Skip navigation
Favorites
Sign up to follow your favorites on all your devices.
Sign up

Reggie McKenzie: What Khalil Mack was demanding wasn’t going to work

Published September 2, 2018 02:17 AM
Khalil Mack Trade Football

FILE - In this Oct. 29, 2017, file photo, Oakland Raiders defensive end Khalil Mack smiles before an NFL football game against the Buffalo Bills in Orchard Park, N.Y. The Chicago Bears have acquired star pass rusher Khalil Mack from the Raiders on Saturday, Sept. 1, 2018, in a massive trade that sends two first-round draft picks to Oakland. A person with direct knowledge of the trade told The Associated Press that Oakland will get first-round selections in 2019 and 2020, a sixth-rounder next year and a third-rounder in 2020. Oakland also included its second-round selection in 2020. The person spoke on condition of anonymity because the trade had not been announced. (AP Photo/Jeffrey T. Barnes, File)

AP

It was clear to the Raiders early on in Khalil Mack’s holdout that he wanted far more money than the Raiders wanted to pay him.

That’s the word from Raiders General Manager Reggie McKenzie, who said after trading Mack to the Bears that the Raiders could tell early on that Mack was going to demand a contract the Raiders weren’t prepared to deliver on.

“All of us, [coach Jon Gruden], myself, everybody in the organization wanted Khalil to be a Raider,” McKenzie said. “We presented him with an offer, and we got that counter back, talked about it with [Mack’s agent, Joel Segal]. What they were demanding, it just wasn’t going to work.”

What Mack was demanding was to be the highest-paid non-quarterback in the NFL, and that’s exactly what the Bears made him. The teams also exchanged draft picks, with the Raiders getting the Bears’ first-round picks in 2019 and 2020. Now the Raiders need to make those picks work.