Storylines emerge following Oakland Raiders minicamp

Rookie LaMarr Houston (99) at defensive end

Just when it seemed that the Oakland Raiders mandatory minicamp was going to answer questions and set a course for the coming offseason, the minicamp raised fresh storylines to be watched. In fact, none of the real burning questions received much in the way of answers.

The Raiders did have five sessions of intense workouts that were all dramatic improvements over 2009. The center-quarterback exchange was automatic this year. There were too many balls on the ground again, but the number was far fewer. Even JaMarcus Russell was improved over a year ago. Whilst this progress, is important, the team is far from perfection. They still have numerous issues that they are going to have to work out.

Ultimately, with the organized team activities starting at the end of the month, there will be the beginnings of progress along the storylines that emerged over the weekend, but with only one day out of each OTA session open to the media, it will be hard to know exactly how far they are coming. It will be the training camp that starts in July that will start to truly tell the tales.

Defensive alignment: With the acquisitions of Kamerion Wembley and Quentin Groves, the speculation exploded that the Raiders could be making a shift to a 3-4 alignment. The selection of Rolando McClain in the first round and the move of second round pick Lamarr Houston to defensive end only fueled the speculation that the Raiders would make that switch. During the different draft weekend press conferences Head Coach Tom Cable at different times said, “The Raiders are a base 4-3 team” and “we will be doing something different this year, you will see it at minicamp.”

During the minicamp, the Raiders ran exclusively the base 4-3 and revealed none of the new schemes that Cable had promised. That is not to say there won’t be new wrinkles added to the Raiders standard 4-3 press man coverage single deep safety, but none were apparent as of yet.

Quarterback situation: The writing had been on the wall for JaMarcus Russell. The final nail in the coffin was expected to be the acquisition of Jason Campbell from the Washington Redskins during the draft. There was going to be no way that the Raiders would allow Russell to practice at minicamp to protect themselves from paying the $9 million salary he will be owed if he is on the roster for 2010. If he were to get hurt working at the facility, the Raiders would be unable to cut him, and therefore have to swallow that cash.

Not only was Russell present at camp, the first day he was the top performer. He was not allowed to answer any questions about his contract status or whether he expected to be the starting quarterback. He did not appear to be nearly as heavy as some of the reports had made him sound. He did show improved movement and accuracy over this time last year. However, by the third day, Russell had again regressed and Campbell caught fire and appeared to be the best of the three.

Cable said point blank that the play during minicamp meant “zero” in terms of competition for the starting position. The competition would start come training camp, which opens in late July in Napa.