The Raiders made sweeping changes to their organization on Halloween, firing head coach Josh McDaniels and general manager Dave Ziegler after the team's poor 3-5 start to the season.
Those changes continued into Wednesday. Offensive coordinator Mick Lombardi was also let go while veteran quarterback Jimmy Garoppolo was benched in favor of rookie Aidan O'Connell.
O'Connell, a fourth-round rookie out of Purdue, has made one start for the Raiders this season and looked good doing so. He completed 65.1 percent of his passes for 313 yards and one touchdown but did toss two interceptions.
Nonetheless, O'Connell showed the developmental traits needed to become a solid starting quarterback. As such, the Raiders are giving him time to develop on the field and will likely use the rest of the 2023 NFL season — or at least part of it — to see what he can do at quarterback.
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But why did the Raiders make the move now? Here's what went into the decision to bench the Raiders' big offseason acquisition in favor of an exciting — albeit unproven — rookie.
Why did the Raiders bench Jimmy Garoppolo?
The Raiders benched Garoppolo for a simple reason. He simply wasn't performing well in his first season with the team.
In six starts, Garoppolo has posted a respectable 3-3 record while completing 65.5 percent of his passes for 1,205 yards and seven touchdowns. Those numbers may look fine, but they don't tell the whole story.
Garoppolo has struggled with his accuracy and turnovers throughout the season. He leads the NFL with nine interceptions — despite missing two games due to injury — and he has thrown at least one pick in each of his six starts.
One only has to look to the Raiders' "Monday Night Football" loss to the Lions to see the story of his season. He has frequently stared down his receivers and made poor decisions about throwing the ball to well-covered receivers. That was how Kerby Joseph intercepted him in the end-zone on Monday night.
— NFL (@NFL) October 31, 2023.@Lions intercept it on the very next play!
📺: #LVvsDET on ESPN/ABC
📱: Stream on #NFLPlus https://t.co/3b1HZU34bs pic.twitter.com/IvwzicmMPA
Meanwhile, Garoppolo has routinely overthrown wide-open receivers as well. In particular, he has struggled to connect with Davante Adams and brutally missed him twice on deep balls that could have been touchdowns.
As open as you can be and Jimmy Garoppolo overthrows Davante Adams pic.twitter.com/0R6Nr5Og3C
— Tanner Phifer (@TannerPhiferNFL) October 31, 2023
Those misses are part of the reason that Adams demonstrated extreme frustration on the sidelines and spiked his helmet at the end of the game.
So, it's clear that Garoppolo isn't the player that McDaniels and Co. had hoped when they acquired him to replace Derek Carr.
Now, with McDaniels and offensive coordinator Mick Lombardi gone, Aidan O'Connell will get a chance to make his second start of the season.
But why did the Raiders decide it was a good time to make the move to the rookie?
"He’s our best QB," a Raiders source told NFL's Ian Rapoport when asked about the switch to O'Connell.
So, it appears that the Raiders are done trusting Jimmy G. Unless he can win back the starting job and prove himself again, then he will likely end up looking for yet another new team during the 2024 NFL offseason.
MORE:Why the Raiders fired Josh McDaniels, explained
Jimmy Garoppolo contract
Garoppolo signed a three-year, $72.75 million contract with the Raiders during the 2023 NFL offseason in the hopes of becoming the team's franchise quarterback. His reunion with Josh McDaniels didn't go as planned, so now, the question becomes whether Garoppolo will remain with the team beyond this season.
That said, the way that Garoppolo's deal is structured will make it hard for the team to release him in 2024. They would get only $199,000 in cap relief by doing so; as such, the benefits of releasing Garoppolo are minimal.
The Raiders could try to shop Garoppolo and hope that a quarterback-needy team like the Patriots would jump at the chance to acquire the veteran. But barring that, the team may need to get comfortable with the idea of keeping him in 2024 or trying to restructure his contract to make it easier to trade him.
Below is a look at Garoppolo's three-year deal and how much cap savings the Raiders could get by cutting him each season.
(Note: This contract contains void years. So, some of Garoppolo's guaranteed money will count against the salary cap in 2026 and 2027 despite the fact that he is not under contract for those campaigns.)
| Year | Base salary | Bonuses | Cap hit | Dead cap hit | Cap savings (if cut) |
| 2023 | $1,165,000 | $5,567,000 | $6,732,000 | $55,305,000 | -$27,018,000 |
| 2024 | $11,250,000 | $17,267,000 | $28,517,000 | $28,318,000 | $199,000 |
| 2025 | $22,500,000 | $6,017,000 | $28,517,000 | $12,801,000 | $15,716,000 |
| 2026 | — | $4,267,000 | $8,534,000 | $8,534,000 | $0 |
| 2027 | — | $4,267,000 | $4,267,000 | — | -$4,267,000 |
By 2025, the Raiders will be able to move on from Garoppolo while taking a $12.8 million dead-cap hit and saving $15.7 million. That figures to be the latest point at which the Raiders would consider jettisoning him from the team.
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Regardless of whether Garoppolo is on the team next season, this deal isn't looking like a good one. Perhaps if O'Connell emerges as a quality starter that will help to ease the Raiders' pain, but certainly, having a player making an average of $24.25 million on the bench is not the way to successfully build an NFL contender.
