Getting guys who know how to win football games is the most crucial part of this "rebuild" or retool, whatever the Las Vegas Raiders want to call this. This is a season where they aren't expected to win the division, but are expected to make a massive jump.
When you have seasons like that, you need players who have had experience in winning games, winning games in all sorts of different circumstances, even the rookies. And, they have done that for the most part, like adding former Seattle Seahawks QB Geno Smith, who, no, never won a Super Bowl or anything crazy, but has seen so many different things in the league.
And when it comes to the rookies, they've got guys like that, too. Tommy Mellott and Cam Miller have both played in and won multiple D2 Championships, even against each other. Dont'e Thornton Jr. played at Tennessee and Oregon, where he played a ton of meaningful football, and the list goes on and on.
But for the first pick of this draft class, Ashton Jeanty had played a ton of football the last two years, and some really meaningful football this last year. Boise State went to the postseason and actually played some good football. And with that, and how many times he has run the football in his career, you can say that he is pretty mature.
"I think Ashton [Jeanty], just from getting to know him, man, he’s so wise beyond his years," Geno Smith said. "Just super humble, for all the accolades he's gotten, to be one of the highest drafted running backs in a while, super humble, super hard-working, asking the right questions. He wants to learn from the vets. And, I mean, he's special with that ball in his hands, we know that, and we've got to keep getting it to him so he can go out there and be great.
"But we will see when the pads come on, exactly what it's about because that's truly what makes him different, is his ability to break tackles and bounce off of contact and continue to Las Vegas Raiders Transcript 5.29.25 run. But just in the short time he's been here, he's picked up the offense well, and he's doing a great job. So, he's got to keep it up."
This is the same philosophy that the Seattle Seahawks used with Pete Carroll and John Spytek with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. And, for those two franchises, it worked. For Jeanty, you definitely wouldn't think he is a rookie just solely based on the way he carries himself.
But the Raiders will need that in 2025 because they will likely hand the ball off a ton to him. There are times when he will be the offense for the Raiders. So, that level of maturity and being "wise beyond his years" will be needed.
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