Oakland Raiders head coach Jon Gruden came under harsh criticism last year when he dealt star pass rusher Khalil Mack to the Chicago Bears, but recently, the MIT Sloan Sports Analytics Conference said that the trade was the best in professional sports in 2018.
The Raiders landed a pair of first-round draft picks in the deal and cleared money to make some big moves this offseason, but Gruden is still being ripped for the deal until this day.
However, Gruden says that the monster offseason that Oakland has had justifies his trade of Mack last year:
“If we did come up with the money to make the [Mack] contract happen last year, we wouldn’t have any of these men we’re talking about now,” Gruden said, according to Peter King of NBC Sports. “We would not have [tackle] Trent Brown. We would not have [receiver] Antonio Brown. We wouldn’t have [safety] Lamarcus Joyner. We wouldn’t have [linebacker] Vontaze Burfict and we wouldn’t have [receiver] Tyrell Williams. And we wouldn’t have the three first-rounders that we’re talking about.”
There are a lot of ways one can look at this, but the fact of the matter is that Mack is no longer with the Raiders and that there is a lot of excitement surrounding Oakland heading into the 2019 campaign.
Will the trade be worth it in the long run? It remains to be seen, but the Raiders probably would have at least been able to trade for Antonio Brown even if they didn't deal Mack.
We also have to see what Oakland does with the pair of first-rounders it received in the trade.
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