3 cut candidates on the Raiders' roster bubble entering 2021 training camp

The Oakland Raiders will have to cut down their roster after 2021 training camp and these 3 players could be victims of it.

The Las Vegas Raiders are at a crossroads. After an 8-8 season last year, head coach Jon Gruden and general manager Mike Mayock likely view their team as a potential playoff contender. They're likely the only ones who think of the Raiders as a playoff team, which makes it hard to tell what Vegas will do with the rest of the offseason. The midsummer market of free agents is about to begin as teams start cutting players in order to clear cap space, and it's hard to tell if the Raiders will be making those same cuts or trying to scoop up veterans to try for that elusive playoff appearance. Either way, Las Vegas will be getting rid of some players, either to clear up some cap space or clear playing time for younger guys.

Here are three potential cut candidates for the Raiders.

Nevin Lawson

The Raiders seem to have taken the volume strategy with their secondary, flooding the cornerback and safety positions with tons of high-value draft picks. All of those picks have forced Nevin Lawson out of playing time. Lawson played an important depth role last season, seeing some time in the wake of Damon Arnette's injury. But the Raiders signed Rasul Douglas and Casey Hayward in the offseason, pushing Lawson down to the fifth corner on the depth chart. It seems unlikely that Lawson sees the field in 2021 unless there's significant injuries to his position. The Raiders might as well cut him and save themselves the one million dollar cap hit, as he doesn't have any trade value.

Theo Riddick

While the rest of the NFL seems to be swaying away from paying running backs, the Raiders are headed in the opposite direction. They invested a first-round pick in Josh Jacobs and just signed Kenyan Drake as the highest-paid backup running back in the league. Jalen Richard is also still on the roster, getting paid three million dollars. There is absolutely no reason why Theo Riddick should be on the Raiders. Las Vegas has so many other holes around the roster that need to be addressed. They can't afford to pay a fourth-string running back anything, much less 1.1 million dollars. Riddick should be cut immediately, as he has no trade value.

Jalen Richard

Here's where the aforementioned Richard comes in. The Southern Mississippi product has been on the Raiders since 2016 but has never posted over 500 rushing yards in a single season. His best year came in 2018, where Richard notched around 800 all-purpose yards. The Raiders clearly didn't want to increase his workload, as they drafted Josh Jacobs in that time frame.

If Richard was playing a significant amount of snaps, his three million dollar contract would be justifiable. Unfortunately, the Raiders just signed Drake to a big deal. Drake will take pretty much all of Richard's snaps, so it just doesn't make any sense for him to remain on the team. He has no role left and is just eating into the cap space. It's extremely unlikely that anyone is willing to offer anything for him, so a trade is off the table. Richard should be a free agent by the time training camp rolls around.