The Oakland Raiders have some major free agent issues after a number of their players left for new teams and now names like Knowshon Moreno, Justin Tuck, LaMarr Woodley, Julius Peppers, Michael Vick, Jared Allen and Ben Tate are the top targets after Darren McFadden returned, while Lamarr Houston, Jared Veldheer and Roger Saffold are now gone and now Justin Tuck has signed with the Raiders.
The Saffold deal never got completed after the lineman failed his physical reportedly and now the team is scrambling to recover after losing Veldheer to the Arizona Cardinals. Reggie McKenzie came into the offseason with a record amount of cap space and now that one deal has fallen through and McFadden is back on a one-year deal, McKenzie has to get things back on track, as he has also lost Rashad Jennings and Lamarr Houston.
Justin Tuck and Jared Allen are solid options on the defensive line and LaMarr Woodley also came into for a visit with the team and those areas are two needs for the Raiders defense. Houston appeared to be the most important player to re-sign, but instead McKenzie let him go to the Chicago Bears and now the focus is on Tuck and other names like Allen and Woodley. McKenzie needs to get past the Saffold fiasco, and it is a fiasco, as the team was hoping Saffold could replace Veldheer and now they need to find someone else to come in and take over.
On defense, Tuck could be a very nice option, as he is still productive despite his age and with Peppers on the market as well, he could come in cheaper. Tuck put up 11 sacks last season and that beat out the nine he had over the last two years before that and while the Giants could like to keep him, they are letting Tuck test the market. Allen is on the older side as well but he is very consistent and he had 11 sacks or more in each of his seasons with the Vikings. Woodley was released by the Steelers and he is younger than both players and while he had nearly 60 sacks with the Steelers, he had just five last season and now will have something to prove and the team desperately needs to bring someone in to make up for the loss of Houston.
According to ESPN.com, what happened to Saffold was that he failed his physical and the Raiders may have had a reason they wanted that to happen, as they overpaid him on a five-year, $42.5 million deal, with $21 million guaranteed. The report says that the team may have had "buyer's remorse" after losing Veldheer, meaning they had an interest in having him fail his physical. The team has Khalif Barnes and Menelik Watson, but they need to do more and the offensive line plays into the running game, as the team lost Rashad Jennings to the Giants already as well.
The Raiders have gone 4-12 the past two seasons and with a top five pick and plenty of cap space they have room to make moves, but with players getting signed left and right, McKenzie needs to start getting deals done.
