What Gardner Minshew II Can Bring to the Raiders

The Las Vegas Raiders signed Gardner Minshew II last month to compete with Aidan O'Connell for the starting quarterback job.

The Las Vegas Raiders have Aidan O'Connell as the presumed starting quarterback for the upcoming season.

They also currently own eight picks in the upcoming 2024 NFL Draft, and whether or not they intend to draft a quarterback is up in the air. However, if there is one certainty this offseason for the Silver and Black, it is that quarterback Gardner Minshew II will compete for the starting job and has a lot to offer.

The Raiders signed Minshew to a two-year deal in March. Before coming to Las Vegas, Minshew had stints with Jacksonville, Philadelphia and Indianapolis. Last season, Minshew was named the starter after rookie Anthony Richardson went down with an injury. Minshew threw for 3,305 passing yards with 15 touchdowns and nine interceptions while completing 305 of 490 pass attempts.

One of Minshew's best seasons was as a rookie with Jacksonville in 2019, when he threw for 3,271 yards with 21 touchdowns and six interceptions to earn his career-best Pro Football Focus grade of 70.5. One notable PFF metric is his career average of 3.3 percent when it comes to turnover-worthy plays.

On "Raiders Breakdown," analyst and former Raider Eric Allen mentioned Minshew's toughness as a trait he liked.

"Sometimes to be a player in the National Football League, you got to know you're going to get hit, but you still have to deliver an accurate ball under duress, under pressure," Allen said.

Allen lauded Minshew's ability to make deep throws.

"On the deep ball, you love the accuracy," he said. " ... The accuracy, the anticipation throws -- you love to see that from Gardner Minshew. He's able to stand in the pocket, [has] good feet."

Allen said Minshew's ability to run with the football would help relieve the pressure on the running game.

"Can you run, Gardner Minshew?" Allen said. "What if we put [him] in situations where [he's] in the red zone? Can [he] make it happen? Yes [Minshew] can make it happen. ... You have to guard against a quarterback being able to run for a touchdown -- we haven't seen that in Raider Nation in a long time.

" ... I really like that fact about Gardner Minshew. He can be mobile, and he's accurate, and he can anticipate the throws."

On the "Las Vegas Raiders Insider" podcast, our Hondo S. Carpenter Sr. expressed his thoughts on Minshew's signing, saying it was a great move by the Raiders.

"You pay him more than a backup, but you certainly don't pay him anything that's not manageable," Carpenter said.

While the starting job belongs to O'Connell and the chance the Raiders take a quarterback in the upcoming draft, Minshew will have every opportunity to compete.

The NFL Draft will be held in Detroit, Mich., on April 25-27, 2024. The Las Vegas Raiders currently have the No. 13 overall pick.

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