HENDERSON, Nev. — Now that head coach Antonio Pierce finally put any speculation to rest and named Gardner Minshew the Las Vegas Raiders’ starting quarterback, what will the offense look like with Minshew at the helm?
Given Minshew’s scrambling skill set and ability to extend plays, expect a lot of held-breath moments, alongside run-heavy sets with multiple tight ends in rookie Brock Bowers and Michael Mayer. Plenty of play-action set up by feeding running back Zamir White. And short and intermediate strikes to wideouts Davante Adams and Jakobi Meyers as new offensive coordinator Luke Getsy continues installation of his version of the West Coast offense.
With the occasional deep ball.
Hey, the vertical game is in the Raiders’ DNA. Or did you miss Minshew’s 48-yard toss to speedy receiver Tre Tucker in Saturday night’s exhibition against the Dallas Cowboys?
Then there’s Minshew’s not-so-analytical traits.
“His personality is infectious, his energy is infectious, his leadership is infectious,” Pierce said.
So, what could stand some on-field improvement?
“Footwork in the pocket, staying on script,” Pierce said. “There is some magic about him when he does break the pocket and does his thing, but there’s a lot of times where if the first [or] second read is there, we’ve got to let it rip. So, he understands that. And more importantly, taking care of the football.”
In other words, Minshewmania has taken on a neon glow and is set to run wild in Sin City.
But how long will its residency last in a town with a voracious appetite for glitz and glamour, but not much patience for, well, limited payoffs? Raiders fans have been clamoring for a quarterback to tuck and run since Derek Carr suffered a broken right fibula in the penultimate game of the 2016 season.
“I’m super optimistic about what we’re going to be able to do as a team this year,” Minshew said before being named starter, “and just looking forward to this year, in general.”
In the preseason opener at the Minnesota Vikings, Minshew came off the bench and picked apart the defense with those short and midrange passes while keeping the Vikings honest with his legs.
Against the Dallas Cowboys on Saturday night, the 6-foot-1, 225-pound Minshew started and was more scattershot. Because while he did have that beautiful deep ball to Tucker, Minshew also misfired several times.
Throughout the offseason competition with second-year returner Aidan O’Connell, who is more of the prototypical pocket passer at 6-foot-3, 210 pounds, longtime Raiders observers could relate to a pseudo-2006 battle between the more mobile Marques Tuiasosopo and the more statuesque Andrew Walter.
And that did not excite many, if any, walking the streets of Silver and Blackdom.
Minshew, in two preseason games, passed for 212 yards and a touchdown in completing 16 of 33 attempts. He also had 12 yards rushing on two attempts.
O’Connell was a combined 21-29 for 172 yards and a TD but also had a pick-six and took a sack.
Given Pierce’s relationship and trust in O’Connell, whom he elevated to starter upon his promotion to interim coach on Nov. 1, it will be interesting to see how much rope Minshew is given.
There’s a reason Pierce, when announcing the decision, referred to Minshew giving the Raiders the best shot at starting fast in the “first quarter” of the season.
“Well, I do everything in sections,” Pierce said. “I mean, you’re going to look at the whole season, but we want to get off to a fast start, right? We’ve got two games on the road, two at home. That’s the first quarter of the season for us.”
The Raiders open at the Los Angeles Chargers before playing at the Baltimore Ravens in Week 2. Las Vegas then plays host to the Carolina Panthers and then the Cleveland Browns.
So if things are going sideways for the Raiders that early in the season, Pierce would have no qualms again rolling with O’Connell, whom he referred to as his “BFF” last season.
Still, the choice was made with the Raiders anticipating a fast start by Minshew.
Three times in his five-year career has Minshew started at least eight games in a single season. And he has gotten off to a relatively fast start in the first four starts of those respective seasons, passing for a combined 3,216 yards with 21 TDs and 9 INTs while completing 64.9% of his passes in those 12 games. He has also run the ball 38 times for 220 yards but has been sacked 38 times.
Extrapolate those early-season numbers to a 17-game schedule and Minshew projects to 4,556 passing yards, 30 TD passes and 13 INTs with 312 rushing yards and 54 sacks.
Still, his teams were just 4-8 in those games.
The wild card in all of this is Adams, a three-time first-team All-Pro who has yet to build chemistry with Minshew and seemed to be leaning toward O’Connell, referencing his accuracy in camp.
Consider: Adams “signed off” on the Raiders moving on from Jimmy Garoppolo last season in favor of O’Connell and built a rapport with the then-rookie. But then Adams was in and out of OTAs before attending the three-day mandatory minicamp. He also missed the final five practices of training camp in Costa Mesa, California, as well as the exhibition against the Vikings for the birth of his son before rejoining the team in Las Vegas for two practices.
But after saying he preferred not to play at all in the preseason, and before Pierce said all healthy starters would suit up against Dallas, Adams sat out Saturday’s game against the Cowboys as Pierce said Adams was “sore” after an “awkward movement” in practice. In short, Adams, who acknowledged a “few reps could help,” has not had much time with Minshew since he arrived but said in camp “conversations” were also important.
“And that’s kind of how [Aaron Rodgers] and I used to work [in Green Bay],” Adams said. “It wasn’t just about the reps that we had in practice, but it was about the communication, the film that we watched together and just going off of time and the different things like that that were equally as important as getting those on-the-field work.”
Pierce also said no starters would play in the Raiders’ exhibition finale Friday night against the San Francisco 49ers, so, no game reps to be had there, either.
Adams, though, is well versed in Getsy’s scheme from their time together in Green Bay. So they have that going for them, right?
“I don’t think anything here is a finished product,” Pierce said, “but based off of where we want to go in the first quarter of the season, we feel like Gardner gives us the best opportunity.”