Decisions the Raiders Should Regret 1 Week After Trade Deadline

The Las Vegas Raiders enter the second half of the season with their most promising win of the season. After firing Josh McDaniels, the team rallied around interim head coach Antonio Pierce to beat the Giants 30-6.

The win came just five days after the Raiders decided to sit out the trade deadline, which is something they could come to regret.

While the Raiders have some pieces to win right now, there was some anticipation that they would be sellers at the deadline. There were also at least a few players they could have targeted that would have made sense based on the current construction of the roster.

Instead, the franchise chose to be ideal at the deadline.

In some ways, it made sense for a team with as much turbulence as the Raiders have had to sit it out. But that doesn't mean there weren't opportunities that were lost.

Here are three regrets they should have just one week after the trade deadline.

Not Firing Josh McDaniels Sooner

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Josh McDaniels

On one hand, there are some franchises who probably move on from their head coach too quickly. We see some of the most successful franchises in the league are the ones who have continuity year-after-year at the top.

On the other, it's hard to ignore just how different this team looked against the Giants playing for Antonio Pierce after the Raiders fired Josh McDaniels last week.

"We've got a new leader right now," Davante Adams said, per Paul Gutierrez of ESPN, "and it's somebody that we can get behind and somebody that played the game. So it makes it a lot easier for us to connect with him, because he understands the mind of a player and he's done a really good job just making sure we understand that it's not about him -- it's about this team. It's about us figuring it out and getting behind him, obviously."

In a league where every team has NFL-caliber talent and most games are decided by just a handful of plays, culture matters. Having a leader that a team believes in matters.

It's pretty clear based on the way this team has played and the way they responded when McDaniels was gone that the former Patriots offensive coordinator was not that leader.

With the franchise also parting ways with Dave Ziegler, the Raiders went into the trade deadline with a lame-duck duo at the front of the organization. That's not the best way to approach the trade deadline.

It's better late than never, but the Raiders clearly had to make the move. It just would have been better if it were a few weeks earlier.

Not Finding a Home for Hunter Renfrow

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CHICAGO, IL - OCTOBER 22: Wide receiver Hunter Renfrow #13 of the Las Vegas Raiders warms up prior to an NFL football game against the Chicago Bears at Soldier Field on October 22, 2023 in Chicago, IL. (Photo by Todd Rosenberg/Getty Images)

While a lot of things looked different for the Raiders in their first game with Pierce as coach, there was one thing that didn't. Hunter Renfrow was still not super involved in the offense.

The 27-year-old saw just three targets, turning them into two catches for 32 yards. On the season he has just 12 receptions for 124 yards on 19 targets. He's on pace for just 234 yards on the season and has yet to score a touchdown.

With Jakobi Meyers on the roster, there isn't much space for Renfrow to grow into the kind of role he had when he went for 103 receptions for 1,038 yards and nine touchdowns in 2021.

The Raiders will continue to pay Renfrow like he can put up those numbers, though. Renfrow carries a $13.1 million cap hit this season and another $13.7 million next season. They can release him and only carry a dead cap charge of $5.5 million, but getting something for him now and moving on would have been ideal.

Ian Rapoport of NFL Media noted that the Saints and Raiders were "very close" to a Renfrow trade that would have reunited the receiver with Derek Carr in New Orleans.

That's a trade that would have brought the Raiders an additional draft pick in addition to added cap flexibility. Given Renfrow's role, that's a no-brainer that they'll regret passing on.

Not Trading for CB Jaylon Johnson

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CHICAGO, IL - OCTOBER 22: Cornerback Jaylon Johnson #33 of the Chicago Bears heads for the end zone after intercepting a pass intended for Wide receiver Davante Adams #17 of the Las Vegas Raiders during an NFL football at Soldier Field on October 22, 2023 in Chicago, Illinois. (Photo by Todd Rosenberg/Getty Images)

There was a lot of talk about the Raiders being sellers at the deadline. With tradeable assets in Davante Adams, Hunter Renfrow, Austin Hooper and Josh Jacobs among others, there was more speculation about who they could trade away than who they could bring in.

But with Sunday's win, this is still a team that is flirting with .500 and a coach who is fighting to win the job permanently.

Becoming buyers and trading for a player who could be part of the long-term vision should have been on the table. Specifically, it would have been wise to target Chicago Bears cornerback Jaylong Johnson.

The Raiders got a front row seat to what the 24-year-old can do in Week 7. He picked off Aidan O'Connell twice, including a pick-six. He's giving up a passer rating of just 53.6 and is proving to be a cornerback worthy of a big contract in free agency in 2024.

Cornerback happens to be one of the biggest positions of need for the Raiders. Amik Robertson is having a great year so trading for Johnson and giving him a long-term contract would have solved a huge problem for the Raiders.

They could still sign him as a free agent but outbidding everyone on the open market could be more costly than trading for him and getting a more exclusive setting to negotiate.