The Las Vegas Raiders hired John Spytek as their new general manager. He has experience helping build multiple competitive rosters at previous stops around the National Football League and is now tasked with having similar success with the Silver and Black.
At the NFL Combine, Spytek noted a few traits from players who attend minor or traditionally considered basketball schools.
"I think it's been happening for a while. I mean, I think back to like, this is almost before I was born, but like Walter Payton and Jerry Rice playing where they played. I mean, technology has changed that, these guys don't go undiscovered anymore," Spytek said. "And the ones that end up at the smaller schools, they have an easy avenue up right now. And there's compensation involved in that their schools can't compete with at the level they're at".
The Raiders general manager also assigned himself and the organization the task of finding players regardless of where they played on the collegiate level.
In today's world of college football players transferring every offseason for more money, Spytek appreciates and considers collegiate players' handling of the new world of Name, Image, and Likeness deals. Loyalty is a factor Spytek values when considering players.
"For each kid, it's their own choice. We better be able to find players whatever level they're at, D3, when we had a lot of success in Tampa, Ali Marpet, Alex Cappa, maybe those guys transfer up now, maybe they don't. I mean, I give a lot of respect to the guys that stick it out with the school they're at and take a smaller NIL deal than they could have gotten if they would have transferred to the big one.
"To me, like there's a loyalty and a quality to that human that really stands out. And there's a couple guys in this draft this year that kind of had the same opportunity. We drafted one in Tampa last year, Graham Barton, that could've gone and played for a lot more money, and ‘I love Duke, I’ll stay at Duke.’ I'm not saying that's why we drafted him there, but I got a lot of respect for those guys that do that," Spytek said.
