John Spytek wasn’t shopping at Ross or Goodwill this go-around.
The Las Vegas Raiders general manager is steering the Silver & Black ship out of the storm and into better waters after a tumultuous 2025 campaign that saw the team finish 3-14 overall and securing the first overall selection in the 2026 NFL Draft in the process.
That process started with shipping edge rusher Maxx Crosby to the Baltimore Ravens for two first-round picks (including the 14th overall pick this April) — that deal shockingly fell through on Tuesday evening with Crosby reverting back to the Raiders. Then there was a late-round picks swap that netted veteran slot cornerback Taron Johnson from the Buffalo Bills. And once the legal tampering period opened on Monday, Spytek and Vegas appeared slow to the free agency table but when they threw the dice, boy did it roll.
The initial big splash: Making Tyler Linderbaum the highest-paid center in the NFL — by a wide margin — with a reported three-year, $81 million contract. Before that was re-upping in-house free agent cornerback Eric Stokes to a three-year, $30 million pact. But Linderbaum was the opening of the floodgates that saw the Raiders ink wide receiver Jalen Nailor to a three-year, $36 million deal, back-to-back linebackers in Quay Walker (three years, $40.5 million) and Nakobe Dean (three years, $36 million), and adding likely outside linebacker edge presences in Kwity Paye (three years, $48 million) and in-house free agent Malcolm Koonce (one year, $11 million).
Later on Monday, Spytek and Co. inked veteran kicker Matt Gay (undisclosed) which likely closes the door on Daniel Carlson’s tenure as the Raiders place kicker.
By all indications, the nixed Crosby trade doesn’t have any known impacts on the Raiders’ splurge.
Las Vegas was a key operator in Wave 1 of free agency — something that didn’t happen in Spytek’s rookie year — and thrift shopping this was not for the Silver & Black’s general manager.
All told, the new-look Raiders spent $281.5 million on the initial day of free agency — deals become official when the new league year began Wednesday — according to NFL Research. The next big spenders were the equally down trodden and rebuilding Tennessee Titans who doled out $270 million on Day 1.
It’s good to see both Spytek and Mike Borgonzi filling gaping roster holes for their respective teams and giving their new head coaches — Klint Kubiak and Robert Saleh — ample ingredients to cook up winning recipes via free agency. There’s always the cautionary tale of spending big in free agency doesn’t always equate into victories or playoff appearances and a Super Bowl win. But the targeted spending by the Seattle Seahawks and the 2025 offseason splurge by the New England Patriots showcased good things can come from throwing coin.
Spytek didn’t get into specifics during his media time at last month’s NFL Scouting Combine in Indianapolis, but he gave surface level insight on his confidence heading into free agency in his second-year at the helm.
“I try to be the same guy every day. I got a great group of people around me in the scouting department, so as we approach free agency, I feel like as a group, guys that were here when I got here, guys that have come in, we’re all speaking the same language now,” Spytek said then. “We’ve got a great process in place, and to me, it’s always been about the people that you surround yourself with, and so I feel great about the group that we have supporting the organization right now from the personnel side.”
Spytek’s crew sure made the rest of the league notice with it’s maneuvers on the very first day of the tampering period.
Landing the top and coveted center in Linderbaum to anchor the offensive line at the pivot is an instrumental addition to turn the Raiders’ trenches around. That will have reverberating effects to Las Vegas offense as a whole — helping a young quarterback (assumed Indiana’s Fernando Mendoza will be the No. 1 pick in April’s draft), paving the way for promising second-year running back Ashton Jeanty, off the top — but also the defense — an offense that can sustain drives and score is a boon for defensive coordinator Rob Leonard’s crew.
And the bolstering the line with Linderbaum and adding a speedy wideout in Nailor, along with the other Day 1 additions, plays right into what Spytek envisioned at the combine when it comes to Kubiak being hired as the Raiders new head coach.
“Well, I think our job in the personnel department is give Klint (Kubiak) as many good players as we can that fit his vision and his scheme. But I think one of the things we really liked about Klint was he’s got a system that highlights what the players can do,” Spytek explained. “He talked a lot about that in the interviews. And so, our job is to use that and go forward with that and just get him quality people and football players that that can bring this offense to life.”
It’s no secret the work is far from done. The Raiders’ need list remains lengthy with plenty of checkpoints to reach. But the work to turn around a moribund franchise has to start somewhere. That began in earnest with landing Kubiak and building his coaching staff. Now we’re at the roster-building phase with free agency. Then comes the draft next month, an excursion where Spytek has 11 selections to work with — including the top pick.
How Kubiak and his staff get the new crop of well-paid Raiders integrated into the system and coaching the entire group to victories remains to be seen.
But one cannot ignore that Spytek wasn’t sitting on the sidelines this time in Wave 1 — this time.
