Las Vegas Raiders coach named dark-horse candidate for major NFL award

The Las Vegas Raiders had quite the resurgence in 2023 after the team parted ways with disastrous head coach Josh McDaniels in favor of interim head coach Antonio Pierce, who was rightly given the full-time job earlier this offseason.

After a 3-5 start, the Raiders fired McDaniels and put Pierce in charge. Not only did the Raiders' play improve on both sides of the ball, the team put together a 5-4 record and flirted with a playoff spot before ultimately falling short. Making that run more impressive was the fact that the Raiders did it with a rookie quarterback.

Looking ahead to 2024, the Raiders are returning much of that same team with a few upgrades and the hope is that Pierce can continue moving Las Vegas in the direction he was en route to a playoff berth this season.

Knowing all that, Bleacher Report's Brad Gagnon recently labeled Pierce a dark-horse candidate to win NFL Coach of the Year, which is based on betting odds. Shockingly, Pierce is 12th.

Pierce lit a fire under the Raiders in an interim capacity in 2023, and the roster is good enough to surpass expectations in 2024. It's surprising to see him listed below 11 head coaches in terms of COY odds.

As Gagnon notes, the Raiders have enough talent on their roster to take a step forward in 2024, but for Pierce to win the award, it has got to be a sizeable one.

The Raiders have the talent on defense and at their skill positions on offense to be formidable no matter what, but how good they are will ultimately hinge on the quarterback play.

The book is already written on Gardner Minshew, who is a serviceable starter but not a true difference-maker at the position. If that holds true with him under center in Las Vegas, the Raiders aren't likely to take a big enough leap to get Pierce some hardware.

As for Aidan O'Connell, there's really no telling what he truly is yet because of a  small sample size. He could very well make a big leap in Year 2 and elevate this team to another level, which would put Las Vegas in position to greatly exceed expectations.

But it's also possible that doesn't happen and he's more on the level of Minshew or worse, in which case the Raiders could end up right around the record they finished with last season, which won't be good enough for the award.