After much deliberation, Raiders owner Mark Davis does not intend to part with first-year head coach Dennis Allen and first-year GM Reggie McKenzie despite a poor season, league sources said, though Davis could alter the team’s front-office structure.
Sources said Davis thinks highly of Ray Anderson, the NFL’s vice president of football operations, and some believe he could join that organization if the right opportunity arose. Anderson has spent the past seven years in the league office, but the Stanford alumnus has Bay Area ties and also has vast experience as an agent and working for NFL clubs. Davis is still relatively new at running the day-to-day operations of his team and Amy Trask, the Raiders’ CEO, is working primarily on the team’s desperate search for a new stadium. Having another experienced set of eyes to make evaluations of the coaching staff and front office could be beneficial. Anderson's experience in the NFL office could be an additional benefit as Oakland participates in discussions about stadium financing.
There has never been an African-American team president in league history, and such a move would be fitting for an organization that was always at the vanguard of diversity in the coaching and front office ranks under Mark Davis’s father, Al. Some who know Anderson believe this type of opportunity would intrigue him, while the Raiders continue to seek ways to improve their situation from both a football and business perspective, and with their future in Oakland at least somewhat in question.
