Raiders' Pete Carroll, Geno Smith experiment is not working

You probably did not have many expectations for the Las Vegas Raiders coming into the 2025 season. It is an organization that won just four games a year ago and has made the playoffs just one time in the previous eight years. It is not exactly a franchise that demands respect or preseason hype. 

But do you know who did have expectations for them this season? The Raiders themselves. Not necessarily because of anything they said about their expectations, but because of the moves they made. 

You do not trade a third-round draft pick for a 35-year-old quarterback (Geno Smith) if you are not intending to compete right now. You do not hire a 74-year-old head coach (Pete Carroll) if you are not intending to compete right now. You do not draft a running back (Ashton Jeanty), a position with the shortest shelf-life in the NFL, in the first round if you are not intending to compete right now. 

Those are not long-term rebuilding moves. Despite a series of compete-now moves, the Raiders find themselves at 2-7 after Thursday's ugly 10-7 loss to the Denver Broncos.

Raiders offseason plan is failing ... badly

Pretty much every major move Las Vegas has made this offseason is in the process of failing, and failing spectacularly.

Smith seems like he has aged 10 years in one offseason, and has already thrown 12 interceptions this season and is leading an offense that was averaging just 194 passing yards per game entering play on Thursday (24th in the NFL) and just 16.5 points per game (29th in the NFL). Both of those averages are only going to drop after Thursday's dismal showing. 

The Raiders did not do Smith any favors by giving him a sub-par wide receiver group that was headlined by Jakobi Meyers, a player that did not want to be there from the start of the season and was eventually traded. 

Carroll, at one time one of the best coaches in the NFL during his time with the Seattle Seahawks, seems like a coach that has seen the game pass him by. They used a top-10 pick on the best running back in the class, but surrounded him with an offensive line that is simply not creating any rushing lanes or holes for him, limiting him to under four yards per carry. 

And that is just the problems on offense. They also have a defense that was allowing more than 26 points per game entering play on Thursday.  

The hope with Carroll was that he could help make them a tougher defensive team with the type of powerful running game that he won so many games with in Seattle. They have accomplished none of it, and now they are headed for another lost season that is going to leave them entering the offseason with significant long-term holes and questions at all of the same key positions they have had for years.