Raiders General Manager Reggie McKenzie was stung by the decision of left tackle Jared Veldheer to leave in free agency, saying: “The kid didn’t want to play for the Raiders anymore, and I struggled with that.”
Veldheer, as you might imagine, had a different version of events.
“I appreciate everything that Oakland did for me over the last four years, we just couldn’t get [a contract] done,” the now-Cardinals left tackle told Doug and Wolf on Arizona Sports 98.7 FM. “It wasn’t that I didn’t want to be there, because I know that’s been said recently. That just wasn’t the case. Things were unable to get done at the table and that led to free agency and now I looking forward to Arizona and looking to what the future has here.”
Veldheer also said things started moving quickly when Cardinals G.M. Steve Keim started the process of pursuing him.
And to be frank, even if the money was equal, it’s hard to argue that being a Raider is a better deal than being a Cardinal in any respect.
The team’s better, the stadium’s nicer, and even though the Cardinals aren’t a model of traditional stability, they’re moving in the right direction at the moment.
So to be honest, it’s hard to figure why Veldheer’s fighting it.