The Las Vegas Raiders made a big change this offseason in an attempt to change their fortunes, hiring longtime Seattle Seahawks head coach Pete Carroll to come in and change the culture in Sin City.
Carroll's attitude and energy is already permeating the building in Las Vegas as training camp winds down and the focus begins to narrow on the start of the regular season, but it didn't take long in the offseason for the former Super Bowl Champion head coach to start bringing in his guys to set the standard.
The biggest of those additions, of course, was quarterback Geno Smith. The Raiders acquired the veteran signal caller, fresh off of a successful couple of seasons in Seattle, in a trade this offseason.
Smith spot as the starting quarterback is safe in the silver and black, but what the team looks like around him is still a work in progress. Las Vegas has a pair of young cornerstones to build around on offense in Ashton Jeanty and Brock Bowers, but there are still some holes on the defensive side of the football.
At the moment, the Raiders have a rough idea of what the starting group could look like heading into Week 1 against the New England Patriots in Week 1 on Sept. 7. However, nothing is set in stone. Here are a pair of players who could be surpassed on the depth chart between now and the season opener.
DT Jonah Laulu
Jonah Laulu is listed as a starter coming into his second season after making seven starts for the Raiders in 2024. The Oklahoma product was a seventh-round pick in the 2024 NFL Draft, and now it looks like Pete Carroll will be relying on him a lot coming into 2025 to eat some snaps in the middle.
Laulu should be able to do just that, but Tyree Wilson could give the Raiders a lot more upside from that spot especially on passing downs. Wilson was originally drafted as an edge rusher with the No. 7 overall pick in the 2023 NFL Draft, but he has been getting a lot of reps on the inside this preseason.
Wilson is listed at 6-foot-5, 263 pounds and is an explosive athlete with great strength. He hasn't been able to find consistent production so far in his career, but maybe Carroll is the coach he needs to be able to do just that.
The Raiders already have a pair of standouts at defensive end in Maxx Crosby and Malcolm Koonce, so there is no room for Wilson to earn a starting job on the outside. However, keep an eye out on him getting some interior reps against pass-heavy teams or on late downs ahead of someone like Laulu.
LB Devin White
When the Tampa Bay Buccaneers won the Super Bowl back in 2021, Devin White looked like a future superstar at linebacker. The tandem of him and Lavonte David was one of the best in all of football, and the former LSU star was viewed as one of the best young players in the league at his position.
Since then, things haven't gone how White would have envisioned. Tampa Bay let him go following the 2023 season and he landed with the Houston Texans in 2024, but made just seven appearances with one start. White wasn't very productive during that time, finishing as PFF's 141st-ranked linebacker against the run out of 189 players. He was better in coverage, but is essentially a sub-package player due to his inability to stop the ground game.
If the Raiders are going to play three linebackers, and the third is going to be primarily a coverage defender next to Elandon Roberts and Germaine Pratt, why not give Jamal Adams a look?
Adams is a converted safety who is now listed as an outside linebacker with the Raiders, and he has plenty of familiarity with Carroll's system dating back to his time with the Seattle Seahawks. He has struggled in coverage a bit in recent years as injuries have taken some of his explosiveness away, but playing closer to the line of scrimmage should hide some of those limitations and let him be a downhill player.
Playing Adams at linebacker especially in sub packages would give the Raiders some more athleticism and better instinctive play, which it will need to compete in the loaded AFC West division. As a result, this is a switch that would make a lot of sense before Week 1.
