Rising Raiders rookie turning heads in 2026 OTAs

Not long ago, NFL scouts were penciling McCoy in as a legitimate top-10 pick. The 6’1″, 188-pound cornerback out of Tennessee had the size, athleticism, and coverage skills that teams covet at the position. Bleacher Report’s NFL Scouting Department ranked him 11th overall on their final big board, a distinction that carried real weight heading into draft season.

Then came the injury news that sent his stock into freefall.

McCoy missed the entire 2025 college season with an ACL tear, which had already built some caution into his draft profile. But the real damage came during draft week itself, when reports emerged suggesting he might need additional surgery on that same knee. Teams that had him circled in the first round began to back off. Others crossed him off entirely. By the time the fourth round rolled around, McCoy was still on the board, and the Raiders pounced, selecting him 101st overall.

It was a high-risk, high-reward swing. The kind of move that either looks brilliant in two years or gets quietly forgotten. Based on early OTA returns, it’s trending sharply toward the former.

A Freak of Nature Takes the Field

When a player comes off a major knee injury, especially one with reported concerns about further surgery, you watch their movement closely. You look for hesitation, for the subtle ways a player protects a limb they don’t fully trust. That’s exactly what Silver & Black Sports Network’s Jesse Merrick was doing when he watched McCoy at the start of OTAs.

He didn’t find what he was looking for.

“Anybody that’s been around athletes knows this, and all these guys that play are athletes, but you can just tell how springy guys are and the way they walk,” Merrick said during an appearance on the JT the Brick Show. “And you watch [McCoy] and you’re just like, ‘Yeah, I can tell he’s a freak of nature athlete.'”

Merrick went further, saying that without prior knowledge of McCoy’s knee history, you simply wouldn’t pick it up watching him move on the field. “If you had no idea that he had this knee problem, you wouldn’t notice it out there on the field,” he said. The Raiders are understandably keeping him on a pitch count and managing his workload, but the early impressions are everything you’d want to see from a player with his question marks.

For a franchise in rebuilding mode, that kind of buzz around a fourth-round pick matters. The Raiders don’t have the luxury of hoping mid-round selections develop slowly. They need players who can push for roster spots and potentially contribute sooner rather than later.

If McCoy’s knee holds up and he continues to flash the elite athleticism that made him a consensus top-15 talent on draft boards, Las Vegas will have pulled off one of the draft’s great heists. The Raiders may have posted the league’s worst record last year, but right now, with McCoy turning heads in OTAs, they’re looking like pirates.