Marcus Mariota talks joining Raiders, tenure with Titans

For the first time since it was reported that Marcus Mariota was joining the Las Vegas Raiders, the former Tennessee Titans quarterback spoke about the change of scenery he’ll have in 2020.

In an interview with Rob DeMello of KHON2 News, Mariota was thankful for his five years in Nashville, but it’s clear he’s very excited to be joining the Raiders, which gives him an opportunity to play closer to his home state of Hawaii.

“Words can’t even express how excited, how happy we are as a family,” Mariota said. “These last five years have been a blessing, no doubt. I think Nashville has treated us very well, but this is a great opportunity for us. It’s an opportunity to be closer to home and also to be apart of a great organization.”

Along with the opportunity to play closer to home, Mariota also made it clear that finding stability and a coaching staff that would use his tools to help him play at a high level was important to him when trying to find a new team.

“There were two priorities that I had while I was going through this free agency process. Number one was to find stability. I wanted to be part of an organization that had a stable head coach, that had stability in the front office,” Mariota explained. “And then secondly for me, I wanted to be part of a coaching staff that could bring out the best in me, that could embrace my talent and just kind of put my best foot forward… the bonus and the cherry on top of it was being closer to home and being in Vegas and again I really can’t stress it enough, we’re just so excited.”

There has always been a lot of talk among Mariota’s biggest supporters that the Titans never really tailored their offense to his skill set, leading to his struggles — and that is true to an extent, although that isn’t the entire story of what went wrong with the Titans.

Clearly the Oregon product believes that Raiders head coach Jon Gruden will maximize his talent. And, as we’ve seen in the past with Rich Gannon, Gruden is known for resurrecting the career of a quarterback.

However, before Gruden can really unleash Mariota on the field, the former No. 2 overall pick has to get his chance to start, as he’s coming into the Raiders as the backup signal-caller for now.

When talking about that, Mariota was very diplomatic and said that this is Derek Carr’s team right now. Regardless, Mariota plans to support Carr, much like he did Ryan Tannehill in Tennessee after he was benched in Week 7 of last season.

“First and foremost this is Derek’s team, and I understand that, I understand that going in,” Mariota explained. “Like I said, I think for me my priority going into free agency was to be apart of a team that I felt could bring out the best in me, and whatever happens, whatever comes of that, I’m ready for it. But I do know to play starting quarterback in the NFL, to be at that spot is not an easy job to do. And I think when it comes down to it, a strong, stable, supportive quarterback room makes that job a whole lot easier, and that’s what we have to do. I’m going to do my best to support Derek in every possible way that I can and along with that I’m just going to to try to become the best player that I can be and see where that takes me.”

The interesting dynamic about Mariota being signed by the Raiders is that it’s a similar situation to what he went through last season with Ryan Tannehill, except now Carr is the vulnerable quarterback and Mariota is the guy waiting in the wings.

Mariota signed a two-year, $17.6 million contract with the Raiders, but it is loaded with incentives that could bring it up to as much as $37.5 million over two years should he become the starter.