After 26 days of holding out last year, Raiders offensive lineman Donald Penn came jogging out from the weight room for practice. They should have played the “Rocky” theme, since the team wasn’t going to have to use Marshall Newhouse at left tackle after all.
On the 27th day of his holdout this year, Khalil Mack did not come running out to join his teammates on Tuesday afternoon. The defensive end is not back yet, and almost assuredly won’t return by Friday’s third preseason game against the Packers.
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I have talked to both sides this week, there is “nothing new,” and the progress has been glacial as they are apparently still far apart on guaranteed money. The Raiders made an offer in the spring, it wasn’t enough, and there has been very little volleying back and forth.
The Raiders can fine Mack $814,000 per preseason game that he misses, according to the collective bargaining agreement, which would bring the total on Friday to $2.44 million. But … and this is important, there has been no indication that owner Mark Davis and general manager Reggie McKenzie would try and collect those fines.
They just want Mack back, and they have said repeatedly over the years that they want to sign him to a long-term deal. The Raiders have hired coach Jon Gruden since then, but Gruden has said that one of the reasons he took the job was to coach Mack and Derek Carr.
So, why the long holdup then?
— It’s a lot of money. Mack should get more than Von Miller’s six-year, $114 million deal that included $70 million guaranteed. And the Raiders already guaranteed $70 million of Derek Carr’s $125 million extension last year, which makes it more complicated.
— The deck is stacked against Mack. He has a contract this season. The 2016 Defensive Player of the Year is due to make $13.85 million in the fifth-year option of his rookie contract. Plus, the Raiders can franchise-tag him the next two seasons. (Carr, meanwhile, didn’t have a fifth-year team option since he was a second-round pick and not a first-rounder like Mack.)
Penn returned to the Raiders last year without a new deal, receiving one — with more money — a week later after a promise from McKenzie. And Penn, as important as he was, was a 34-year-old lineman. Mack is 27 years old and, as Gruden said the other day, the best player on the team. It’s the reason you haven’t heard McKenzie say he won’t negotiate until Mack returns, like he often did while Penn was gone last summer.
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But like Penn, Mack may also have to come back without a deal done, because sitting out regular-season games (and missing paychecks) doesn’t seem to help his cause.
Oh, and any talk of the Raiders trading Mack is ridiculous. There is no reason to. And they don’t want to.
There is another former NFL Defensive Player of the Year, Aaron Donald, who is holding out with the Rams. While McKenzie told The Athletic at training camp that Donald’s situation has no bearing on his talks with Mack’s agent, Joel Segal, it may indeed carry weight with Segal or Davis. Donald is a defensive tackle, but he and Mack are two of the top three or four defensive players in the NFL and the first deal would reset the market for the second one.
Gruden, meanwhile, has said he is focusing on the Raiders players that are at practice daily, while tight end Lee Smith, at training camp, had an interesting take on why Mack’s absence is not a distraction.
“When Rodney Hudson isn’t around, that’s a problem,” Smith told The Athletic. “He is the nucleus of the O-line and the ID-ing process on offense. If Derek Carr is not around, that’s a problem. Khalil can just come back and see ball, get ball. I know Coach Guenther’s defense isn’t the easiest in the world to master and Khalil has a lot to learn when he gets here, but I respect Khalil very much … he is a pain in the ass to deal with on the offensive side of the ball, but he has to do what he has to do on the business side.
“None of us will ever question him when he is trying to make sure he is getting as much out of this league as he is going to give it. But he is not the quarterback and he is not the center. He is the defensive end that when he gets back … let’s just call a square a square — if you got some turd holding out, then that’s a problem. It becomes about them and it becomes a distraction. They’re acting up … Khalil is silently holding out and when he gets back, he will be the absolute best teammate. That ‘C’ is on his chest for a reason.
“None of us are worried about Khalil.”
— Reported from Alameda
(Top photo: Sergio Estrada/USA TODAY Sports)
