Final defensive spots may be up for grabs in last preseason game

By Case Keefer (contact)

Friday, Aug. 26, 2022 | 2 a.m.

The Raiders’ starters got the best of the Patriots’ starters in a pair of joint practices earlier this week at the former’s facility in Henderson. Now it’s time to see how the players at the end of each team’s roster perform against each other in a 5:15 p.m. kickoff tonight at Allegiant Stadium.

Neither Las Vegas (3-0 in preseason) nor New England (1-1) is expected to play most of their starters in tonight’s preseason finale for both teams. Even the few who do suit up will likely only play in a few series before giving way to those fighting for the last roster spots or practice-squad roles.

It’s the last chance for players to make an impression with final cuts required to trim rosters from 80 to 53 players at 1 p.m. next Tuesday.

“It’s a tough time of year for everybody, we know that,” Raiders coach Josh McDaniels said. “You’d love to keep 80 guys on the team. That’s what you’d love to do but we’ll see how it all plays out.”    

There’s always some uncertainty in how exactly NFL teams’ initial regular-season roster will shake out but the Raiders wiped some of it away at least on offense with a pair of attention-grabbing moves earlier this week. There were no such revealing moves on defense, which leaves new coordinator Patrick Graham’s unit as the one to scrutinize the most against the Patriots.

Especially in the front seven, the Raiders appear to have several decisions to make.

Teams most commonly keep 10 players in the secondary, and nine spots seem likely to be accounted for —Nate Hobbs, Rock Ya-Sin, Trayvon Mullen, Anthony Averett, Amik Robertson and Darius Phillips at cornerback and Tre’von Moehrig, Johnathan Abram and Duron Harmon at safety.   

More roles are undetermined among the defensive line and linebackers. Maxx Crosby and Chandler Jones are the stars of the defense at edge rusher, but the depth behind them is unsettled.

Clelin Ferrell, Malcolm Koonce and Tashawn Bower are all vying for playing time but McDaniels and general manager Dave Ziegler may consider carrying five edge rushers into the season excessive. So who would be the first cut?

Ferrell, the former No. 4 overall pick, has made the least of an impression while missing most of training camp with an injury but he carries a near $10 million dead cap hit. Koonce is still developing after being taken in the third round of last year’s draft, which would seemingly make him secure but Ziegler and McDaniels have shown a willingness to move on from Jon Gruden’s holdover players. Bower might have been the longest shot to make the team of the three coming into training camp, but he’s dominated stretches of the preseason and been impactful in practice.

A bigger logjam might be forming in the interior of the defensive line with presumed starters Johnathan Hankins and Bilal Nichols returning to practice last week. Andrew Billings, Kyle Peko, Kendal Vickers and Tyler Lancaster have all played well in their stead — roughly in that order in terms of impact and opportunity.

The quartet of veterans appear to be ahead of rookies Neil Farrell and Matthew Butler on the depth chart, but it would be uncommon if the pair were waived after being taken in the fourth and fifth rounds, respectively.

That leaves six backups to Hankins and Nichols for only three or four spots.

“Things change pretty quickly, plus you have injuries and things like that to consider,” McDaniels said of paring down the roster. “There's a lot to go into it. Again, I have great faith and trust in (Ziegler) because he knows exactly what we need to do when we need to do it.”

The single-most intriguing position battle might be taking place at linebacker next to roster-locks Denzel Perryman, Jayon Brown and Divine Deablo. The Raiders’ top two tacklers in the preseason are a pair of undrafted rookie free agents, Arizona State’s Darien Butler and Wake Forest’s Luke Masterson, who are probably up against each other to make the team.

They’ve both been revelations for the last month, giving the Raiders confidence to cut veteran Kenny Young last week, and the odd man out will certainly be a practice-squad target if he clears waivers. Butler stood out from the onset of training camp while Masterson has come on strong and progressed in recent weeks.

A former safety, Masterson might be better in pass coverage while Butler’s qualities are more in line with a traditional linebacker. They’re both considered undersized, which was a major reason why they went undrafted.

“Both those guys, Darien Butler and Luke, have done an outstanding job of asking questions, putting in the extra time,” linebackers coach Antonio Pierce said.

They both may reasonably believe they’ve done enough to make the roster, but the whole NFL will be littered with disappointed players feeling similarly on Tuesday.  

Difficult decisions are the theme of this part of the football calendar, and the Raiders’ toughest ones are now on the defensive side.

Case Keefer can be reached at 702-948-2790 or [email protected]. Follow Case on Twitter at twitter.com/casekeefer.Case Keefer can be reached at 702-948-2790 or