Comments from Josh McDaniels should make fans feel better about Raiders' draft plans
The Las Vegas Raiders have the No. 7 pick in the 2023 NFL Draft
The Las Vegas Raiders need a quarterback after moving on from Derek Carr earlier this offseason.
Las Vegas has the No. 7 pick in the 2023 NFL Draft. With four quarterbacks potentially going in the top 10, the Raiders could have some tough draft decisions to make.
After recent comments from Raiders head coach Josh McDaniels, Las Vegas fans shouldn't be concerned about the team reaching for the wrong quarterback.
At least one of the four quarterbacks that's expected to go in the top 10 (Bryce Young, CJ Stroud, Anthony Richardson, and Will Levis) will be a bust. It almost always happens.
The Raiders, like any other quarterback-needy team in the top 10, are at risk of making the wrong selection.
But fortunately for Vegas, McDaniels has been around long enough that he knows reaching for a quarterback just because they're flying off the board is a bad idea.
And it's not a mistake the Raiders are going to make.
“There aren’t five quarterbacks among the top 10 players in the draft,” said McDaniels to The Athletic. “There never is. There never is. So if you’re taking the fourth or fifth one, you better have liked that player a whole lot to begin with. You can’t just say you’re going to take the fifth quarterback and he’s going to be the seventh-best player in the nation. That’s unlikely, and history has proven that to not be a good formula."
“We’re not going to let anybody else determine how we feel about those players,” added McDaniels. “We’re going to evaluate the quarterbacks, period."
Some of the worst draft decisions happen when a team feels pressed to address a certain position. It sounds like the Raiders are well aware of the pitfalls of that approach. And they won't be making the same mistake that so many other franchises have made in past drafts.
