Pete Carroll Says Tom Brady Will Be Involved In Raiders QB Search

Raiders HC Pete Carroll said that former QB Tom Brady will be leaned on during the team’s search for their next quarterback.

Carroll said that having Brady in the organization is a “once in a lifetime opportunity” and the team will take advantage of his experience and expertise in finding their next franchise quarterback.

“[I]t’s our mission to build this football team up around the quarterback position. This isn’t the only spot,” Carroll said, via PFT. “We happen to have the greatest of all time to help us, and to see clearly, and we’re going to lean on Tom as much as we possibly can for his insights because nobody has the insights that he has. He’s that unique. But the quarterback position is one of the positions on the team and we’ve got to make it all fit together well. I had pretty good success with my quarterbacks in the past — you can go all the way back to my college days — and they all turned out to be really extraordinary members of our club. There’s a way to embrace the challenge that the quarterback has from the rest of the football team as well. We need to support our guy. And we need to do what we can to make that work. It’s really about making a great football team around the quarterback position. Coach [Bill] Walsh taught me a long time ago that it’s the hardest position in professional sports to play, so we need to make it as easy as possible. And we’ll go about doing that by running the football, protecting him, taking care of the ball, playing great defense, and kicking the football when we want to kick it. So, there’s a lot that goes into this. But to think about how fortunate we are to have Tom Brady with us — it’s just a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.”

Raiders GM John Spytek called Brady the greatest football player of all time and noted that his intangibles and the way that he commanded a locker room are two important qualities that the team will look for in it’s next quarterback.

“He was never out of a fight,” Spytek said. “He was willing to do things that the ordinary football player, person wasn’t willing to do. We’re going to turn over every stone to find that leader for this team, too. There’s just going to be certain requirements for the job. And it doesn’t necessarily take the strongest arm or the best thrower, it’s the guys who will push their teammates to a place that’s uncomfortable, that will give almost anything to win. That’s what the best ones do, and we’re going to find one of those.”

Carroll, 73, was hired as the Seahawks head coach back in 2010 and was in the role for 12 years. He was previously the head coach at USC and had a stint in the NFL as the head coach of the Jets and Patriots in the late 1990s.

Since taking the job in Seattle, Carroll led the team to a record of 227-137-1 in 14 seasons to go along with 10 playoff appearances, two trips to the Super Bowl and a championship in 2013.

Seattle and Carroll mutually agreed he would step down as head coach after the 2023 season and he remained in a consulting role. From there, the Raiders hired Carroll as their next coach in January.