The Las Vegas Raiders franchise has had some iconic players come through the organization over the course of its existence, with a long line of Hall of Famers.

Perhaps one of the most iconic players to wear the Silver and Black was wide receiver Tim Brown, who earned the nickname “Mr. Raider” for all that he accomplished while catching passes during his 16 seasons with the Raiders.

We recently caught up with the Raiders legend to discuss an upcoming celebrity golf tournament he and his wife are hosting, as well as several topics related to his old team. Brown opened up about the current state of the Raiders during the 2025 NFL season, along with rookie Ashton Jeanty, quarterback Geno Smith, head coach Pete Carroll, tight end Brock Bowers, the division rival Kansas City Chiefs, his favorite Raiders teammate, and much more.

Q: Ashton Jeanty is the next Raiders player who was drafted No. 6 overall. What have you thought about the rookie running back? Because he’s kind of getting a hard time right now, just three games in. Obviously, that’s such a small sample size. But what have you thought about Jeanty so far?

Brown: “Well, look, he should be getting a hard time, but it’s not his fault.

I mean… The offensive line? I mean, the offensive line has not given him an opportunity to even get to the line of scrimmage. I was watching the game the other day, and my wife, who obviously, she likes football because of… I mean, I hope she does. You know what I mean? But she doesn’t watch a lot of football with me, unless it’s Notre Dame or something like that.

But I was watching the game, and I was like, ‘Baby, come here.’ And I rewind this, and I just said, I want you to just tell me what you think, right? And it was a couple of plays where Jeanty was trying to run the ball, and he was getting hit by not one, not two, but three guys in the backfield. And her limited understanding of football, she was like, ‘That don’t look right.’

She was like, ‘That shouldn’t be happening.’ You know what I mean? So, I mean, it’s unfortunate for him right now that the offensive line is just not cooperating with what needs to happen. And until that happens, man, until they decide that they’re going to make this running game go, it’s going to be tough for him.

Because you think about him, that’s probably different from a lot of other running backs. Because he’s such a small guy, he really needs to get that momentum going. If he gets caught in the backfield, he’s so light, they can just grab him, put him on the ground.

But if he gets that momentum going now, he can lower that elbow on somebody and break a tackle. But he just hasn’t had many opportunities, man. So, I hope that things will change.

Well, look, if the Raiders are going to do anything this year, that has to change. And hopefully, they’re working on that right now.”

So that’s what you’d say, the No. 1 thing the Raiders have to change? 

“It was the biggest issue for the Raiders right now. So it’s just the offensive line? Yeah, I think, look, man, I love my offensive line when we played, right? We didn’t have the best, we didn’t have the greatest offensive line, but we had a bunch of guys who were dogs, man. Cory Littleton, [Steve] Wisniewski, Lincoln Kennedy, these guys, man, they gave you everything they had, man.

And they were my best friends because I knew this, I could run the best route in the world. But if my quarterback is on his butt or running for his life, it don’t matter, right? I’m not getting involved. So I think from that standpoint, man, was having a good offensive line is where the thing starts and ends.”

That’s why I was going to talk about Geno Smith as well. Because he came out the gates, what was it, 300 and something yards? He looked pretty good, right? But he’s been running for his life the last couple of weeks. 

“And the thing about Geno is he is the ultimate pocket quarterback, or he wants to be anyway, even though he has the ability to run. And I think what has to happen, I think he’s going to have to get out of the pocket and run a little bit more. Because right now he’s a little too stationary.

And if they know you’re going to be seven yards deep or 10 yards deep in the middle of the field, in the middle of the offensive line, then it’s a lot easier for them to plan things and put you in that bucket or in that closet, man, where you can’t get out of. And so I would hope that they’re thinking about moving the pocket with him, let him do some more runs, I mean, some more passes on the run. And sometimes he’s got to turn a third and four into a quarterback draw.

It may be a pass call, but if they’re playing man-to-man, I mean, that was a beautiful thing about Rich Gannon, man. If it was third and four, and he saw man-to-man, and I saw man-to-man, I knew that I was pretty much blocking for Rich Gannon. Because as soon as he had a break, he was going to come right off my butt if I was running underneath to get that first down, especially if it’s third and less than five.

So I think in those situations, he really has to put himself in a mindset, if this guy’s not open right away, I need to get out of the pocket and go get the first down.”

How do you feel about Pete Carroll? He’s got a tough job to do right now, especially with everything. It’s been like a revolving door at head coaches for years now. And he’s not getting any younger, right? He’s the oldest coach in the league.

“He seems to have a lot of energy, man. You see the guy running up and down the line of scrimmage.

So that doesn’t seem to be an issue, man. And as long as he has the energy to do it, you know he has the ability to coach. Those skills never leave. The coaches are always going to have the ability to coach you up. So I just think it’s all about his energy level, man.

I hear the practices are lively with him. I’ve seen the footage. You just got to get the right people in place, man, and get this thing done at this particular point.

And one of the main issues I think we have in offense is that we don’t really have a No. 1 receiver.”

What do you think of the Raiders’ receivers? Because Tre Tucker has balled out with a three touchdown day, but he’s the only one that really kind of did anything in the passing game, right?

“And Jacobi [Meyers] obviously is a good veteran receiver. I hate to label him as a possession receiver, but I mean, he showed a little burst. I caught a couple of passes over the middle, and I saw a little burst with him. So, really, something that I’ve seen since he’s been with the Raiders, I believe. But the guy’s legs are lively. I think you’ve got to get these guys in the right position. Obviously, in our passing game, they want to go through Brock [Bowers]

I think everybody understands that, including the defense; they understand it too. But I think that, yeah, we got to have a guy on the outside, man, to come up as that number one, to make it easier for everybody else to do what they have to do.”

Do you think Brock Bowers is a generational talent at tight end?

“Yeah, I think he is one of the best guys I’ve seen come out in a while.

I mean, his ability to run routes. I mean, [Travis] Kelce, I don’t know even how to explain his route running because, you know, I think they just got to the point where they just say, look, I’m going to go up 10 yards and then I’ll make a decision what I’m going to do once I get up there, right? Because if a guy’s inside, they go outside. If a guy’s outside, they go inside. If there are two, if the guy, if they go zone, they just hook it up, right? So you’re not really running routes.

So they’re just on a level that he can play for any other quarterback or any other team right now, because they’d be like, bro, I need you to go 10 and out. And he’s like, no, he would be freaking out. I think Brock right now, man, his ability to literally run routes, I think it’s a beautiful thing.

Now, the one thing I would love to see them do a little bit more with him is right now, it seems like a lot of his stuff is outside the numbers, outside the hashes is to get him, you know, 10, 12 yards in the middle of the field, you know, make it a lot easier for anybody, for him, for everybody, for him and the quarterback, you know? Yeah, well, he’s dealing with that knee issue too, right? So I think that’s slowing him down a little bit. And obviously, Geno has no time, right? So that’s not, that’s not helping either.”

You did mention Travis Kelce. Do you think the Kansas City Chiefs are cooked?

“I’m gonna pretty much quote Kelce here from a couple of years ago, we were at a golf tournament in Tahoe. And he came up, we were talking, man, I was congratulating him on winning the championship or whatever. And somebody and somebody else were in the conversation.

And he just said, ‘Hey, look, guys, let me tell you all something. If 15 (Patrick Mahomes) is on the field, we got a shot. We got a shot to win. Just don’t matter what the situation is. If he’s on the field, we got a shot.’

And certainly you see that you see that in his play this year. I mean, he’s playing a lot more physical football than I think I’ve ever seen a quarterback play a guy of his size. He’s not a super athletic guy, but I’m seeing him take on DBs, you know, not running out of bounds and literally dropping his shoulder. And that’s a little craziness. Well, I mean, if I was on his team, I’d be like, ‘Bro, I don’t know what’s going on with this macho thing is you going through, but I need for you to chill out and run your butt out of bounds.’

So we won’t be piling you up off the field one of these times. So, but you know, so to answer your question, man, I know I, you can’t count that team out, man. As long as they have that guy throwing balls to everybody.”

Is it weird, Tom Brady being part of the organization after the Tuck Rule and all that stuff?

“I mean, you know, even though the tuck rule was 24 years ago, it is very weird. Yes.

It’s very, very weird. A lot of Raiders fans have come to me like, ” I have a say-so in this deal. A lot of people just don’t like it, but you know, you have to know Mark Davis and what he’s looking for. I think Tom presented a package to him that, you know, he couldn’t turn down.

It wasn’t about the money. It’s not about the money. It’s about people. It’s about the resources that Tom travels with for the most part. I think that’s what he felt would be a big benefit for the team going forward. Just got a couple more for you, man.”

Favorite Raiders teammate all time?

“I think without a doubt, I’m thinking about this only because I was thinking how I was going to say it, but Marcus Allen, without a doubt. I played five years with him, and he literally taught me how to play the game on a professional level.

Just watching how he handled certain situations. Both good and bad. And, but how he, no matter what he was going through, no matter how great it was or how bad it was, he was always the team leader and always spoke from a position of the team and never from a personal point of view. And when you’re a guy of that stature, you can say what you want to say and people, ‘Hey, well, it’s Marcus Allen.’

He can say what he wants to say. But by doing that, he would have brought more attention to himself and not to the team. And, he was never about that.

It was remarkable to me to see him go through some of the things he went through. And never complained about it. Never, ever complained about it.’

Not knowing when he left, a lot of that was going to come on me, which it did. It wasn’t tough for me because I had already had the blueprint of how to handle it. And you prepared you for it.”

I heard a story. You tried to fix a hamstring injury with an inner tube during a game?

“It wasn’t me. It was a Raiders trainer. Yeah. I mean, how crazy does that sound?

With a bicycle inner tube. They taped it to my butt and to my calf. And I played, I scored against the [New York] Giants. I scored on a 65-yard touchdown.”

I bring that up because I think it’s a strange kind of thing in professional sports over the last couple of years that Achilles injuries have just been running rampant. It’s like you saw [Austin] Eckler go down. And then it was Najee Harris. In the NBA, with those three superstars going down: Damian Lillard, Tyrese Halliburton and Jayson Tatum, all within a month. 

Do you remember if it happened a lot when you were playing, and what do you think is the reason for it?

“Not, not a lot. I mean, I, I, I can’t remember, and I’m sure it happened, but I really can’t remember one guy tearing his Achilles, you know, my 16 years with the Raiders.

I mean, we had some knee injuries, but not Achilles, but I think personally, what I believe is that back in the day, we played a lot of different sports. We weren’t football players or basketball players or baseball players. We were basketball players, during basketball season, football, during football season and track or whatever, you know, during the spring months.

I think now with so much focus on basketball, basketball, basketball, football, football, football, that’s all you do. I built a racquetball court in my house. When I was in the 90s, when I built that house, I don’t remember when I built that house, but I’m not in that house anymore. But I did that because I had been playing racquetball for years and realized how great it was for me to do what I needed to do. As far as running routes, because when you’re playing racquetball, you’re running at that ball, that ball doesn’t move. It doesn’t move at all.

I think all that training sort of gets your body ready to do all the crazy stuff that you may have to do on a football field. But if you don’t prepare yourself for that, and all you’re doing is running football routes, running routes all the time. Running routes, running routes, then when you get in that weird position on the football field, on the football, in a game, which is going to happen, then, you know, it’s very easy for these things to happen.

So that’s my thoughts on it, man. That’s what I believe. I believe that these guys are becoming one sport guys, and that’s all they do in offseason.

I think because of that, you’re seeing a lot of guys just wearing those muscles, same muscles down, and it gets to the point where they snap on.”

Is there a wide receiver in the league that reminds you of you? And who do you think is the elite of the elite receivers in the league right now?

“I’m going to say no, only because most of the receivers these days who are doing their thing are guys who are outside guys. The [Justin] Jeffersons, the Ja’Marr Chase, Devante Adams. Puka [Nacua] is just a beast.  I don’t know what category you put him in.

He’s in his own category. But I guess, he, more than anybody, did what I did because he does 90% of his work in the slot. And that’s what I did.

I mean, most of the time, especially when Jerry [Rice] got there, I was in the slot 99% of the time that we lined up. So I think from that standpoint, most of these guys are outside guys and they’re able to do what they did. I was in there with the linebackers and safeties, man, you know, bumping in with the big shoulder pads, all that stuff, looking like a mini tight end or something.”