With a disappointing 0-2 start to the season and ranking 31st in sacks in the league, coach Jon Gruden keeps thinking that the Oakland Raiders will be OK without Khalil Mack.
“It doesn’t make me regret making the decision,” Gruden told reporters Monday. “We made the trade. There’s going to be hindsight and all that stuff. We would have loved to have had him here but he’s not here.”
“I would have loved to have coached him, loved to have had him here. But he’s not here, and you know, somebody’s got to step up. We’ve got to keep building our football team.”
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And this is a really confusing statement, because what the Raiders head coach is saying it’s that he does not regret having let Mack go—even though his defensive line has been virtually non-existent over the past two weeks— but that he would love to have him in the team. That makes absolutely no sense because it was the Raiders who didn’t want to give a contract extension to the pass-rusher which prompted him to look for a new team. Sure, they eventually offered Mack a deal, but by that time it was too late. Gruden could’ve had one of the best defensive players of the league playing for him this season, but the team didn’t want to pay him what he deserved.
Now, Khalil Mack has had a standout season start while the Raiders haven't been able to win a game yet because their defense has allowed more than 20 points in the second half of both games, making them look terrible. The Chicago player started the season with two sacks, two forced fumbles, one interception, and one touchdown; whereas entire Raiders’ defense has the same amount of sacks and interceptions, and no touchdowns. Oakland’s young defensive line has struggled to pressure opposing quarterbacks during its two losses.
When the 2016 Defensive Player of the League was traded to the Chicago Bears in exchange for four future draft picks, some Black and Silver fans thought that it wasn't a big thing since Oakland’s defense couldn’t get any worse than last season when they allowed 25 points or more in half of their games, but apparently it can.
The second-highest paid coach of the NFL pointed out that perhaps in the future they will look back at this moment and see that they made the right decision.
“Hopefully we prove that in the long run, we did the right thing.”
Even with the two 1st round picks that Oakland got in Mack's trade, the chance to find a player like Khalil Mack in the next Draft is really low.
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