The Raiders Will Soon Lay the Foundation's Next Layer

The Next Step

The Raiders' 3-14 campaign that led to Pete Carroll's firing and Las Vegas cleaning house among its coaching staff may be classified as a failure on paper. However, if the 2025 season went any differently than it did, Las Vegas would still be on its quarterback carousel.

Las Vegas landing the No. 1 pick in the NFL Draft and likely securing Fernando Mendoza made the 2025 season worth it. In a round about way, that is a solid year one for Spytek. His second season as the Raiders' general manager gives him a chance to add the next layer of the Raiders' rebuild.

Spytek enters his second season as a general manager with $100 million in cap space and four first-round draft picks between this year's NFL Draft and next year's, plus many other picks. Any general manager would love to have those types of resources, especially early in their tenure with a team.

Spytek inherited more roster problems than many first-time general managers would like to walk into. He took on a job that many others have failed at in recent memory. He now has all the necessary tools to fix mistakes that were made long before he arrived but have still plagued Las Vegas' roster.

Next season will be another step in the Raiders' turnaround, which is expected to take several seasons. However, year two under Spytek is a pivotal part of that rebuild. Las Vegas must have a productive draft and free agency period and secure multiple players who will be around for a while.

Spytek recently explained how last season's draft class was the first step in Las Vegas' turnaround. It was far from pretty, but the 2025 Raiders and everything that happened helped set up the next era of Raiders football nicely. Spytek knows that both the good and bad are a part of the rebuild.

"It's a testament to our scouts and the work that they do to build it the right way, to find the right kind of human first, and that's why I keep saying, you guys that are in Vegas with us, I believe in those guys. They're about the right things,” Spytek said at the NFL Combine.

“That was really important to me for the first draft that I had a chance to run in Las Vegas, that we find the right kind of people because we're playing the long game here, and I'm betting on the growth that those guys will have because they're about the right things."