you know is going to be you're going to give this guy three years to figure it out. Like I kind of want you to start the clock as quickly as possible. And he get the as many reps as possible so that you can kind of have the guys legs under him when you get to the part of the season where you want to start seeing growth. And it's kind of a I don't know, it's a tough it's definitely maybe it's situation by situation. You know, how many, you know, what is the supporting cast around him is this going to hurt his confidence to be told he's the guy and then suck out loud against NFL teams or you know, do you want a guy, you know, to when I you're trying to like light internal if yeah, and it feels it feels a little bit like they're trying to light a little bit of a competitive fire under his ass, right? Like they're trying to get with it. I think they are trying to kind of get him into the mindset of I'm going to win this job. And then this is now my team. I get a little whiff of that. I'm not I'm not seeing that I guess. I think I think it would be different if it were a quarterback who was like 32 mid-range guy who feasibly could play for a couple years. But I mean, you brought in you brought in a horse. They're going to shoot after the track, you know, track close the tracks closing for the season that they're bringing them to the glue factory. I mean, this is I get I get a different one on that too, man. I'm I'm I disagree strongly. I get a different one from that too. I kind of feel like they wouldn't be that disappointed if Kirk cousins has like an eight kind of a year and then walks out the door and they get compensatory pick for them. And then Mendoza literally does have a red shirt year. I think that's the kind of stuff they're saying, which I don't I don't like it. And I guess I'm I'm kind of worried if they if they are kind of sincerely considering a red shirt year for Mendoza. I'm going to be pretty pissed. Yeah, no, I don't want any of that to happen. I want to just I just say we needed a veteran body in the in the you know, in camp here. And we need him to start a couple games to get the season going. Well, Mendoza gets his legs under him because it's different than you can't prep for a week. You can't prep the week of a game without going through the week of a game. I think there's a lot of it. You know, you hear some of these guys like getting actually prepping and installing an offensive game plan. He's like even the preseason isn't, you know, it just isn't the same. And I think they just need to get him through that process a couple times. Hopefully he's starting at like week five. You know, I just I'm hoping it's a placeholder again. We're we're just speculating. We're not being very additive here to but there's not a lot of talk about with the Raiders. So I'm fine belaboring this because it's an important. Whoa, for having to cover their season outcome. It's extremely important. Is it? I definitely would say so. What is it that a rookie, a rookie quarterback with this supporting cast is not winning many games. Kirk cousins. I don't know. He's like not that far off a league average. Not that far. No, but at the same time, if if Kubiak truly is above average and Mendoza steps in, like we've seen other rookies step in, like not not even that long ago, I've seen guys like Herbert come out and just hey, the guy, you know, duck to water gets it. It's a decent enough opening cast for opening cast. What am I saying? Surrounding cast. I think he can win some games. Okay. Kirk has drafted first overall, man. You kind of expect a little bit of excellence. Yeah, I'm kind of with Patrick. I'm currently grading my quarterback room a little higher. I say Kirk is an upgrade over a guy who's never played a game before, but I would not be surprised with myself if you know three games into Mendoza's career, once ever it starts, he's better than Kirk. Kirk is well, and I don't think it's going to be like, hey, Mendoza is clearly a top 10 quarterback right now. I think it's Kirk is like the 17th best quarterback. And Mendoza right now is a little bit above that. Kirk was in a little sense. Kirk had a better set of weapons in Atlanta last year that he's working with this year, not by like a lot, but a better set. And I would say that I am guys. And I would put like Kirk Cousin's performance last year was much more. It was much much, it was more more inclined to bet on that performance than I would have been on cam ward. - For instance, like cam ward was not, he was not a bet on at any point in the season for the Tennessee Titans last year. And a lot of that I think is just, you know, it's just, you know, what he was in a bad situation around, like coaching, surrounding cast, like everything, everything kind of, everything came up crap for him. - Yeah, and yeah, it's tough to say one way or the other. It's tough, but, you know, I, I, I mean, that perfect world here, and I'm sorry to say this, but in a perfect world, cousins gets hurt week three. (laughing) Right? And then it's just like, okay, here we go. Like throwing out Mendoza, he's going up again, you know, he's starting week four against the chiefs. Like that would be, you know, I would, I would appreciate the opportunity to see him up against this slate. Because the sequencing of the Raider schedule does not lend itself to an easy insert. - And again, I'm out on that anyway again, because the Drake May thing where teams don't seem to, I don't know if teams very much care anymore. Like let's just, they're all NFL teams. Some are tougher than others. We're going to put them out there when he's ready to go out there. I don't care who it is. I wonder, and you spark this in me. - I wonder if Kirk gets the same entry that JJ had. JJ McCarty left here. Where it's like, clearly we're here like the last one, the right one, both of them. - McCarthy was hurt, but he wasn't hurt that bad. So it's like, hey, he turned his ankle and it's one of those where he could play next week, but I don't know, that's a high angle spray. Look at like six, four to six possibly. Probably, you know, get Wally pepped here. - Yeah, well, I mean, I think everybody, I would assume that this organization is going to make a decision of who they think they have the best chance to win with on any given weekend. If it's clear that that's not Kirk cousins and it might be Fernand Mendoza then you're gonna see the green light. So yeah, it'll happen at some point this season, hopefully. And yeah, I would like to start the clock on developing him as an NFL talent so that they have C-West would be all-time awesome. Let's go through the rough season outside of the draft, which was kind of bad. A couple of positives, 'cause we spoke a lot of negatives. I mean, there were three and 14. God, who's the OC? Chip Kelly, what's Chip Kelly? - Chip Kelly was the OC chair. - He was mid-season firing. I mean, just got rid of everybody. Jenty couldn't get going. If you look at his numbers, it's like 75% of his yards or after contact because nobody was blocking for him. Max Cross, he was playing on an injured knee, Bowers only got what, 12 games. He still had seven touchdowns and a really efficient season. But yeah, Bowers, Crosby, presumably hopefully healthy. There are obviously some nice cornerstones. It's not, roster's not bereft of talent. So Eric Stokes, I don't know how your grade is on him. Like, there's not, there's not full units on this defense or on offense, or it's like, there's nobody good, 'cause we have teams like that. In fact, like, Tray Tucker, you know, we talk about the difference between Atlanta and the Raiders as far as skill position stuff. But I had like a nice little number in Tray Tucker too. So not all bad, although the interior of the defensive line, the entirety of the offensive line, and then several pieces in the secondary were just horrific at times. And at times, I guess I mean, the whole season, like God, who's the free safety drew? Pull them out? Yeah. Yeah, pull them out. Yeah, it's probably starting again. Either way, off season, let's get to the real, the real me, like we said, they signed Kirk Cousins after he was released. They went and got Tyler Lindobom. Oh, yeah, pull them out. This rating is not good. Yeah, it looks like he's just penciled in. I mean, free safety. There's a rookie back there that maybe could save the day, but back to the back to the F-Suson Lindobom from Baltimore, the center, every center got paid because-- Wild, overpay, in your opinion, or mild overpay. Mild because every other, there's like five of these now in this off season, all the centers got money. Traded for Terran Johnson from Buffalo. OK. I guess it's going to be probably your nickel guy. You can replace some defense for you. It went and got Quay Walker and the Kobe Dean from Green Bay and Philly. OK. Those guys are-- I mean, those are your linebackers because they're better than what you had. Quitty pay. A little depth there on the outside of the edge. Remember him from Indy? And then just a whole bunch of other guys. Spencer Burford, another guard, Matt Gay, the kicker, Derek Young, a wide receiver. A lot of just depth pieces at that point. God, who do we talk about who they lost? Wasn't a lot. Really, truthfully, besides the coaching staff, they traded max for a few hours. That didn't really go through. Great. Yeah, not a lot of departures I had, truthfully. And then, obviously, the draft was mostly, hey, we got Fernando Bendoza first overall. That's fun. They drafted a safety in the second round. As I mentioned, we both mentioned pull-of-mouse. Pretty soft. They drafted an entire secondary. Yeah, they kind of did. So a second round, Traden Stukes from Arizona Safety. An edge in the third round, Quay Keiran Carr offered. He's going to be on the right side behind Coons. They stopped the slide. Yeah. They stopped the slide on Jermad McCoy taking him in the fourth. Do you remember he was considered a top 10 pick? He was relatively close to the draft occurring. And I knew it. Was that me? And no on him. Yeah, it was a knee. The knee injury. I haven't heard how he's looked. I haven't heard how he's looked in camp, have you? I haven't heard much from Raiders camp, actually. Backing up Stokes. Now, they've only played-- they'll play another game here at Thursday. We can see a little more. And they drafted a guard from A&M, swing, interior piece, tackle depth, maybe-- Tray Zoon, the third. There is no Zoon. Jermad McCoy, you mentioned in the fourth round. He's backing up Stokes currently. A running back from Arkansas, like Washington, complimentary piece to Gentie, probably. I think he's maybe third on the depth chart right now. Another safety in the fifth round. Another corner in the fifth round. And then White Receiver, kind of developmental piece from Oregon, Malik Benson, and the defensive tackle in the seventh round. Brand and Cleveland from NC State. Your head coach is now Clint Cubiak. Your offensive coordinator is. But without looking at it, I could not do this. Andrew Janko, something. Chinaco. Chinaco. Andrew Janko. Yeah, I mean, not a play calling. Offensive coordinator, but he was from Seattle. Guess what, Andy? Not a nepotism hire. Never heard of a Chinaco in the world of football. It's not Andrew Janko, Jr. Famously. Famously, you know. It's like a lot of these guys. Who is it? Lane Kiffin. You know where Lane Kiffin was born? Tampa, probably. No? I'll give you one more chance. Los Angeles. Lane Kiffin was born in Lincoln, Nebraska. Oh, I wonder where he graduated from. And funny, he graduated from Bloomington, Jefferson High School in Minneapolis, because Monti was with, you know, Minnesota. I suppose at that point. So a lot of these, yeah, a lot of these nepotism coaches are from all over the God's creation. Because they're dads are moving around a lot. Chinaco apparently was a quarterback at Pittsburgh in college. And he's been, he's, he's had a cup of coffee in a lot of spots as quality control guy. He's been with Kubiak in Minnesota at New Orleans, and Seattle. Yeah. Kubiak likes him. I think he's, it's part of a Simon and Garfunkel type thing, because he says he does, he does the playbook design. He does the game planning and install. And then Kubiak calls the place. So if there is another positive for Kubiak, it's that he was able to bring his, his, I need another duo like that, the, I can't just do Simon and Garfunkel again. That was good one though. I got up a bit. It's a Monday. Chinaco, by the way, is a little bit of a nepotism guy. His dad, Tim played fullback at Penn State under Joe Berterno, and then was the head coach at Clearfield area high school from 85 to 2022. You know, I'm going to go with Ashford and Simpson, the Motown writing duo. All right. All right. All right. Either way, like I said, he does the playbook design game planning and install. Kubiak likes the collaborative process, apparently. So that's, that's fun. your defensive. Coordinator is Rob Leonard. Apparently our defense is flipping from the four, three, two, a three, four, but who plays base anymore? Anyway, he does come from a bit of the Flores type tree and McDonald's. So I just figured when he couldn't get Jim Leonard, you got Rob Leonard. - No, you do get, you're gonna get a lot of that, like three, three, three, five and third down. You're gonna get a lot of the disguise stuff, a lot of different looks up front. So I think it's a, you don't really get to tell much of that from preseason 'cause they're gonna go pretty vanilla on that stuff, but apparently a little bit of a change on defense and then Mike McCoy, assistant head coach, former head coach of San Diego. Joe Woods is your passing game coordinator. - You see DC and Cleveland too? - I kinda don't like this coaching hire. - It's a little old. - I kinda don't like the, a lot of this, these pieces. This is making me, this is why again, like, a lot of times you pull a young offensive-minded guy into the building and if he goes out and gets a Dennis Allen type of guy who's been around for a while and knows what he's doing and like, lets him just deal with the defense. I kinda dig that, right? Sean McVeigh famously hired Wade Phillips, right? That was kind of like his, like I don't know what I'm doing. I'm just gonna get a guy who definitely does know what he's doing to take care of the defense inside of this for me, like I kinda dig that attempt and I don't like the Rob Leonard hire. I don't like some of the other names on this, on this org chart. - Yeah. - They can be worried about Kubiak a little, I gotta say. - Patrick's trained to goad me into trying to pronounce Rohit Mogulaya Pala. Paley Mogulaya Paley, who is their director of game management and special projects guy comes from the storied Michigan computer science program. So they got, how did you know that? - They got, I had to look it up. I mean, Patrick says I need Andy to try to pronounce this guy's name. He's got a hell of a last name. Rohit, Rohit's very easy, it's an easy first name. Yeah, a computer science nerd, which is a plus, let's give him a plus for that. If you hire a guy who went to a big 10 school for computer science and now helps you with game plan management or however it is, I'll give it as a plus for analytics. - He was a high school quarterback in Novi, Michigan and then went on to be a computer nerd as you declare him at Michigan, University of Michigan. So yeah, he's got some football in his blood. All right, man, I'll be perfectly honest. The Raiders off season and all the personal changes he just made make me worried about Spitec. Not that he didn't get good players to fill clear and obvious needs, but he just had to pay a little over market for a lot of good as far as I can tell you with all the football rules. - I keep forgetting that Spitec is a real person and not just a man to bring me. - Spitec, he just had to overpay of a lot of good to plug a lot of glaring holes and then I also got to tell you there are a lot of organizations where you have just guys surprising to the good in pre-season and camp so far from the rookie class. Like this might be end up being a really talented and surprisingly good wide receiver class, past rush class. Like we might have just gotten a shot in the arm of really talented, you know, kind of non-quarterbacks in this group and I'm not hearing anything about the Raiders rookie class, which has a lot of guys who might be asked to step into those pretty important roles if there are injuries to the old good guys you overpaid a little bit and or if you're gonna cycle out some of the guys who don't deserve a starting job like Isaiah Polo Mau. So I don't know, man. There's a lot of weak signal here that the Raiders have a GM who has a strong point of view that I agree with and there's a lot of signal here that the coach higher might have gone, might take, it might take as much time to develop your rookie quarterback as it does to actually come up with a coaching staff or a chart that can compete. 'Cause right now it's, there's just too many holes and I think that's gonna be a problem. So we shall see ratings for you. - Rating. - Yeah, Dominic. Do you disagree with me? Do you think this was a good off season? - Yes, based on drafting. Getting the number one pick and not missing the 10 minute. - I feel like you would have said that about the Titans last year though, right? - I didn't really love the coaching higher. - Okay. - Whereas I'm a kubiak guy. We're gonna find out. We're gonna find out how much for Sam and how much was, you know, if it was Sam Darnell's footprints in the San Cari and Clint Kubiak. - Jackson Smith and Jigba. - And it is funny. The funniest part of this whole thing is the dichotomy of like this all-American aw-shocks guy having to work in Las Vegas. And then bringing in the ultimate, you know, wonder-bred version of that from, you know, the 20-years-older like they're the same person. - They're the same person. - Yeah, it's old guy, young guy, same person. No question. - They're both just dying to go to the one of these steak houses but like, I really, I don't wanna go to a casino. I can't bring my wife to a casino. Kirk, seriously, it's not even by the geek now, man. We'll just go to Golden Sphere. - Yeah. Anyway, Kirk did not show off anything in the last half of 2025 to say that he should have been on a quarterback teams were actively fighting over to start this season. He is very, very quintessentially the replacement level guy that you're hoping loses the job to the upstart who's fighting for it. That said, he did have one, two, three, four relatively positive games out of his nine starts. He started nine games. Actually, I think he only started eight. He came in and really for one of these. But yeah, it was, I don't know. None of the lows were that low except when he played the Seahawkson, he just got his absolute skull crushed. But solid against the bucks, solid against the, solid against the bucks, cardinals, and pretty doggone good against the Rams at the end of the season before thoroughly letting us down in the Saints game. Week 18. What was that spread? I don't know, I had it. I had right six and a half seven. I don't remember. Well, in the last 19, 17, I just can't remember, I don't know, they won, 19, 17. They won. They needed, they needed that last touchdown. Who's the three point favorites? I gotta look this up, not bigger than that. I don't know. You put it out of your, you put it out of your mind. But he was not very good in that game. $100,000 swing. Yeah, it was close to Falcons three and a half. I think I had three. In my head, it was seven. That was probably my number. I have the QBOC number here. And again, going into week one, this is my Cursons is playing 100% of the snaps in week one. Clint Kubiak is coming in with his, it was Holland and Dozier. That was the duo I was going for. I found the other one. Holland and Dozier. We need, we need Gill to power rank. Oh, yeah. Motown duels like that either way. We had dinner set up with Gill when we're in Vegas next time going to sign up for the circuit contests. So we'll get us, we'll bend his ear on that. But yeah, you'd time out to thank the folks down at the circus sports. Why not? Running those contests, sponsoring the podcast and hoping you get out there and sign up, I'm going to sign up for both the Circa Millionaire, try to win some money in that again. And we're going to, we're going to take an honest effort again at the survivor. Did you see Diggs posted the survivor count and survivor count is trending up 56% more sign up? Yeah, far. I know a little uptick in millions, but a massive uptick. Survivor's hitting 25 million, I think. That's amazing. People helped that out. Honestly, you know what's doing it? Just going to give them a shot. What was the last year's number, 18 something? Yeah, go ahead. Kelly, I'll hear this eventually in the hilltop. It's got to be, it's got to be the documentary. Probably is. Honestly, those are doing something. Yeah, Matt and James doing a good job. The survivor documentary. But anyway, yeah, we're going to enter, I'm going to enter next year for a goal. If 56% holds, it's going to be a 28 million dollar price. Yeah, I don't know. That's a tough run right to keep going. to go from 18.7, I think last year to 28. Yeah, it was probably fueled by a lot of there was a lot of liquidity out there for bet bash My I think there were some people with some pretty fat pockets that were firing firing firing 24.8 is my prediction. I mean yours 20 Would you say 24.8 this price is is this price is not just closest just closest You can go you can cut me on either side if you want. I'm gonna say 26.05 I think it's going over eight one then if we're going down to the All right, I'm at a 4.8 Okay, I'm a three point nine four point eight is 4.8 is pretty pretty pretty positive. I Don't not quite have Kirk as League average. I think I'm have have him 19th Based on I assume he's healthy because a lot of his bad performances to start that Stint in Atlanta. It's like oh, no, this guy's not a hundred percent this guy can't go This guy has the shoulder thing going on this guy has his legs not fully there when he's playing good He can be League average or above right now. He's not and I'm a kubiak guy so I'm going on here 4.8 I'm at 3.9 and I thought I was high so You have not get you're not don't don't get caught off sides there That's a it's a pretty bold number. I have to say Kirk cousins was kind of in like the he was in the Aaron Rogers jade and Daniels bright bright young He was in like that cluster for me. So I'm like under 50th percentile But not so low that I would have him at like replacement level pricing. So he is my Yeah, he's like my 28-ish quarterback. I think or 26th-ish 3.9 for me I'm prepared to be wrong, but I honestly thought I was high. I thought you were going to come in lower Skill group for me is a 4 Ashton genty. I'm not buying As a long-term producer at the NFL level, but he could surprise to the good this year after How bad things were for him from a blocking standpoint last year? I think he's probably going to end up just being a pretty average running back in the NFL and the Raiders are going to look pretty stupid for using a top six pick on him, but Whatever the case is the entire skill position group rests at the feet at the bald head of Bowers and You know, I don't know This isn't this is this is if the golfins didn't exist. This would be the worst wide receiver room in football Yeah, like I said, I'm not as down and trade tuckers some people were like it was a surprise positive, but and Jalen nailer, I think has upside, but I started lower than you. I'm at a three and it's basically like Hey, your best players tight end and that's that's a tough field of swallow Genty has upside I'm not as out on you as he I'm not as out on him as you are He did force a bunch of mistakles. He really got hit in the back field a lot and he fought through some stuff The blocking was a warrant I'm gonna give him one more chance to prove that he's you know special because we saw glimpses of it, but I like Dante Thornton Jalen nailer jack back these these aren't names that are Getting getting people super excited. You got a hay word at fullback. That's a plus. I guess just based on the last name and then I think they signed Noah Brown the other day That's Dude that I mean the depth is pretty rough to remember Michael Meyer. I do you tight ends. Yeah, he he he can play He can play see it's you're really stacked up at tight end and then Like we said Mike Washington and Dylan Laube is your backup running bags. It's Trades thin as well, so I started pretty low. I'm willing to bump us up pretty quick If tray Tucker is my wide receiver 56 any NFL and he's your wide receiver one Which means there are teams out there with a wide receiver three better than your wide receiver one Ironhead reference. Yeah, RIP ironhead One other RIP football podcast, but Hayden Panityeri, geez See that she died. Yeah, that was weird and said Yeah, shout out one of no shout out one of the great child performances When she remembers the Titans they had the little girl that knew ball That was a fun. I'm gonna have to give that one a rewatch. It's a good good movie guys. Yeah Sprock powers is TE1. I feel it's healthy this year. I think and Very good. I'm expecting he gets 12 to 15 looks a game and is gonna threaten Top target getter and the NFL. That would be a good game plan. Yeah I support that Clint cubic if if he's targeting Brock Bowers 12 15 times I'm gonna have to change my tune a little bit on him Don't run him into the ground, please, but Certainly feature him All right, well Maybe I'm high on what's on the scope position group before but It's tough because it's like I downgrade it because it's a tight-end and on average It's just not the crux of a lot of offenses Obviously it's becoming more of the passing game over the last 10 years. What now? Yes, it's still when when your wider receiver room is that rough? It's hard to be like no, we're just feed the tight-end like yeah Wouldn't that be your defensive game plan then just kind of stop him yeah All right offensive line. I'm at a 3.1. I'm at a floor point two mostly for the lender bomb thing like that's good berthford's Probably go berthford stinks. No, I mean, but compare comparatively. It's like at least brought in he brought in another body at guard Did did did did did did did did did did did did DJ glazed DJ glazed did did did DJ glazed is not a good player JPJ only played seven games He had some Colton Miller. I have him as a minus. I have DJ glazed as a double-minus I have berthford as a double-minus. I have lender blonde as a plus. I have Colton Miller as a double-plus Yeah, Colton Miller was great, but he played four games and That was or got that the ankle injury got him so ever good left tackle. You have a good center Very incomplete picture and then yeah, it's it's rough from there and the right side is An absolute mess. I think it's but it's gonna I think they're like my 25th ischbest offensive line I the fact that you have a I think Colton Miller might end up being a top Five left tackle. He's the Brock Bowers of this offensive line. Yeah, he's doing all the lifting We got to see what it's good to do it Yeah, we got to see lender bomb do it. Maybe Spencer berthford's better than I think too. I don't know All right 4.2 for me that offensive rating in totality is 40th percentile and good enough for 24th best in the NFL by my numbers Which means this is a team that's gonna score points. They're not gonna get shut out of time, but there's also a relatively low ceiling on this group There's no world where we're waking up and we're debating is Kirk cousins does he deserve a six or a seven Right, like there's this is all they have a hard new band. It's a narrow band and it's and it probably has downside Colton Miller injury The Brock Bowers injury He's not as fleet of foot as he once was. Yeah, if your if your left tackle goes out You might want to just plan on hey, we're probably both this week. Oh, we split in time No, we're just assuming you're going to get hurt Kirk during the game Yeah Defense not the worst in football But close Very very close my runstop number is 2.7 that's up considering their investment the linebacker position My past rush is a 4.3 that is effectively a max cross-b Respect number and my coverage is a 3.4. I maybe came in high on coverage This is the 31st first best defense by my ratings. I give them a 35th percentile and I could see this number going down if the rob Leonard experiences is as unsatisfying as it could be Yeah, I'm a little higher on runstop 3.1 same kind of stuff. We're just I expect Man, I expect the interior to be a little better Interior of the defensive line was just all time all time bad I don't know if you could have got much worse with some of the guys who are playing up there and the linebacker should help 3.4 for past rush. I thought mine was just like this is the bare minimum I can give team with Max Krasby on it because the rest of it sucks. It's, it's so thin after him. It's really good. You're probably going to have that Crawford rookie cycling in. You had a Brennan Jackson who was going to be a rotational edge. He went to the IR two days ago. I think this number could be paid plays up to potential that we've seen from him over the course of his short career. But right now, like, I'm not a coon sky. So I think my coverage number is the same as yours through 3.4. Tonka Hemingway. His runstop numbers, man. It's bad. It's really, really. I mean, it's like the reason league bad. Is this like, is this just a, man, we can't fix everything or did they somehow look at those 200 snaps from Tonka Hemingway and decide they were going to go to work with him as they're starting left defensive tackle. Like, is this, is this a failure to self evaluate? Because this guy's not a starter in the NFL. So here's the thing. I think part of it is if you're looking at the, if you're looking at the Arlad stuff right now, I don't think Hemingway's actually starting. Like you said, I think we're switching to more of a 4.3. And we're going to, we're just going to plug a nose tackle in there that's not Tonka Hemingway. Adam Butler did a pretty decent job in runstop. So maybe that's the plan. Yeah, that's the, and they, and they also brought in Fattucasi, Fattucasi. Sure. He's a 325 pound guy who's played 10 years in league. He can play nose. So it might be Fattucasi at nose. And then Coons and Crosby on outside. And then whatever else you have backing them up is like outside linebackers, or maybe you're just playing a lot more nickel, nickel base at that point. Is this your worst defense? Second worst defense third worst. Second worst, I believe. Okay. Your other ancillary ratings, I don't have any way to come up with an intangibles. I'm at 33rd percentile. Special teams for me is six, but that may be high. In totality, I am a minus 3.4 for the rate is you are a minus 3.6. Looks like we agreed on coaching and special teams I'm too high. So I'll turn my knob down. There's, they kind of had a lot of turnover there too. That's a tough one. And your numbers are just smack on like 30 third percent. Tall team, except for your high on QBSC. Just big, big cousin sky. Remember when I was so high on the Falcons when he went there, that I watched one game and like I've made a huge mistake. You know, it's funny. You know, it's funny in my mind when I'm rating 33rd percentile is the Mendoza one. All need to change that. Well, we're going to find out if there's a reason to change that. We're not going to find out for a while though, because unless Kirk Cousins gets hurt, there is no daylight in terms of opposition, strength of opponent here in the early going for the Las Vegas Raiders. They are out to four point favorites in their opener against Miami. Okay, probably taking Miami in that spot. The chargers are going to catch, are they going to be catching eight and half points against the chargers. That's going to be an interesting one where we might be in a perfect world, Andy. Miami wins outright week one. And then that number against the chargers is like 10 and a half or something. And I think you're maybe talking about taking the death with the Raiders week two. Saints week three is a possible win spot, but it's not, you know, your three point dog on the road, second and back to back. And then it gets wild. Casey, New England, Buffalo, the Rams. If this is one of the worst defenses in football, Andy, how do you feel like that run of quarterbacks is going to equip themselves against your defense? How many points do you need to say overrun that? How many points do you need to have to win in that four game stretch? When any of the games, any of the games, you need to bank all your points for one of is it a 40 you need a 40 burger? Do you need a 40 burger to get a win in that four game stretch? You probably do. I think all of those teams are hanging high thirties on you. The Jets week eight, if you're looking for any daylight to insert a a rookie quarterback, it would presumably be there. It's on the road. So that's not ideal, but at least it's against the Jets. Niners, oh man, but see, this is what sucks, man. The defenses you're up against have violent past rushes. This is going to be really, really tough to find a way in for Mendoza. He's probably going to come in and just get blasted. This doesn't look great. You're playing. What are you going to do? You're playing three teams and you'll be fine. You're playing three teams in four weeks, not coming off of thereby. San Francisco Denver Cleveland. You know what? Even without miles cared, it's still a good defense there. I think Cleveland, oh, absolutely. If San Francisco is healthy, which yet to be seen, but yes, Seattle Denver Cleveland against that offensive line, and then Chargers Denver closing with Kansas City. It's going to be another high pick, right? Oh, yeah, for sure. I think you've got, I would be scouting the Ohio State Buck guys to make a call on Mr. Smith to add to your weapon to try to upgrade your weapons so that you'd have a wide receiver one who's better than wide receiver 56 in the NFL. E-maters are not making their win total. I don't think the six implied wins is an overstatement. This to me looks like four, three or four, and I don't see a ton of, kind of, well, blank and blank and blank happen. And that opens up some path to an eight and eight season, for the eight and nine season nine for these guys. So I'm inclined to look for win total under fewest wins type of, uh, type of outcome here. Do you have any positive, uh, you know, nooks or crannies you want to try to bet into for the Raiders? Or is this a team that you think can and will lose many, many games? Yeah, I mean, it's just such a tough schedule. You know, you can, if you look at what, what's the everything goes right, Parley? Mendoza starts early, he gets it. He's clearly the man. He's going to be a star in the NFL. He's instantly, you know, the 11th best quarterback in the league. But when X-ray breaks his ankle, Fatma Holmes isn't right. It was going to say, yeah, uh, you beat me up the punch line with the Chargers as she goes into shambles again. Yeah, half the Parley depends on other teams. It's not just, hey, things went right for us. Things going right for us. You're going to need, you're going to need some other stuff that happened negatively for a handful of teams for you to, you know, feasibly make the Fc playoff. So be good. Hey, let's get the kids in playing time. Let's get some glimpses. Hopefully he doesn't get, I was going to say you want the, you want the Caleb Williams rookie year minus the sacks where it's like, hey, we've, we've, we've got something we can work with here. We still are in a rebuild. Um, obviously at that point, they, they needed to get the coach installed. Maybe, uh, you're feeling pretty good about Kubiak and going to next year with another fourth place schedule. And yeah, maybe we can cook there. You know, Andy, fewest wins for the Raiders is plus 942. The dolphins in contrast are plus 175. I'm projecting the dolphins to have 4.1 wins. I'm projecting the Raiders to have 4.8. So pretty clearly the market thinks less of some of the bad teams than the Raiders and Raiders kind of surprising to the bad. Maybe, maybe a fun play. I was going to say, I looked at like awards and stuff. There's nothing I'm interested in here. Crosby's listed pretty high for DPI. I don't know how you win it on that defense, because that defense is good. No, no, no, no, no, no. Mendoza rookie of the year is going to be priced out toward poison. Yeah, I just, you have fun sitting on that price all year. Kubiak coach of the year feels tough too, just based on, even if we really, really think highly of him at the end of the year, are we giving it to a guy with six wins? Well, no, absolutely not. And four wins, five wins, you know, you said something interesting there. The Mendoza rookie of the year. You want to exercise in account preserving your account. Bet that now. There's zero world where that price is at the best it's going to be this minute. Am I, am I wrong? No, I mean, you're right. It's just like the dart thing I did last year. So that would have been great. Yeah, get it like wait until the kind of the wheels are wobbling on the Kirk Cousins experience and then bet it. if you want it. I'm not betting it period, but yeah, that would be the plan. All right, well, kind of, kind of staring at this plus 924, a fewest wins. Yeah, I don't hate that. Like, they end the season clearly lower on Miami. I have Miami of like three and a half wins. But what's a win here between friends, you know, and the Raiders, if the Raiders come down to that. It probably comes down to that week one game. Are you going to be with me taking the dolphins, plus the four? I'm going to be betting draw live on the three way. Yeah, Raiders get the fewest wins in the NFL if they lose those games to the dolphins, the Cardinals and the Titans. That's who they're fighting with for the bottom, I think. And I could lose, they could lose all those games. So yeah, I think that's where you're trying to shoot for if you're looking for a way into this team. I'm going to give Rob Leonard one season on the job. And I hate that I'm saying this because I'm being colored a little bit by the outperformance in the preseason from them, but that did not look like a well coordinated defense to me. It was tough because it's like they're just throwing the venue. That's the hardest thing about some of these coordinators. It's like, man, are they, did they install a defense to try to stop an offense? Or did they install a defense to try to judge some players? Yeah, you know, it's really tough with these preseason games because everybody or did they install a defense? Did they? Which is the question I was asking. He learned, he learned under Maccadoo in New York. Come in. He said some good mentors, but I mean, I'm positive. You're being tongue in cheek. No, no, but the positive is he did work under Brian Flores and Miami. He worked in Baltimore for several years under Carball. Like he's been in some some decent systems just. He was promoted by P. Carroll. Is that a negative? Yes. P. Carroll hired. Who's the kid? He could be a coward. P. Carroll hired his own kid to coach the offensive line last year, set back some guys development by decade. It was, uh, anyway. Sorry, JPJ. All right. Let's go. Let's call it a day. Let's go. Broncos. All right. One one. Yeah. Feels a little too obvious. I'm from being honest. We'll see. Save the thoughts for one minute from now.