What exactly are the Las Vegas Raiders doing in free agency?
Liz Loza & Charles Robinson discuss the curious case of the Las Vegas Raiders in the first week of free agency. After moving on from two starters on the offensive line and adding the always controversial Kenyan Drake, Liz & Charles try to figure out what this means for Josh Jacobs and the rest of the 2021 Raiders team. Hear the full conversation on the Yahoo Fantasy Football Forecast. Subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you listen.
Video Transcript
LIZ LOZA: I will just say that John Brown reminds me of my toddler in the toy aisle at Target, like any new shiny thing she wants. Like mommy, I want that. Mommy-- and I was like, yo, we're here to buy, you know, soap. We're not here to buy toys. We got to stick with the plan.
And I just think that he gets so excited that-- and, you know, he's got this giant contract. So it's not like he's going to get fired anytime soon. So he has the freedom to be impulsive.
Kenyan Drake, two years, $11 million. I've never been a Drake truther because I'd like to see him perform outside of the month of December. And we saw that bear out in Arizona last year.
I think this is really a story about Josh Jacobs because, you know, heading into the year, into 2020, there were made-- Mike Mayock made a comment, I believe at the combine, that was like, oh, Josh Jacobs is going to take his leap as a pass catcher. We're going to see that evolution.
And, you know, there was a debate about whether it was coach speak or not. And, in fact, Josh Jacobs did start to catch more balls. He cleared 30 catches, in fact, in 2020. Now they add a pass catching running back. So it feels like there's a bit of a regression here for Jacobs.
Jacobs also has an injury history. He was never the starter at Alabama, right? That was Damien Harris. But he flashed. There was questions about heading, you know, into the draft, whether he could handle a full workload.
He has shown an incredible toughness. He's played through a million nagging injuries. And I think he, you know, was active for 15 games last year.
So he's played through all these injuries, but I'm wondering if this addition, and this is giving the Raiders the benefit of the doubt here, is because they're seeing the wear and tear on Josh Jacobs sooner than they were anticipating. Regardless for fantasy, it takes both of them.
CHARLES ROBINSON: Two running backs who have a history of being banged up, I guess, apparently equals one running back.
