The Las Vegas Raiders officially closed the book on the Tyree Wilson era by trading away the former first-round pick in a draft day deal last week.
It wasn’t exactly a novel that will be remembered as a classic.
Wilson’s story with the Raiders started slow and ended anticlimactically with a few brief bright chapters sprinkled throughout that offered only waning hope it would get better.
Nobody is clamoring to secure the movie rights.
But his departure does trigger thoughts of what could have been had the Raiders not decided to draft Wilson with the No. 7 pick in the 2023 draft, a selection that was always seen as a bit of a roll of the dice by then-general manager Dave Ziegler.
The pick crapped out and Ziegler’s tenure with the Raiders would end midway through the next season.
That’s certainly not on Wilson, but it didn’t help.
So what could have happened had the Raiders chosen someone else instead?
The possibilities are quite intriguing.
But if the hypothetical game is to be played, it would have to start two years earlier with the most horrific day for the franchise since it moved to Las Vegas when wide receiver Henry Ruggs drove drunk on a Las Vegas road and killed Tina Tintor and her dog.
That tragic event had lasting ramifications, even on the field. Not only was Ruggs in prison, but also the Raiders were essentially disqualified from considering star defensive tackle Jalen Carter in 2023 because of his involvement in a crash that resulted in two deaths just a few months before the draft.
Carter almost certainly would have been the Raiders’ pick at No. 7 absent that incident, though he also could have come off the board even earlier in that case.
He has gone on to make two Pro Bowls and was a second-team All Pro for a Super Bowl championship team in Philadelphia after the Eagles picked him at No. 9.
But again, that pick wasn’t going to happen for the Raiders.
Carter, however, is one of a group of successful players selected after the Raiders picked Wilson.
In fact, seven of the next 15 players drafted immediately after Wilson came off the board have made Pro Bowls.
That includes a pair of superstar running backs in Atlanta’s Bijan Robinson (No. 8) and Detroit’s Jahmyr Gibbs (No. 13).
On the surface, they wouldn’t necessarily have been options for the Raiders because Josh Jacobs was entrenched as the starter.
However, the situation between him and the team was already starting to grow untenable. The Raiders had declined to pick up his fifth-year option and had instead slapped the franchise tag on him. He had expressed frustration and it seemed unlikely a long-term deal would get done.
It didn’t.
He spent one more year with the Raiders and then signed with Green Bay.
So Robinson and Gibbs seem much more feasible in retrospect.
There may be an even bigger miss, however.
In a pre-draft analysis video, this publication opined that if Carter wasn’t an option then the Raiders should select either Devon Witherspoon or Christian Gonzalez, whichever of the top two corners were still on the board.
Witherspoon, our top choice, went to the Seahawks at No. 5, but Gonzalez was still available.
In fact, he slid all the way down to the Patriots at No. 17.
Witherspoon has been to three Pro Bowls and was already named one of the top 50 players in franchise history.
Gonzalez dealt with some injuries, but has emerged as one of the top corners in the league. He has a Pro Bowl appearance and a second-team All Pro nod.
He probably should have been the pick, based on projection and need.
But there were also other options.
The Raiders really needed help on all three levels of their defense, and while linebacker may have been a stretch in the top 10, the Lions picked Jack Campbell at No. 18 and he has become one of the top players in the league at his position.
Then there is the true dream scenario, however unlikely.
Seattle drafted a pretty decent wide receiver prospect at No. 20 named Jaxon Smith-Njigba.
While the Raiders had Davante Adams at the time and Smith-Njigba probably wouldn’t have been their pick at No. 7, this is a hypothetical situation.
He turned out pretty good.
In the end, Wilson was just the wrong pick at the wrong time.
It happens.
A better selection in that spot wouldn’t necessarily have changed the course of the franchise at the time, but it couldn’t have hurt.
Wilson and the organization now get a fresh start and can move on.
But Gonzalez would look pretty good in a Raiders jersey right about now.
And let’s not even get into what could have been had they picked the better Byron Young in the third round. That’s a story for another day.
Contact Adam Hill at ahill@reviewjournal.com. Follow @AdamHillLVRJ on X.
