ALAMEDA, Calif. -- Lost in the morass of the Oakland Raiders packing up their locker room Sunday following their season-ending loss in Houston a day earlier was this nugget:
Backup quarterback Matt McGloin, who is to become an unrestricted free agent, told the Associated Press he was looking to go "somewhere where they will give me a chance to compete for a starting role" in free agency.
Well, that would seem to eliminate Oakland. Derek Carr, and the surgically repaired fibula in his right leg, is the face of the franchise and Connor Cook was chosen over McGloin, and his banged-up left shoulder, to start the Raiders' first playoff game in 14 years.
Predictably, it did not go well for Cook, whose 8.3 Total QBR was the lowest of any quarterback in the opening weekend of the playoffs. Cook completed just 40 percent of his passes, the second-worst completion percentage in Raiders postseason history, behind Daryle Lamonica's 38.5 percent in the 1969 AFL title-game loss to Kansas City.
The three other worst completion-percentage postseason games in franchise history: Marc Wilson (40.7) in the 1985 divisional round vs. New England, Jay Schroeder (41.9) in the 1990 AFC title game in Buffalo and Lamonica (42.6) in the 1968 AFL title game in New York against Jets.
Cook was also picked off three times and was sacked three times by the Texans' No. 1-ranked defense.
But as Carr said of Cook, "He won’t ever be in a tougher situation than he was then."
McGloin, with a chance to show he deserved to be in the conversation, flopped in the regular-season finale when he completed just six of 11 passes for 21 yards against Denver before getting knocked out of the game with an injured left (non-throwing) shoulder on a late hit by Jared Crick.
In seven starts with the Raiders, six in 2013, the undrafted McGloin, who was initially signed as a "camp arm" in 2013 out of Penn State, went 1-6, winning his first start at Houston. In fact, entering training camp that season, Oakland’s quarterback depth chart read: Matt Flynn, Terrelle Pryor, rookie fourth-round draft pick Tyler Wilson and then McGloin.
In 2014, the Raiders signed Matt Schaub and drafted Carr. They drafted Cook in 2016.
After the loss in Houston, coach Jack Del Rio said he contemplated switching Cook for McGloin at halftime, but his coaches told him changing quarterbacks would not have made much of a difference given all of the other problems going on around the position on offense.
McGloin, the highest-paid quarterback on the Raiders roster last season with a base salary of more than $2.5 million, was asked if he thought he could have played.
"It’s not my decision," he told reporters, per the San Jose Mercury-News. "It doesn’t really matter what I do, what I think.
"You always want to get in there, want to play. That’s why we have team doctors, that’s why we have trainers that are looking out for the best interests of you and the best interests of the team."
