The Las Vegas Raiders fired Antonio Pierce on Tuesday after just one season as their full-time coach, the latest in a line of coaching changes over the past several years.
“We appreciate Antonio’s leadership, first as an interim head coach and this past season as the head coach,” the team said in a statement. “Antonio grew up a Raiders fan and his Silver and Black roots run deep. We are grateful for his ability to reignite what it means to be a Raider throughout the entire organization. We wish nothing but the best for Antonio and his family in the future.”
Pierce took over as the interim coach midway through the 2023 season and went 5-4 the rest of the way, earning strong player support for him to get the job on a full-time basis.
But the Raiders, after a 2-2 start, went on a 10-game losing streak to put his job in jeopardy. The Raiders dealt with a number of injuries including to defensive linemen Maxx Crosby and Christian Wilkins, navigated the Davante Adams early season drama that culminated with a trade to the New York Jets and finished the season 4-13.
Pierce was the fourth full-time Raiders coach — Rich Bisaccia closed out the 2021 season as the interim coach — in the past decade.
As for where the Raiders turn next, Mike Vrabel has been rumored as a possible candidate. He and Raiders minority owner Tom Brady were teammates with the Patriots, but Vrabel also figures to attract a lot of attention from other clubs with openings, perhaps including in New England.
There are other pressing issues than coach. Las Vegas needs a franchise quarterback, something Pierce did not have at his disposal. Aidan O’Connell has proven to be a capable starter but hasn’t shown he has the ability or consistency to take a team deep into the playoffs.
General manager Tom Telesco will need to fix a number of holes to give the new coach a reasonable chance to compete, most notably addressing running back and wide receiver and finding more depth for the defense.
Titans fire GM Ran Carthon
General manager Ran Carthon paid the price for the Titans going 9-25 in his two seasons.
The Titans introduced Carthon as the franchise’s first Black general manager in January 2023, and he helped the franchise hire a new coach in Brian Callahan a year later. A year after that, Carthon was fired.
Tennessee controlling owner Amy Adams Strunk, who fired general manager Jon Robinson in December 2022, will have yet another new GM to help the franchise decide what to do with its fourth overall No. 1 pick in the NFL draft, which it secured after going 3-14 in 2024. Strunk said Chad Brinker, president of football operations, will lead the search for a new GM. Brinker also will have full roster control.
Strunk said in a statement Tuesday that it was impossible to ignore that the Titans didn’t improve over the last two years. She said Callahan would continue as head coach even as the Titans lost their final six games and eight of nine.
The 14 losses matched the 2014 season for the most losses since the team relocated from Texas to Tennessee in 1997. It has had the No. 1 overall pick once since then, and Robinson traded it for a haul of selections for his first NFL draft in 2016.
“I am deeply disappointed in our poor win-loss record during this period, of course, but my decision also speaks to my concern about our long-term future should we stay the course,” Strunk said in her statement.
She hired Carthon to work with then-coach Mike Vrabel, who was fired two days after the 2023 season ended. He helped with the search that landed on Callahan.
Jaguars request eight interviews
The Jaguars are conducting their coaching search with transparency for the first time in franchise history. The Jaguars released a list of interview requests a day after owner Shad Khan fired coach Doug Pederson following his third season. The list includes five current NFL offensive coordinators: Buffalo’s Joe Brady, Tampa Bay’s Liam Coen, Detroit’s Ben Johnson, Baltimore’s Todd Monken and Philadelphia’s Kellen Moore.
It also includes two current defensive coordinators — Detroit’s Aaron Glenn and Las Vegas’ Patrick Graham — as well as former New York Jets head coach and current Green Bay assistant Robert Saleh.
Saleh worked as Jacksonville’s linebackers coach from 2014 to 2016. Monken spent four years (2007-10) as Jacksonville’s receivers coach.
Khan fired Pederson after the team’s 18th loss in 23 games, a stunning stretch of futility that had a lot to do with injuries to quarterback Trevor Lawrence and receiver Christian Kirk and a defense that regressed under first-year defensive coordinator Ryan Nielsen.
Khan called the Jaguars “the most predictable team on both sides of the ball” in the league and said he wants his sixth head coach to create a level of “being unpredictable.”
Dolphins GM: Hill ‘never asked for trade’
The Dolphins don’t appear to have any immediate plans to trade Tyreek Hill.
General manager Chris Grier and coach Mike McDaniel both had conversations with Hill on Monday, a day after the star receiver indicated he might want out of Miami following a loss to the New York Jets, which punctuated a losing season in which the Dolphins missed the playoffs.
Grier said Hill did not retract his postgame statements, when he said he enjoyed playing in Miami, but “at the end of the day, I’ve got to do what’s best for my career.”
“But he never asked for a trade with me,” Grier added, speaking at his end-of-season news conference Tuesday.
“They were [productive] conversations,” Grier said. “I will keep those between us. The one thing I would say is, in a frustrating season, he was very emotional in a game where we had a chance, coming back from 2-6. All of that with him playing through his [wrist] injury just kind of bubbled to a point.”
Hill caught just two passes for 20 yards in the season finale and pulled himself out of the game late. He did not play in the fourth quarter, which McDaniel said he told Hill was unacceptable in the pair’s hour-long conversation on Monday.
McDaniel indicated that his relationship with Hill is fine, but the two needed to “clear the air.”