Las Vegas Raiders Hire Of GM Tom Telesco Means More Of The Same For Raiders Fans

Getty Image / Tom Telesco

Las Vegas Raiders fans, the ones who have stuck with the team through multiple moves and a lot of bad football, are some of the most loyal in all of football. They deserve more success than they’ve seen.

But, the hire of new general manager, Tom Telesco, is likely to result in just more of the same for the franchise, which has not won a playoff game in 21 years.

Owner Mark Davis officially hired Tom Telesco on Tuesday.

Telesco will replace David Zeigler, who was fired in November alongside Head Coach Josh McDaniels. The Raiders have decided to keep interim head coach Antonio Pierce on as head coach, which I think is a pretty good choice.

But, Telesco is not the answer to the Raiders’ problems. He spent the previous eleven seasons with the Chargers organization as their general manager, and the results aren’t pretty. For the vast majority of those seasons, he had at minimum, solid quarterback play between Philip Rivers and Justin Herbert. In that time, the team only won two playoff games, only making the postseason three times in his eleven seasons.

Yes, he did accumulate talent in San Diego/Los Angeles, but it never translated to the results on the field you’d expect given the baseline success you’d expect with the quarterback play he had.

The Chargers have always been an unlucky organization, and there was a lot of that present in his tenure. But, he too often failed at the most important job of being a general manager, which is hiring a head coach. Even if you let him off the hook for Mike McCoy, who was hired a few days after Telesco was, he still had two head coach hires under his tenure. Both Anthony Lynn and Brandon Staley were huge failures who significantly underachieved with the franchise. Yes, the Raiders have made that hire for him, but if he has to hire another head coach at some point, his track record isn’t promising.

The one area where Raiders fans should be excited is drafting in the first round. Telesco admittedly has had a ton of hits in the first round like Jason Verrett, Joey Bosa, Rashawn Slater, Justin Herbert, Derwin James, and Mike Williams. But, it seems as if he’s struggled after the first round, and it’s led to Chargers teams that had a lot of star power, but often had units that were huge holes and lacked depth.

He’s had some disastrous free agent signings, too. Most recently, cornerback JC Jackson got huge money from Telesco, but played just seven games for the team before being traded back to the New England Patriots.

I think the Raiders could have done a lot better here, and there’s nothing to suggest the 51-year-old Telesco will be the one to turn it around for a franchise that’s due for some playoff wins, with the second-longest playoff win drought in the league behind Miami.