The Raiders Have Some MAJOR DEVELOPMENTS From Day One Of *Mandatory Mini Camp*

Just when us Raider content creators were about to scrape the bottom of the barrel in terms of content and videos for you guys, minicamp has started. And reports are flying fast and furious about different people and blah blah blah and we're winning Super Bowls and all this good hyperbolic nonsense. However, there are some legitimate things we need to talk about from day one of mandatory minicamp. Some have to do with the team, people that showed up, players being healthy, players getting first team reps. A lot to discuss. Here's what I want from you guys. We just hit 7,000 subscribers. Let's get to 8,000 fast. Let's get to 8,000 before the end of this month. If we can get to 8,000 before the end of this month, 10,000 subscribers before the new league year is possible. If you are a new viewer or an old viewer who hasn't considered subscribing yet, hit that sub button. We're flying to 10k. Let's get it done. Before I get into the people that are playing very well in mandatory minicamp thus far, I want to talk about some of the people that have shown up. Those people being everybody. Everybody's there. 88 players are accounted for. There are a couple people banged up with injuries. But the injuries that we were concerned about, Colton Miller, JPJ, they're both playing. They're both doing as much as they can in mandatory minicamp. And also Devontae Adams is out there running routes with the best of them, with the rest of them. Apparently, all the people that we have on the roster, undrafted free agents, all the way down from the last guy to Max Crosby, are all present and accounted for. There are no holdouts for contracts. There are no injury concerns. Everybody is there, working hard, getting ready for week one. Another thing I want to talk about before we get into the rest of minicamp is that the preseason schedule has been released for NFL Network, and all three of our games will be on NFL Network. I don't know if all three of them are live, but because sometimes they air them a couple hours after they actually are played, which kind of sucks because you have to avoid the score if you want to be surprised, blah, blah, blah. But all of them are on NFL Network, so you won't be having to scrape and scrap your way around to find where those games are. A quick Google search can show you what times those games are. I think the first game we play is the Vikings. That should be very interesting to see Aiden O'Connell, Gardner Minshew, J.J. McCarthy, all these guys rocking and rolling. Speaking of people getting first team reps, we'll talk about Aiden O'Connell in a second. Apparently, apparently, if the reports are to be believed, Dylan Laube is getting some first team reps at running back, specifically in pass down situations. Why is this important? Because apparently, from what he showed in his athleticism and his ability in OTAs, they already trust him to learn the playbook and to get in there in pass down situations and catch passes in an offense where Devontae Adams and Jacoby Myers and Bowers and Mayer are all on the field. And Luke Goetze has been known to run a lot of two, burps, a lot of two tight end to running back personnel. So I think there's going to be a lot of situations in which Zemir White and Dylan Laube are on the field at the same time. And if you just saw the Madden 26, what is it, Madden 25? Oh, it's Madden, wait, Madden 25, wasn't there already a Madden? Wait, they already did Madden 25 for Madden 14 because it was the 25th anniversary. So they're just calling this one, there's two Madden 25s. That's, that's a nightmare. Madden 25 cover artist or cover athlete, I should say, is Christian McCaffrey. Maybe Madden curse takes him out. And then the next 23 white guy running back to take his place is Dylan Laube. Just wishful thinking. I don't know. We'll see. Maybe they can coexist. I don't think they can, but maybe they can. So that's very important that he's getting first team reps, pass catching reps with the first teamers. And before I get into the Aiden O'Connell of it all, because I'm sure everybody has seen the report, I want to discuss media day for a second, which kind of goes hand in hand with minicamp and OTAs. Not only was media day awesome because it showed how energetic and happy the players are. They were playing games with them. They were happy. They were gleeful to talk about this team. People like Devontae Adams, right? Showed a level of enthusiasm. I hadn't seen him show in a while, honestly, more so than when Derek Carr was here. And I think he knows the type of team we have. And I think Devontae Adams being as happy as he was in those media day interviews kind of shows where he's at with the quarterback situation. I think he believes whoever's going to be starting week one that we can go out there and win with them. Michael Mayer had a lot to say about last season, about this season, about the offensive general. And he's being very, very politically correct by saying, you know, last year my mindset wasn't right. I wasn't coming into work happy and that's on me. And look, that could be true. I'm not calling him a liar, but I do think there's a lot to be said about the current regime and the past regime in terms of the vibe in the room, the vibe during practice, the vibe during games. Michael Mayer said, football's a game and it's a game where you win more when you're having more fun doing it. And this year he's having a blast. I've seen a side of him in this media interview, and you can go look it up, it's on the Raiders channel if you want, that I hadn't seen before. He was energetic. He was spry. He was happy. He was ready to go. And he talked about the offense that Luke Getzey's putting into play with him and Bowers and all the weapons we have. And when he was talking about the offense, his face lit up like a Christmas tree. He said it's going to be prolific. His eyes got wide and JT the Brick was like, whoa, your eyes got wide. You could suit up and play tomorrow. He's like, dude, if you told me to suit up and play right now, I'd get out there. He is so excited. He said the team is fantastic. And look, this is all with a massive grain of salt. They're not going to come on here and say, yeah, we suck or I don't know, let's see how it goes, blah, blah, blah. He was giving a lot of energy into these media interviews that I hadn't seen from a player before coming into a new season. And he said he's very excited by just the little glimpses he's gotten from the playbook and stuff they've run in practice and stuff they've talked about in meetings to implement that into game time situations. I mean, just the thought of Loughby and Jacobs, not Jacobs, I apologize, Loughby and White, Bowers and Mayer, Myers and Adams. I mean, all you need is competent quarterback play for that to be pretty damn unstoppable. Speaking of competent quarterback play, again, take all this with a grain of salt. It's June 11th or whatever day it is. It's early. It's very, very, very, very early, right? However, reports out of mandatory minicamp day one is that Aiden O'Connell is lighting the defense up. He looks like a different player than he did last season. He looks more accurate, more confident, more up to date with how to beat a modern defensive scheme. And look, you know, people that are reporting these things, they don't have any force in the race in terms of the quarterback. If Minshew was lighting the world on fire, you'd hear about it, right? And they have to report stuff and they need clicks too. I get it. I need clicks. We all need clicks, right? We're on YouTube for God's sakes. However, the fact that the reports are coming out so big time for Aiden, so confident in his ability to be smoking the defense. Apparently, he just looks like a different player than he did last year. And I don't know if I was predicting that he would develop, right? I was saying if he does develop, that's going to be huge for us. I just saw glimpses of a quarterback that if he could get better, could be a starter in this league. You know, when I look at quarterbacks in terms of evaluating how good they could be one day, I look at a few things. Can you throw the ball within the pocket under pressure? Can you make the right read? Can you be accurate? And look, at times, he didn't do those things last year. But there are some quarterbacks who never do those things. Bryce Young didn't do that once last year. Not to say he can't turn it around. Quarterbacks have been worse than him and ended up better than him, right? But last year, Aiden was able to make the right reads and throw some balls into some tight windows that not many quarterbacks in the league that are starters can do. That's just a fact. If you watch the film, or you hear people talk about it, that actually study how the game is played, they said Aiden O'Connell was making some throws last year that not many people could make. Coupled that with a lot of rookie mistakes, and you don't know what a ceiling is. Maybe he's already hit his ceiling, right? These are the discussions we need to talk about. Maybe how good he played last year was how good he's going to play forever, which means he's just a backup. And that's okay, too. But I said this, if he can come in and get bigger and stronger, and it's about his work ethic, if he has a work ethic, he will get better. You are never the best you can be, whether that's at your job, at a relationship, at cooking your favorite meal, at playing a sport, playing a video game, it doesn't matter. You literally are never the best you can be at something. Michael Jordan lost basketball games, right? If you strive to get better, and you have a work ethic, there's nothing that can stop you from getting better. So he showed me flashes, he showed me accuracy, and decision making, and arm strength, right? And confidence. And if he had a work ethic, and everything that we know about him, you know, eighth round rookie, walk on at Purdue, fought his way to star, play in the Big Ten Championship, blah, blah, blah. Everything, evidence-wise, told us that he does have a work ethic. The thing about it is, Gardner Minchu also has a good work ethic. It's just going to come down to who can perform better. And right now, day one OTAs, apparently the word is out that Aiden O'Connell is the guy. And we've come a long way from us signing Gardner Minchu, and saying, well, I guess he's going to be the stopgap for a few years, to now Aiden being the unquestioned starter. Now, if we go into the preseason and he sucks, we're going to have a separate discussion. But for right now, for all intents and purposes, the word is out. Aiden O'Connell is improving. The last thing I want to say real quick is, apparently the defense is also wreaking havoc in these offensive line drills. And I don't know if you guys have ever been athletes in your life, but you know there are times where you are running through plays in practice, whether it's football, basketball, baseball, whatever. I guess it's not plays in baseball, but you get it. Where you're running up a scheme and you're playing against the defense who knows what the play is, right? So you're kind of like, defense, kind of go easy here because you know the play, don't overjump, you know, the passing lanes or whatever, blah, blah, blah. I think that's what's happening in OTAs or in minicamp. We're running plays and the defense maybe knows it's coming, doesn't know it's coming. But the defense is like, we don't give a ---- if we know it's coming. If you know we know it's coming, we're going to play it as if we know it's coming and you got to beat us. And apparently, there was a healthy scrap today between Thayer Mumford and Max Crosby. And apparently, Luke Goetze has been telling the defensive line to chill out a little bit. And the defensive line has been like, no, we're coming. Like, the hardest defense you're going to have to play all season is the defense you play every week in practice. And that right there is how you are prepared to play anybody. Because I've coached a little bit of my life. I've coached basketball. And I've always told my kids this, the best way to prepare is when in practice, you go as hard as you possibly can, that when you play under the lights, Monday night football, it can't be any harder. You cannot be more pressured in a game than you are pressured in practice. And if the defensive line is disrupting practice at an obscene pace, you know, a pace that's far enough pushing the line before APS to step in and be like, guys, you got to let them run a play or two. That's exactly what I want to hear. People on the offense and defense getting after each other, going back and forth, getting in each other's faces, healthy competition. And then when that bell rings, we all come together and go, the reason we're all feeling this way and getting angry at each other is because it's so important for us to show that the hardest team the Raiders are going to play all year is themselves in practice and that the hardest team anybody else is going to play all year is the Raiders. And like I said, I just want to preface one last time. It is June 11, 2024. It is not September 1st or the 7th or whenever the first game is, right? It's not even the preseason. I'm sure when the preseason rolls around, we're going to have new levels of hype and despair and hyperbolic terms positively and negatively. But you just have to go off of what you're hearing right now. And what I'm hearing right now is that Michael Mayer's a stud. He cannot wait to show the offense off this year. Aidan O'Connell has taken the starting job by the reins. Dylan Laube is getting first team pass catching reps. And the defense is disrupting the offense at an egregious pace that it's pissing off the offense. And I love it because like I said, this offense is not going to face a harder defense than the defense that's right across from them every day at practice. And that is a recipe for winning football games. Anyway, guys, thank you so much for watching. Like I said, let's get to 10K before the season starts. Let's get to 8K before the month ends. Please be sure to subscribe. It is free after I'm no charge to you. I love you guys, and I'll see you next time.