The Las Vegas Raiders have built a roster that looks less like a random collection of players and more like a reunion tour.
That theme showed up early in the offseason, when the team started earning a reputation as something of a professional branch of the Georgia Bulldogs. It kept popping up through the NFL Draft, and it was still there after roster cutdowns, when the Raiders added four players to the practice squad: offensive lineman Evan Neal, edge rusher Azeez Ojulari, and wide receivers Cody White and Ronnie Bell.
Neal doesn’t come with any obvious built-in links, but the other three fit right into the Raiders’ growing web of familiar faces. White spent time with Klint Kubiak on the Seattle Seahawks in 2025, while Bell played for Kubiak with the San Francisco 49ers in 2023. Ojulari also has a strong connection to the building beyond that: Las Vegas’ front office includes several former Philadelphia Eagles executives, and that’s where he played last year.
The college ties run even deeper. Ojulari overlapped with every former Bulldog on the Raiders’ roster, having played at Georgia with Eric Stokes, Quay Walker, Nakobe Dean and Brock Bowers. White, meanwhile, was at Michigan State with Jalen Nailor and Connor Heyward for multiple seasons.
Bell’s background adds another layer. He played at Michigan, the alma mater of both John Spytek and Tom Brady, and while he was there he was teammates with Kwity Paye and practice squad linebacker Cameron McGrone.
The familiarity doesn’t stop with the newest arrivals. Walker and Dean were also college teammates with Stokes and Bowers at Georgia, though Stokes and Bowers didn’t actually play together there. Nailor and Heyward crossed paths at Michigan State, and Paye and McGrone were together at Michigan as well.
There are more overlaps still. Rookies Treydan Stukes and Dalton Johnson were teammates at Arizona and are best friends off the field, too. The Raiders brought them in just one day apart during the 2026 NFL Draft, which should make the transition to Las Vegas a little easier for both of them.
Dont’e Thornton Jr. and Jermod McCoy spent a season together at Tennessee, and Thornton Jr. also overlapped with Jackson Powers-Johnson at Oregon earlier in his career. Fernando Mendoza and Roman Hemby won a championship together last year at Indiana. Atonio Mafi and Gary Smith III were together at UCLA, and injured undrafted free agent wide receiver Corey Rucker played on the same Arkansas State team as Keyron Crawford.
It’s a long list, and it says plenty about how the Raiders are putting this thing together. The coaching staff already has plenty of shared history, and the roster is starting to look just as connected. That kind of cohesion should help the Silver and Black.
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Mike Washington Jr. has gone from a rookie camp curiosity to one of the more interesting developments in Raiders camp, and it happened quickly. The first-year running back has impressed enough in the preseason that general manager John Spytek singled him out as a perfect scheme fit, pointing to the way Washington has handled his opportunities and the efficiency he showed when games started counting toward evaluation.
The bigger wrinkle now is how the backfield gets sorted out while Ashton Jeanty deals with an ankle injury. Washington has been taking first-team snaps in practice, which suggests the Raiders are seriously weighing a larger role for him as they sort through a situation they may not have expected this soon. For a team trying to settle its running game, Washington's rise has turned a depth-chart question into one of the more intriguing decisions left on the table. [Read more 🡒]
Raiders May Need Their Biggest Strength More Than Ever
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That front could wind up being more important than ever if the back end needs extra help early in the season. The coaching staff is planning to rotate defensive linemen to keep everyone fresh, a move that should help the group hold up across four quarters and cover for vulnerabilities elsewhere on the defense. For the Raiders, the plan is simple enough: let one of their strongest units carry more of the load while the rest of the defense comes together. [Read more 🡒]
Raiders Leave The Door Open In A QB Battle Fans Cant Ignore
The Raiders entered this stretch with one of the leagues more closely watched quarterback rooms, and John Spytek made it clear the team has no plans to trim it down yet. Las Vegas is keeping Kirk Cousins, Aidan OConnell and Fernando Mendoza on the roster, a move that underscores how much the organization values the competition and the different things each passer brings as the group works through camp and the preseason.
Cousins still sits atop the depth chart as the starter, but the real intrigue is in how the backup spots have settled around him. Spytek pointed to Mendozas development and OConnells preseason showing as reasons the Raiders are comfortable carrying all three, and for now the message is simple: both reserves are prepared to step in if called upon, leaving the rest of the evaluation very much alive. [Read more 🡒]