Silver And Black Pride
Defensive tackles were a hot topic during the head coach’s presser on Friday
Las Vegas Raiders head coach Pete Carroll spoke to the media after Friday’s training camp practice, a day after the decision to release veteran defensive tackle Christian Wilkins. As expected, Wilkins’ departure was a big topic of conversation as Carroll weighed in on the matter while praising young defensive linemen Jonah Laulu and Tyree Wilson.
On the process that went into moving on from Wilkins.
PC: “It took a long time to make our decision, and we watched our way through the whole thing. We’re keeping really clear with what we said, I think there was no clear path to his return, and so we just had to move on.”
On replacing the 2024 big-ticket free agent.
PC: “This place is about competition, it always has been, and it’s just wide open. I don’t need to talk about any names right now. I think in fact, if you watch the rotations, we’re giving everybody a chance, mix guys with the ones and the twos all the way throughout just to gather a bunch of information. I went right back to cut ups yesterday of the first two days, just watching each individual guy, and we’re just putting the information in the vault here, and we’ll figure it out in time. But we have good, young, spunky group of guys now. The young guys that came in this past draft [Tonka Hemingway an JJ Pegues] are part of that competition too, so it’s exciting.”
On Wilson.
PC: “I think this is really his time. He had a little bit of an injury issue early on, last year he made improvement. I’m counting on him to do stuff in a big way, and that’s not just outside at end where he is a real natural. We’re moving him around, trying to see what we can do and work in complement with our other rushers. But I’m really enthused about how he’s shown his effort and his concern about doing things really hard and full speed and all that. So that’s a really good sign. He’s a marvelous looking athlete.”
On Laulu.
PC: ”Jonah hasn’t done anything but the right stuff so far, he’s been on it. I found him watching film coming off the last season before we even got back together and all that. And I thought I saw some really good traits about him. And so, I’ve been kind of in his corner the whole time, pushing him to be in the front line in this thing. And so far, he’s shown us the flexibility to play different spots, which is good. He’s playing really hard and he’s playing really smart and he’s making a bid for us.”
