Rost: Why Pete Carroll is the coach the Las Vegas Raiders need
Jan 24, 2025, 10:12 AM | Updated: 12:21 pm
This isn’t a Seattle Seahawks story, but it’s a story every fan of the team cares about: Pete Carroll was reportedly hired Friday morning as head coach of the Las Vegas Raiders.
At 73 years old, he will become the oldest head coach in NFL history, surpassing a record previously held by Romeo Crennel, who last coached for the Texans in 2020.
Pete Carroll returns to NFL as Las Vegas Raiders coach, per report
And it’s probably because of that — and a somewhat middling end to his illustrious career in Seattle — that he wasn’t seen as a front-runner this coaching cycle. That role is typically reserved for a young, hotshot offensive coordinator on a contending team, and that was indeed who was hired to coach the Chicago Bears: 38-year-old former Lions OC Ben Johnson, who was also heavily sought after last season before deciding to remain with Detroit (Johnson was also linked to the Raiders during their coaching search).
Instead, the Raiders go the opposite direction: an older, far more experienced defensive mind. Carroll isn’t the shiny new toy Johnson is, but he’s what the Raiders need.
How Pete Carroll and Raiders fit together
The Raiders aren’t on the verge of becoming a Super Bowl team. They don’t have a young quarterback to mold like another team looking for a coach, the Jacksonville Jaguars, have with Trevor Lawrence. Nor are they favorites in their division.
In fact, the Raiders haven’t finished first in the AFC West since 2002. They have just two playoff appearances since then, both wild card losses. Those are also their only two seasons in that span with double-digit wins. They’ve had a different leading passer in each of the last three seasons and are on their third head coach during that same time. Since their last Super Bowl appearance (2002), they’ve had 13 different head coaches, including interim hires. Carroll becomes the 14th. The Raiders don’t need a brilliant offensive mind to turn them into the Chiefs; they need a man obsessed with winning to build them a culture.
Will a Pete Carroll and Russell Wilson reunion happen now in Vegas?
Say what you will about the defensive struggles of Carroll’s Seahawks team over the last several years of his tenure in Seattle (it was certainly a part of his demise there). His Seahawks missed the playoffs in two of his final three seasons and had fallen from the level of dominance they’d once firmly established. There are consequences to not meeting a high bar (for goodness sakes, even the Eagles’ Nick Sirianni was on the hot seat earlier this season).
There were questions about Carroll’s loyalty to certain players and his willingness to hang onto underperforming coordinators too long. But Carroll built a winning franchise. He shifted a culture from a four-win team in 2008 to a Super-Bowl winning powerhouse in five years. And he did it with a skill set that he brings, sharp as ever, to Vegas.
Who knows if it works. The successful Pete Carroll run in Seattle was launched by the best defense of the last decade-plus but was bolstered by the stability of a healthy, franchise quarterback with Russell Wilson. The Raiders are still missing that piece. But in turning from the current hiring trend, the Las Vegas Raiders just made their 2025 season must-see television.
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