The experience of being a Las Vegas Raiders fan has been quite the whirlwind these days, as if heading into a Week 17 “home game” against the streaking San Francisco 49ers wasn’t already stressful enough.
Of the many crisis management tasks for the Raiders public relations team this week, the latest has come from star wide receiver Davante Adams who has refused to make any commitment to the iconoic Silver and Black beyond the current 2022 season.
Yes, the All-Pro favorite of Aaron Rodgers who opted to leap from Green Bay to Vegas and reconnect with college teammate Derek Carr — who will be officially inactive against the 49ers — is now unsure of what’s next.
Here are the official words from Adams:
“I’m not going to sit here and go on and on, but obviously I support my guy. We’ve got to finish this season out the best way we can possible with all things considered at this point. Anything else that you guys got, you can leave that for coach or for Derek … I wouldn’t be here right now if he (Carr) wasn’t here. I think everybody knows how I feel about him.”
Las Vegas Raiders’ Davante Adams on Derek Carr being benched (H/T PFT)
To quickly recap before we get any further, it was announced Wednesday afternoon that quarterback Derek Carr would be taking a seat on Sunday in favor of backup Jarrett Stidham, who has never started an NFL game.
Shortly thereafter, it was announced that Carr would be taking a literal step further, and remove himself entirely from the Raiders for the final two games of the season.
The official reasoning has been listed as Carr not wanting to be a distraction to the team.
Related: Las Vegas Raiders’ Davante Adams and the NFL’s top WRs of 2022
Davante Adams’ words about Carr leaves Las Vegas Raiders with more questions to answer
The unofficial reasoning for Carr choosing to do such a thing is that his career with the Las Vegas Raiders has almost certainly come to a sad end, a mess that won’t be cleaned up any time soon.
When you have managed to pluck away one of the NFL’s best wide receivers who specifically chose your team in order to play with “former starter Derek Carr” instead of continuing his sprint to greatness with back-to-back NFL MVP Aaron Rodgers, it’s not just a problem, it’s a four-alarm fire with a full-blown reshuffling of the deck to follow.
From the coaching staff to the stars on their roster, there is no end in sight to what the Raiders will look like next season.
To put things rather bluntly, the alarming reality is the Las Vegas Raiders will head into Week 17 of the 2022 season with absolutely nothing to play for and with Chase Garbers serving as the team’s backup quarterback.
Garbers has yet to throw a pass in the NFL and his own Wikipedia page still has his roster status listed as “Practice Squad.”
With two games to play, the offseason work for a wildly deflated and defeated Raiders franchise has already started.