00:00Hello, everybody. This is Hondo Carpenter, your Las Vegas Raiders beat writer on Sports Illustrated and the host of the
00:06Las Vegas Raiders Insider Podcast.
00:08As you may have already heard, Ben Johnson at this point at the time of this taping is finalizing, but
00:14all signs are he will be the Bears, the next Bears head coach.
00:18He's been in the process of assembling a staff that's been going on for a little bit, and he's getting
00:24all of that together.
00:25Whether we're going to dig into a little bit today on what happened, but we're going to spend most of
00:31our attention looking to what's coming.
00:35There was shock around the league. Agents were talking about it was expected to happen.
00:41It wasn't me, multiple people reporting that he was the frontrunner. Never said the deal was done, but certainly was
00:48the frontrunner.
00:49I know that the Raiders felt they had him. I know there were Raider players that felt they had him.
00:54And people that I talked to in Detroit, even as late as last night, I talked to one and said,
01:00do you happen to know, is he going to just talk to the Raiders or is he going to talk
01:04to multiple teams?
01:06And they said that they anticipated he would talk to a couple of teams just to figure everything out in
01:14his head.
01:14But he speaks to the Bears and bam, it's done. Raiders lose him.
01:18He was their frontrunner. That is the guy that they had targeted.
01:24But it's not like there are not some great candidates out there.
01:28We've talked about him, Pete Carroll being one.
01:31Another name that I just was told now that someone believes is going to at least come into the picture
01:38is Liam Cohn,
01:40who's the offensive coordinator with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.
01:43So I would I right now the names that I'm hearing around the league are it's Pete Carroll or Liam
01:50Cohn.
01:50But I think it may be a little early to say that right at this moment, because who knows,
01:55they probably have others in the back of their head that they interviewed and really liked.
01:59I don't think if you're the Raiders that Pete Carroll is a second place prize in the least, but he's
02:05a heck of a coach.
02:06And I know he fits more of what they liked at the very beginning when I told you that ideally
02:14they wanted a coach with experience,
02:16but were willing to be Tomlin, which happened when they visited with Ben Johnson.
02:23As far as the GM search, I think I've been telling you all along, Spitek was the leader.
02:29However, the interview of Newmark was because that's who Ben Johnson wanted as his guy.
02:36And that's why the, you know, the Raiders certainly looked in that direction with Ben going in another area.
02:42I still believe Spitek will end up being the general manager.
02:46As you know, he's the AGM with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.
02:51And that's the connection, of course, because he's very familiar with Liam Cohn, the offensive coordinator there in Tampa Bay.
02:58There's going to be a lot of posts looking at what happened here.
03:06And this is why the NFL has the process that they do.
03:10I talked about the other day, people said, why is this stretching on?
03:14It could make it where it was harder for the Raiders to hire Ben.
03:18Well, that's why you've got to wait, according to the NFL rules, till guys are done, till their teams are
03:25done.
03:26And that's exactly what happened.
03:27The Raiders felt confident around the league, the overwhelming consent.
03:32I think Ian Rapoport said it or somebody talked about among agents in NFL, that is just the expectation that
03:38he's going there.
03:40I know that I heard from people who were possibly going to join him in Las Vegas.
03:48And I know that that was the sentiment, again, from many in the building and outside or around the NFL
03:54and in Detroit.
03:56In fact, last night, like I said, someone in the Detroit organization was telling me about the kind of guy
04:03the Raiders were getting.
04:04And he was 100% convinced.
04:07So there you go.
04:09That's the latest.
04:10Now, what do the Raiders do?
04:12Do they go for the young up-and-coming offensive mind like a Liam Cohn?
04:16Do they go for a Pete Carroll who's experienced, a Hall of Famer?
04:20You already know what you're getting with Pete.
04:22There's no experimentation.
04:26There's absolutely no guessing.
04:28I will tell you, I was working on an article for when Ben Johnson was going to get hired on
04:34the pros and cons of Ben Johnson.
04:37And there are a lot of pros.
04:39No denying that.
04:41Just because he's not going to the Raiders doesn't mean he isn't a great coach.
04:44But one of the cons that I heard that I thought was very interesting was that people talked about him
04:50being an offensive genius and all of that, but that he was kind of introverted and not as motivational of
04:59a guy.
05:00In fact, one person told me he's a lot like Josh McDaniels.
05:04Great guy.
05:05Great offensive mind.
05:06But he kind of has that same personality.
05:09So I was going to talk about how will that, how does Ben Johnson address, you know, not necessarily being
05:16like most head coaches and how they lead from the front.
05:19So that's a fascinating thing to look at.
05:22We're going to have a lot on that.
05:23We're going to continue to work the phones to find out everything that's going on.
05:29But again, I think Spitek now is clearly back in the lead to be the offensive coordinator because of his
05:35relationship with Brady.
05:37I think Pete Carroll clearly has to be right up there and Liam Cohn, but they've interviewed so many others.
05:46This could go in a million different directions.
05:50Overall, I've had a couple of people email me and just simply say, what a disaster for the Raiders.
05:57I don't think it's a disaster for the Raiders at all.
05:59Yeah, that's the guy they wanted.
06:01Yep, that's the guy they thought they were going to get and so did everybody else.
06:04But they didn't.
06:07And I've heard a couple of thoughts, but nothing I've been able to confirm as to why it didn't happen.
06:12I'll continue to work on that.
06:13But at the end of the day, you want somebody that wants to be there and you want somebody that
06:19you want.
06:20And if the Raiders were to end up with Pete Carroll in this, nobody should be acting like this is
06:26a bad thing.
06:28Pete Carroll is a heck of a coach.
06:29Liam Cohn is certainly an option.
06:32Although I have said to you all along, I would think when you're a Raiders, you want somebody with experience.
06:38And I think that would be something that Liam Cohn would have to overcome.
06:41So there's a lot of information there.
06:43We're going to continue to work the phones.
06:47We're going to continue to bring you all the information that we can.
06:50But I wanted to get this out to you right away.
06:52Thank you for listening.
06:54And, again, if you go back and listen to the first pod we did, we kind of talked about what
06:59they were looking for originally.
07:02And that's where they continued.
07:03Now, what direction do they go?
07:06I think the important thing is, and I don't expect this to happen, but it can't be panicked.
07:12Okay, this organization is not going to rise or fall on one hire.
07:17It's now finding the right one.
07:19But certainly they've interviewed enough people.
07:21They've talked to enough people that now it's not like they're starting over at ground zero.
07:27Thanks, everybody.
07:27We'll see you again tomorrow.
07:30Appreciate you listening.
07:32Have a wonderful day.
Comments