Getty Las Vegas Raiders owner Mark Davis.
With the firing of head coach Josh McDaniels earlier in the season, the Las Vegas Raiders will have to launch a full head coaching search regardless of how interim head coach Antonio Pierce performs. There’s already been one outside name to emerge as a possible candidate.
According to Vincent Bonsignore of the Las Vegas Review-Journal, former Stanford head coach David Shaw is a name to keep an eye on.
“That process could lead back to interim coach Antonio Pierce and interim general manager Champ Kelly at the end, but the team is expected to consider some big-time names,” Bonsignore wrote in a November 28 column.
“One candidate gaining some traction for the coaching job is former Stanford coach David Shaw, according to league sources.”
Shaw has been coaching for nearly 30 years and was previously an assistant for the Raiders under former head coach Jon Gruden from 1998 to 2001. He started as an offensive quality control coach before getting promoted to the quarterbacks coach.
Shaw worked in the NFL for several more years before teaming up with Jim Harbaugh in the college ranks at San Diego and then eventually Stanford where he succeeded Harbaugh as head coach in 2011.
He spent 12 years as the head coach at Stanford where he was named Pac-12 Coach of the Year four times. He resigned following the 2022 season and has been out of football since. He went 96-54 during his time as the Stanford head coach.
Is David Shaw the Right Fit?
What David Shaw has going for him is that he has a lot of experience coaching at the NFL and college levels. Teams can often be apprehensive about hiring former college head coaches but Shaw is a bit different considering he spent nearly a decade on NFL sidelines.
Now, it’s fair to question if Shaw is the perfect guy for the Raiders’ head coaching job. He went 14-28 across his last four seasons at Stanford. There has been NFL interest in Shaw in the past as he interviewed for the Denver Broncos‘ opening last year. His experience and previous ties to the Raiders make him a logical coach to interview for the opening.
That said, he would be a risky hire. He never had a major position of authority during his time in the NFL and only Bill O’Brien and Jim Harbaugh have winning records as first-rime NFL head coaches coming from college since 2000.
#TakeMeBackTuesday 1998
#Raiders Jon Gruden with assistants Skip Peete, Chuck Bresnahan, Frank Gansz, David Shaw, and Willie Shaw.
Jim Harbaugh Assistant?
Jim Harbaugh is another coach who will likely be closely linked to the Raiders in the coming months. It was thought that he could’ve taken the job back in 2022 before the team hired Josh McDaniels. If Harbaugh ends up landing the gig, it could make sense for David Shaw to join the Raiders as an assistant.
The end of Shaw’s tenure at Stanford may leave a sour taste in the mouths of NFL owners. If he could be an offensive coordinator or assistant head coach to Harbaugh for a year or two in the NFL, that could increase his chances of getting another chance to be the man in charge. Shaw spent four seasons at Stanford as Harbaugh’s offensive coordinator so a reunion in Las Vegas would make a lot of sense.