Could the Patriots lose two key pieces to Las Vegas? The Raiders are currently searching for both a general manager and a head coach, and both searches have them at least looking New England’s way.
The Raiders have already requested interviews with Patriots director of player personnel Dave Ziegler for the GM job and inside linebackers coach Jerod Mayo for the head coach job. The interview with Ziegler reportedly took place on Friday.
Over the weekend, Mike Florio added that the Raiders are also “preparing to make a run” at New England offensive coordinator Josh McDaniels.
Appearing on The Greg Hill Show Monday morning, ESPN’s Adam Schefter said that while the Raiders haven’t formally requested to interview McDaniels yet, he could see Ziegler and McDaniels ultimately going to Vegas together. (Listen to the full interview with Schefter below. The McDaniels discussion begins at the 9:30 mark.)
“I don’t believe that as of this morning the Raiders have even put in a permission slip. Until they do, it’s not real. But if they do, then I would say it’s on,” Schefter said. “I think Dave Ziegler is right in the thick of that. I think if Dave Ziegler takes that job, it’s only logical to deduce that he would have interest in Josh. So that’s something that just continues to float out there. We’ll see what the Raiders decide to do, but yes, that’s probably wise to pay attention to.”
Chris Curtis then asked Schefter if there’s anything Bill Belichick could do to try to keep McDaniels from leaving.
“I don’t think there’s anything Bill could do to get in the way of Josh becoming head coach of the Raiders, if that’s what Josh wants to do,” Schefter said. “If Josh wants to become the head coach of the Raiders, he’s going to be the head coach of the Raiders -- if Dave gets the job. I kind of think there’s a little bit of a connection there between the two. If the Raiders go that direction with Dave, I would think -- we’re making assumptions -- if Dave gets the job, then why would he not be interested in Josh? And if he’s interested in Josh, I don’t know what Bill could do.”
So, would McDaniels, who seems to be pretty selective about which opportunities he’s interested in at this point, want the Raiders job? Boomer Esiason, appearing on GHS earlier in the morning, thinks he would. (Listen to Esiason’s interview below. The discussion about McDaniels begins at the 8:25 mark.)
“If the money was there, hell yeah I would,” Esiason said. “You’ve got Derek Carr -- at least you’ve got a quarterback right now who can still play, and still play at a high level. He’s not one of the premium, premium guys. But if that was an opportunity for Josh, and they’re going to give him total control, which I think whoever goes there is going to have a very good shot at doing that, you do have a playoff team sitting there. I don’t see how you say no. Whoever’s gonna go there is probably going to extract at least a six-year deal, I would think, simply because of some of the instability around the organization at the moment.”
Whether McDaniels would have “total control” remains to be seen given that the Raiders are searching for a GM as well. But if he and Ziegler went together, you would assume they’d have an understanding between them regarding how much say McDaniels would have in personnel decisions.