Las Vegas won’t shy away from taking a running back
Less than a week out from the 2025 NFL Draft, one of the most popular mock-draft connections is between the Las Vegas Raiders and Boise State running back Ashton Jeanty. The Raiders are in desperate need of offensive playmakers and don’t have anybody of note at running back, while Jeanty is considered arguably the most explosive playmaker in the draft. So on a certain level, it makes sense.
But Jeanty is also a running back, and there are natural questions that arise when it comes to using a high draft pick — No. 6 overall — on a running back. But new general manager John Spytek doesn’t seem like one of the people that buys into that particular train of thought.
“I’m going to be careful about talking about any specific player, but more broadly to the running back question: We just saw Saquon Barkley change the Eagles in one year,” Spytek said, via The Athletic. “Now, they had a great team around him and added an elite player. And I think where we sit, the idea is to add elite players at any position. I don’t try to devalue any certain position. … There’s certain ways to build a team, and I don’t know where we got to a place where we don’t feel like running backs are valuable.”
The key part of Spytek’s answer there should be the fact that the Eagles had a great team around Barkley before adding him to the mix. We saw what it looked like when Barkley — as good a running back as there is in the NFL — was on a team that did not have the requisite talent to make him look like the superstar he is.
And that’s kind of the position the Raiders are in right now; they don’t have the elite roster to make a star back really shine. They have other needs that are far more pressing, at positions where players can make a far greater impact on their ability to win games. But Spytek cautioned that needs aren’t always static, and that you have to balance drafting for need with taking the best player on the board.
“It’s a combination of both,” Spytek said. “Certainly, we have to take into mind places that we’re not as deep at, at certain positions. And, also, we have opportunities to add really good players, too, whether we think we need that player or not. From my experience, there’s two things: If you start forcing players because you need them, you end up regretting that, and you also can’t have enough good players at certain positions, too.
“Sometimes what doesn’t feel like a need right now becomes a need after one or two injuries during the season, and then you’re thankful you took this really good player. At the end of the day, we’re going to combine all of that along with character and injury data and we’re going to have a cool stack set up and we’re going to pick the best player available.”
Whomever they end up drafting with their first pick next week, whether that’s a running back or a player at another position, the Raiders will still need to add a whole lot of talent beyond that player if they want to compete with the three playoff teams from their division. They’d be wise to lean into the premium positions if they want to quickly close that gap.
