The Oakland Raiders took an important step last season, 3-13 record be damned.
They added a potential franchise quarterback in Derek Carr and a defensive building-block in linebacker Khalil Mack via the draft. They won some meaningful games against legitimate opponents after pulling the plug on the Dennis Allen-era and, even more importantly, they did it the right way - in a tough, consistent, repeatable manner.
After tabbing former Broncos defensive coordinator Jack Del Rio as the next leader of the franchise and with over $50 million in cap space at their disposal, the next step for the Raiders will potentially be an even bigger one.
Del Rio arrived in Indianapolis for the NFL's Scouting Combing Wednesday and fielded questions from the assembled media on his overarching plan for returning the once-proud Raiders to their former glory.
"You acquire that talent, and then you go in and compete," Del Rio said, per IBABuzz.com. "We're going to have a very competitive mentality throughout our organization in everything we're doing. We want to make sure that we're competing to be the very best, and goal No. 1 is to win the division."
Step one in meeting that goal will be acquiring more talent - perhaps talent like Denver Broncos nose tackle Terrance Knighton.
"Yeah, I mean, obviously we drafted him, we thought at that time he was kind of a dancing bear type," said Del Rio, who drafted Knighton when he was head coach of the Jacksonville Jaguras. "Kind of a big powerful man that could stay on his feet and run down the line. This game is about big, powerful men, so that the guys that have the skill level can do their things. This big, powerful man played well in Jacksonville. We got back together, he played well in Denver and so I appreciate that, I respect that. We have to have those kinds of people in our trenches, in our offensive and defensive line, in order to play the kind of football we expect to play."
While it's not a certainty that the man they call "Pot Roast" will again follow Del Rio to a new NFL location, he has already stated his preference to again play for his former head coach and coordinator, per Bill Williamson of ESPN.
Adding talent isn't the only priority Del Rio has - he also wants to take the guys already in place, like Mack and cornerback DJ Hayden, and turn them from good players into great ones.
Mack especially is a guy who seems to have caught the eye of his coach - a former NFL linebacker himself.
"He showed signs of being dominant in certain things, in particular stuffing people at the line of scrimmage and putting up that stop sign, and telling people they're not coming that way, and some of the ability of finishing on the edge we think we can help him with some of those things and some of those opportunities when you get teams in must pass situations, we think he can flourish. Excited about a young talent like that," Del Rio said of his young linebacker.
As for Hayden, the former first-round pick in the 2013 NFL Draft, Del Rio sees endless potential but a need to get and stay healthy.
"DJ has got great feet. He's got special corner feet. The ability to transition, change direction. For DJ it's all about staying healthy, and it's hard to develop if you're not on the field working. We're going to work hard."
The Raiders have a number of holes to plug and positions to upgrade, but with some good young pieces already in place and Del Rio and his staff hard at work at acquiring more, the future may not be so bleak for fans of the Black and Silver.
