Raiders' Antonio Pierce has timeline for naming starting QB

Las Vegas Raiders head coach Antonio Pierce admitted before his club's preseason opener at the Minnesota Vikings this past Saturday that he probably won't have "a juggernaut offense" regardless of whether 2023 fourth-round draft pick Aidan O'Connell or journeyman Gardner Minshew wins the ongoing competition for the starting quarterback job.

Pierce sounds ready to declare the victor of that battle sooner rather than later.

As shared by Paul Gutierrez of ESPN, Pierce told reporters on Sunday he wants to announce his QB1 following this coming Saturday's exhibition matchup against the Dallas Cowboys.

"We've got to get ready to play football, and I think we've got enough film," Pierce explained. "We'll have two games here [by then] to evaluate both quarterbacks to see how they'll play."

O'Connell started what became a 24-23 loss to Minnesota and completed 7-of-9 pass attempts for 76 yards with no touchdowns or interceptions. Minshew, meanwhile, connected on 6-of-12 passes for 117 yards with a 20-yard touchdown. He also rushed for seven yards.

"I thought both guys were efficient," Pierce said about how his quarterbacks played against the Vikings. "...I thought they really did a good job of the operations. We did have one delay of game [penalty] with Gardner that we need to clean up, but I thought Aidan did a really good job from being backed up down in the red zone."

O'Connell went 5-5 as a starter during his rookie season that featured Pierce becoming the Raiders' interim head coach in early November. Per multiple reports, the 25-year-old seemingly went into Saturday holding a slight lead in the competition over Minshew, who signed with the Raiders this past March and who may be seen by Pierce as little more than a "Band-Aid" option at the sport's most important position.

Las Vegas explored moving up from the 13th pick of the 2024 NFL Draft with a young signal-caller in mind but ultimately discovered that the Chicago Bears, Washington Commanders and New England Patriots had little interest in moving out of the top three selections. In total, six quarterbacks were drafted before the Raiders landed tight end Brock Bowers with pick No. 13.

As of Monday morning, DraftKings Sportsbook listed Minshew as the betting favorite at -130 odds to start over O'Connell (+100) for the Raiders' Week 1 game at the Los Angeles Chargers on Sept. 8. 

Unless one of those two individuals becomes a revelation for Las Vegas between the third Saturday of August and early January, the Raiders could continue to be linked by some with Dallas Cowboys star Dak Prescott assuming Prescott remains in the final year of his contract through the end of the 2024 season.