Ranking the Raiders' Best 2026 Players: No. 3

Over the past few seasons, even when the Las Vegas Raiders had one of the worst rosters in the National Football League, they have often had some of the best players at certain positions. That is still the case, but the roster has improved overall.

Las Vegas has had an eventful offseason, adding talent across the board. As training camp rolls around, the Raiders look to continue implementing a new way of doing things under Klint Kubiak and his newly assembled coaching staff.

Las Vegas has come a long way in a short time, but it still has a long way to go. There is no shortage of issues facing the Raiders this upcoming season. Many questions remain after all the new additions made over the past few months.

Yet, for all of the questions surrounding a Raiders team with many new pieces on its roster and coaching staff, there are certain positions Las Vegas has few, if any. There are many, but the position group the Raiders are most confident in is the tight end position.

Leading up to training camp, we will rank the top 30 players on the Raiders' roster. There will be no rookies on this list, as it is impossible to make the list with zero regular-season snaps.

Ranking the 2026 Raiders: No. 3, TE Brock Bowers

The Raiders have arguably the best group of tight ends in the league. The confidence the Raiders have in their tight ends is largely based on Bowers, who is arguably the best tight end in the league when he is healthy. In fact, Bowers' health is the only question at the moment.

Bowers is entering his third season in the league. After arguably the best rookie season by a tight end in league history, Bowers' 2025 season was impacted by an injury he suffered in Week 1. His injury was one of the biggest downfalls the Raiders had last year.

Still, even when less than fully healthy and on a roster with one of the worst offensive lines in the league, Bowers proved his mere presence on the field, let alone his play, was enough to impact games for the Raiders. Klint Kubiak recently explained what he has learned about Bowers.

“He’s kind of a football robot in a good way. He's a football robot from heaven, he's a Cadillac out there. We got to get the most out of Brock [Bowers]. Wherever he goes, he's been successful in college and high school with whoever's coached him. Can't say enough great things about him. Love his work ethic. He is a standard bearer," Kubiak said earlier this offseason.

Bowers should be one of the primary beneficiaries of the Raiders' coaching staff and the roster changes they made this offseason. Kubiak and his offensive-minded coaching staff, along with the improvement of the group of quarterbacks and wide receivers, should directly benefit Bowers.

There is still plenty of work for Bowers and the Raiders to do moving forward, and many questions still remain. Yet, Bowers being an integral part of Kubiak's offense goes without saying. Bowers was part of the reason Kubiak accepted the position. Bowers should make Kubiak's first season productive.

“Being a part of many year ones, you learn from your mistakes, you learn what works, how to best bring the players along, how not to load them up too much, and kind of give them things in the install piecemeal, and then there's days where you go out there and just stress the heck out of them mentally and see what they can retain," Kubiak said.

“But I think it kind of goes back to the people that you're around, and I've been lucky in those two spots to be around some other coaches, some familiarity where you don't have to spend that much time with the offensive line, with the quarterbacks, with guys like Rick [Dennison] and Andrew [Janocko]. So, really blessed to have them on our staff, and allows me to go and spend time with other parts of the team."

Of the many things the Raiders need in training camp and beyond, the need for Bowers to be healthy is at the top of the list. Much of what the Raiders want to do on offense will center on having Bowers at least on the field. Las Vegas needs Bowers to return to form in 2026.

In Bowers, Las Vegas has a player who can singlehandedly flip the game in their favor in just a few plays. In his first two seasons in the NFL, Bowers has made it clear that he is among the league's best at his position, if not the best. However, they still need more from him after a down 2025.

As much as the Raiders plan to spread the ball around on offense under Kubiak, the success of the 2026 Raiders and future teams will be predicated on Bowers. Even with Las Vegas spreading the ball around on offense, forcing defenses to worry about Bowers helps them do so.

Bowers is one of the three major cogs the Raiders have added on offense in the first round of the past three drafts. The talented tight end helps Las Vegas in more ways than what shows up on the stat sheet, but that is only when he is healthy. The Raiders need the best version of Bowers.

The Raiders have not done many things right over the past three seasons, especially when it comes to building out their roster via the draft. However, deciding not to pass on Bowers, as he unexpectedly fell in a draft that saw a record number of quarterbacks drafted in the first 12 picks, was one of them.

How the Raiders use Bowers will be one of the few questions they have entering training camp. Figuring out which ways Kubiak and his staff plan to use one of the best players on their roster will be one of the most intriguing parts of camp and the 2026 season.

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