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Silver & Black’s Late January Ritual: Raiders Introduce New Head Coach Pete Carroll, General Manager John Spytek Monday

 

 


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    Story by Alan Snel     Photos by Hugh Byrne

LAS VEGAS, Nevada — New Raiders head coach Pete Carroll may be a 70-something, but he has Bruce Springsteen 70-something energy, an outgoing, jacked-up personality that was evident at his Monday morning presser he shared with freshly-minded Raiders GM John Spytek.

Raiders owner Mark Davis introduced both Carroll and Spytek to media at 11 AM today in the auditorium meeting room where Raiders players assemble for their game plans.

Carroll soaked up life outside the National Football League for the past year after he and the Seattle Seahawks parted ways a year ago. The energetic and relaxed 73-year-old expressed his enthusiasm for competing and the “next challenge.”

Carroll’s kicker on his age: “I don’t care how old you are.”

Raiders owner Mark Davis

“Next challenge” is a diplomatic way of the hurdle of turning around a once-proud NFL franchise that won only four of 17 games, including losing ten straight, during this 2024 season under former coach Antonio Pierce.

Through 18 years as an NFL coach with Seattle along with the Jets and Patriots Carroll racked up 181 wins, including a Super Bowl title with the Seahawks. Carroll spoke of “competition” throughout his comments and said he does things differently. He spiced the presser with humor and even Spytek observed that Carroll “crushed” the press conference.

Spytek comes from the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, where he was the assistant general manager. Spytek is a former University of Michigan teammate of Tom Brady, a Raiders minority owner who had an “integral” role in the selection process of Carroll and the new general manager. Brady and Spytek won a Super Bowl together when their Buccaneers defeated the Kansas City Chiefs in Super Bowl 55 in 2021.

Carroll last coached the Seattle Seahawks, where that team qualified for the National Football League playoffs ten times in 14 years. The Raiders have qualified for the playoffs two times in the past 21 years.

Raiders defensive star Maxx Crosby was there to greet Carroll and Spytek, while a runner who knew Carroll quite well in Seattle — Marshawn Lynch — was there, too.

It was Lynch who gave a “Raiders” scream during the presser.

 

 


 

Alan Snel: Alan Snel brings decades of sports-business reporting experience to LVSportsBiz.com. Snel covered the business side of sports for the South Florida (Fort Lauderdale) Sun-Sentinel, the Tampa Tribune and Las Vegas Review-Journal. As a city hall beat reporter, Snel also covered stadium deals in Denver and Seattle. In 2000, Snel launched a sport-business website for FoxSports.com called FoxSportsBiz.com. After reporting sports-business for the RJ, Snel wrote hard-hitting stories on the Raiders stadium for the Desert Companion magazine in Las Vegas and The Nevada Independent. Snel is also one of the top bicycle advocates in the country.
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