Raiders quarterback competition – Syndication Server

Raiders still living week-to-week at QB heading into Week 12

While Antonio Pierce named Gardner Minshew the starter for week 12 vs the Broncos, he wouldn’t commit to anything past that.

As the Raiders head for their week 12 matchup with the Broncos, they are sticking with Gardner Minshew. And past that, who really knows.

Monday head coach Antonio Pierce was asked if he believes Gardner Minshew is the best option at quarterback for the team moving forward, he chose his words carefully.

“He’ll be the quarterback this week,” said Pierce.

That’s something, at least, considering several times this season Pierce was completely non-committal on Monday as to who the team would start the following week. And one of those times, he switched quarterbacks with Minshew being benched. It was only because of the injury to Aidan O’Connell that Minshew regained his starting job.

The competition now is between Minshew and Desmond Ridder who the team signed off the Cardinals practice squad a few weeks ago. Minshew was benched midway through the game in Cincinnati in favor of Ridder only to have Minshew return to the starting lineup out of the bye week and with a shakeup on the offensive staff.

Antonio Pierce won’t commit to Raiders starting QB heading into bye week

Is Gardner Minshew still the Raiders starting QB or will he be replaced by Desmond Ridder? Antonio Pierce isn’t ready to make that decision.

Here we go again. Back to the Raiders being in limbo at the QB position. In the third quarter of Sunday’s game, looking at a 31-10 deficit, the Raiders pulled starter Gardner Minshew in favor of Desmond Ridder.

At the time, you could write it off as the Raiders just being down three scores and just pulling their starter. But if that were the case, Monday morning you’d expect to hear the head coach commit to Minshew as the starter. He didn’t do that.

“I’m using the bye week to look at everything.” Pierce said in response to a question about the team’s starting quarterback.

This controversy at the QB position has been going on almost weekly dating back to the beginning of the offseason.

First it was Aidan O’Connell taking all the first team reps. Then by minicamp, Minshew started getting some first team reps. By camp they shared first team reps equally. It wasn’t until two weeks prior to the start of the season that Pierce named Minshew the starter. And even then, he made it clear he wasn’t confident in his choice, saying he would give Minshew the first quarter of the season and re-evaluate at that time.

Just a week after Minshew led a come-from-behind win in Baltimore, struggles at home against the Panthers had Pierce putting in O’Connell late in the game and already waffling on Minshew as the starter.

Two weeks later, he made the switch, benching Minshew in favor of O’Connell. Then in just his second start, O’Connell left with a thumb injury and Minshew was back in as the starter.

The next day the team signed Desmond Ridder off the Cardinals practice squad and Sunday, after just two weeks with the team, he was in the game for Minshew.

Now, Pierce is saying he is using the coming week to decide whether Ridder will be the team’s starter or not. And you can bet, even if Ridder isn’t named the starter this week, the question will come up every single week if Minshew struggles.

Breaking: Raiders make change at QB, naming Aidan O’Connell starter

So much for a midseason competition. Prior to Wednesday’s practice, Antonio Pierce took to the podium and formally announced that Aidan O’Connell will be the team’s starting QB, replacing Gardner Minshew.

“When it’s time to make a switch, I make a switch,” Pierce said.

“I just felt like it was best for our offense going forward.”

Minshew was named the starter a couple weeks prior to the start of the season after beating out O’Connell in camp and preseason. But it was never an easy decision. Certainly not as easy as Antonio Pierce had hoped it would be.

Both quarterbacks had issues throughout the offseason practices and camp, so neither truly grabbed ahold of the starting job to make it an obvious choice. Thus Minshew’s leash was always short.

Pierce said he would give it the first quarter of the season and that’s basically how it went down. Five games in, Minshew threw two devastating interceptions in last Sunday’s game against the Broncos, leading to another blowout loss and that was the final straw.

Now Aidan O’Connell will get his shot at it.

Raiders QB job in limbo again following latest ugly loss

Another ugly loss for the Raiders means more questions about who will start at quarterback.

Another bad loss for the Raiders means another week of wondering whether Antonio Pierce will bench Gardner Minshew in favor of Aidan O’Connell.

This time it was the Broncos. A bitter rival who had never beaten the Raiders since they made the move to Las Vegas — a streak of eight straight.

The game started out feeling like the Raiders were going to boat race the Broncos. Vegas scored a touchdown on the opening drive, with Brock Bowers making a great play on a floated ball from Minshew and turning it into a 57-yard touchdown. The second drive went for a field goal. And the third one was looking like it was headed for a touchdown.

Then everything fell apart.

Minshew rolled left and threw too high for Bowers at the goal line and it was intercepted and returned for a touchdown.

Thae Raiders would not score again in the game. Meanwhile the Broncos rattled off 34 straight points.

Minshew completed eight passes for 115 yards and a touchdown prior to the pick six. The rest of the game he completed four passes for 22 yards and two interceptions.

After his second interception, the Raiders pulled him in favor of Aidan O’Connell.

The score was still just 20-10 in the third quarter when Minshew was pulled, so it wasn’t quite like two weeks ago in the blowout to the Panthers when O’Connell came in. This time it was merely poor performance and the Raiders hoped maybe O’Connell could give them a shot. He didn’t.

His first pass went to no man’s land and was he missed completed one pass for four yards and threw two other passes to no one.

He was intercepted again on his third drive, this time on the first play, giving the Broncos great field position at the Vegas 39. They scored another touchdown off f it to go up 34-10.

The game was officially out of hand at that point, so that’s when O’Connell led the team on a pointless scoring drive.

Even with the garbage time stats to pretty things up, O’Connell still had just 94 yards on 50% completions with no TD’s and an interception. So, not exactly presenting himself as a better option than Minshew.

After the game, Antonio Pierces answer to who will be starting going forward was simply to shake his head and say “I don’t know” and adding that he has to watch the film.

Pierce has shown a short leash in his short time as the Raiders head coach. He stuck with O’Connell last season mainly because he was just brought in to play out the string and the Raiders wanted to see what they had in the rookie. He played well enough, combined with the high energy defense to get some unexpected wins. That’s not there this season and thus far neither of the QB’s has shown they can pick the team up.

The smart thing now would be to let the team know in the next couple of days whether Minshew is being yanked or if he’ll be given another shot next week, so they can rally around whoever is the starter. That is their best shot at finding some success. Though at this point, it’s hard to say if it will really matter.

Raiders sticking with Gardner Minshew at quarterback vs Browns

Gardner Minshew is still the Raiders starting quarterback this week as the Raiders face Browns.

With two poor performances in the first three games this season, Gardner Minshew’s status as the Raiders starting quarterback seemed a bit tenuous. The day after the team’s ugly loss to the winless Panthers last Sunday, Antonio Pierce wouldn’t say for certain that Minshew would remain the starter as they headed for Week four. Adding that he needed to speak with the team first.

In the interim days, the team’s two star players Davante Adams and Maxx Crosby both took to podcasts and said they would prefer the team stick with Minshew at this point in time. Come Wednesday, Pierce made it official that the team was sticking with Minshew this week when the team welcomes the Cleveland Browns to Las Vegas.

“What I said was, I need to get with the players and evaluate the film, so there’s no issue,” said Pierce. “Gardner Minshew is the quarterback.”

Back when Minshew was named the team’s quarterback over incumbent starter Aidan O’Connell, Pierce said he would give Minshew at least the first quarter of the season before he re-evaluated it. So, this would be in keeping with that. And it also means, the question will arise again next week. And perhaps every week if Minshew continues to struggle.

Browns rumored to be shopping QB Dorian Thompson-Robinson, should Raiders inquire?

Should Raiders be in the mix to trade for Browns QB Dorian Thompson-Robinson?

Dorian Thompson-Robinson’s football career was launched in Las Vegas. The Bishop Gorman grad attended UCLA and went on to be selected in the fifth round of the 2023 draft. And after stepping up for Deshaun Watson for thre games last season, he’s now buried on the depth chart behind Watson and Jameis Winston.

This has led reported trade attempts by the Browns as they hope to get something in return for a player who may not see the field for them.

Up until last week, the Raiders hoped Anthony Brown could compete for the backup job. But he never panned out and they released him in favor of journeyman Nathan Peterman.

Shortly after that, they decided on Gardner Minshew as the starter over Aidan O’Connell. A competition in which neither of them stepped up to claim the job, leaving the coaches to make a tough decision between basically the lesser of the evils.

It’s safe to say the Raiders have one of the least enviably quarterback situations in the league. And you have to ask yourself if adding someone like Thompson-Robinson to the mix would be valuable.

I think it would.

You’d have to think at very least he would be a better potential option than Peterman. And at best, he could be a more viable option to start than AOC should Minshew struggle early in the season.

What it could come down to is compensation. Which I wouldn’t imagine would be much, considering most teams would probably rather just wait to see if the Browns waive DTR and they can scoop him up for nothing. But any team willing to part with a late round pick or perhaps even just a late round pick swap, may just land him.

At this point, the Raiders are in no position to be turning their nose up at potential competition at a position which basically has two quality backup caliber guys and a third guy who is probably not worth a roster spot.

Gardner Minshew named Raiders starting quarterback

Following the Raiders preseason home opener Saturday night, Antonio Pierce said he’d seen enough to make a decision on who the team’s starting quarterback would be between incumbent Aidan O’Connell and veteran Gardner Minshew, but would take a couple days to make the final decision. He took a few hours.

Pierce announced Sunday morning that Gardner Minshew will be the Raiders’ starting quarterback to begin the season.

“Based on where we want to go in the first quarter of the season, we feel like Gardner gives us the best opportunity.”

Minshew had a better training camp overall and looked solid in the team’s first preseason game in Minnesota. He would’ve made he decision easier had he kept up that level of play in the game Saturday night, but in the end, he had shown enough prior to that to earn the job.

“His personality is infectious, his energy is infectious, his leadership is infectious,” Pierce said of Minshew. “Things of improvement; footwork in the pocket, staying on script. There is such magic about him when he does break the pocket and does his thing, but there’s a lot of times where the first or second read is there and he’s got to let it rip. And more importantly, taking care of the football.”

Antonio Pierce has seen enough to make decision on Raiders starting QB

Raiders have seen enough to make decision on Raiders starting QB

The second preseason game did not go as Antonio Pierce and the Raiders had hoped. The first preseason game saw the two quarterbacks — Aidan O’Connell and Gardner Minshew — battling for the starting job both show flashes. Minshew won the day in terms of his play, however he was going against reserves while O’Connell faced starters.

That wasn’t the case for either quarterback Saturday night against Dallas. Neither QB went against a first team offense and neither QB played particularly well.

Minshew couldn’t lead the team for a touchdown despite five drives, one off of a turnover on a fumbled return. And O’Connell followed up the first touchdown drive of the game with an interception returned for a TD. Pierce said O’Connell’s one scoring drive will not outweigh his crucial mistake on the pick six.

“Everything [counts]. You can’t take the good and not take the bad,” Pierce said. “We’ll look at it and evaluate. They both had opportunities. Aidan had 20 attempts and Minshew had 21. So, that’s as balanced as you can get it and we’ll look at it. Obviously our plan was tonight to throw the ball around and let these guys showcase what they can do and we’ll talk about it.”

Pierce was hoping by this point one or the other of the two QBs would have stepped up and said “I’m the guy.” He literally said that’s what he was waiting to see. That never happened. Not Saturday or really at any point before that.

Even still, a decision has to be made, and Pierce says he’s seen enough to go into that process.

“Yeah, we’ve seen enough reps,” Antonio Pierce said of the Raiders QB competition. . . “We’ll sleep on it and make a decision in the next couple days.”

Pierce said he’s going to be factoring in everything going back as far as OTA’s all the way through camp and the preseason when making his decision. But, let’s be honest, had either guy separated himself in recent weeks, nothing that happened before that would have mattered.

These two didn’t make the decision an easy one. And had they both played great, that would be a good problem to have. In this case, it’s just a problem. But the Raiders have no choice. They need to decide now and start preparing for the season with whoever they choose running the first team in every practice.

Expect that to be the case when they reconvene for their next practice in a couple days.

Raiders waive QB Anthony Brown following rough outing in preseason opener

A week ago Anthony Brown looked like he was in line for the Raiders number 3 QB job. Now he’s out.

It’s been a rough week for Anthony Brown. A week ago today, he was the team’s third string quarterback, which would suggest he had a practice squad spot with his name on it as the emergency quarterback. Now he’s out of a job.

Friday, the Raiders waived Brown, days after adding free agent QB Nathan Peterman.

Peterman is familiar with Luke Getsy’s system, having been with the Bears the past two seasons.

And while Peterman has done little to nothing to be considered an NFL QB in his career — including in four seasons with the Raiders from 2018-21 — Brown came out in the opener and looked completely lost.

Brown entered the game in the third quarter after the two quarterbacks battling for the Raiders starting job had both played a quarter of football.

Nothing looked smooth for Brown and he was unable to make corrections when things broke down. And they were breaking down.

The first six plays featured no completions, two sacks and a delay of game penalty.

In his four possessions, Brown had just one completion for 24 yards, five scrambles for 13 yards, was sacked four times, and fumbled a snap.

The Raiders are back to four quarterbacks on the roster — Aidan O’Connell, Gardner Minshew, Nathan Peterman, and Carter Bradley.

Raiders HC Antonio Pierce target date for naming starting QB coming up soon

Antonio Pierce has set his target date for naming Raiders starting QB

After months of offseason practices, training camp practices, and now one preseason game, we could be days away from the Raiders *finally* naming a starting quarterback.

We have been watching both quarterbacks perform throughout the offseason and training camp, and didn’t come away from that thinking either quarterback had separated himself from the other. That has been Antonio Pierce’s evaluation as well, it would seem.

Saturday’s preseason opener, it was Aidan O’Connell who got the start, but only because one of them had to be the starter. And both quarterbacks played fairly well.

“I thought both guys were efficient,” Pierce said in his Sunday morning press conference. “There were some opportunities that Minshew made down the field that were really good. But I thought both quarterbacks…obviously when it’s a clean pocket you can see what this offense can be with both guys. But I thought they really did a good job with operations. We did have one delay of game with Gardner that we need to clean up. But I thought Aidan did a really good job when being backed up into the red zone and Gardner in the two-minute drill. Everything that we wanted to get out of preseason [Week] one, we got.”

Pierce wouldn’t say who would be taking the field first in next Saturday’s preseason game against the Cowboys, but that after that game, he hopes to have his decision on who will be the team’s opening day starter.

“The goal will be to hopefully make a decision after this game this Saturday,” Pierce said. “We got to get ready to play football and I think we got enough film. We’ll have two games to evaluate both quarterbacks to see how they’ll play.”

So, this time next week, we could have our answer on who will start versus the Chargers in the season opener on September 8 in Los Angeles.