The Raiders are 0-2, and Bears pass-rusher extraordinaire Khalil Mack has:
- as many sacks as the entire Raiders defense
- as many interceptions as the entire Raiders defense
- more forced fumbles and more recovered fumbles
- more touchdowns
As you may have heard, Khalil Mack used to be a Raider, and would’ve been happy to remain a Raider for a salary commensurate with his talent. But in a trade that everyone believes was engineered by Jon Gruden himself, Mack was sent to Chicago for a pair of first-round picks. Obviously a star-for-picks trade is going to look bad in Year 1, and it’ll be impossible to judge until many years down the line. Still, it looks really damn bad right now. And it only gets funnier with each Gruden quote about his anemic pass rush.
And Gruden just keeps talking about it!
After the Week 1 loss, Gruden said he’d have to “take a good look at the reasons why we didn’t” have a pass rush.
After the Week 2 loss,
Maybe!
The next day, at his weekly press conference, Gruden was asked point-blank if he regrets the Mack trade.
“No, it doesn’t make me regret making the decision,” Gruden said. “We made the trade. We made the trade. There’s going to be hindsight, 50/50, all that stuff.”
They do always say hindsight is 50/50.
Finally, yesterday at practice, Gruden stumbled upon a truth.
I am half-sure that Gruden knows exactly what he’s doing, and is just trolling. He’s got the best job security of any NFL coach, and is reportedly getting even more personnel power very soon, so he might as well have fun with it. But so can we, right? I implore all the Raiders beat writers, and those of their opponents, to never stop asking about Mack or the Raiders’ inability to get to QBs. We deserve this.
I’m also eagerly awaiting Part 2 of this: