{"id":663082,"date":"2026-05-24T23:07:11","date_gmt":"2026-05-24T23:07:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/663082\/"},"modified":"2026-05-24T23:07:11","modified_gmt":"2026-05-24T23:07:11","slug":"who-was-that-guy-raiders-beat-writer-says-surprise-o-lineman-stood-out-at-otas","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/663082\/","title":{"rendered":"“Who Was That Guy?” Raiders Beat Writer Says Surprise O-Lineman Stood Out at OTAs"},"content":{"rendered":"

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The Raiders kicked off OTAs this week and arguably the biggest storylines of the first few days involved the offensive line.<\/p>\n

Rookie offensive tackle\/guard Trey Zuhn seems be in play to start at three positions along the offensive line and Spencer Burford might have an early leg up on Jackson Powers-Johnson and Caleb Rogers to start at one of the guard spots. <\/p>\n

Burford signed a one-year deal with the Raiders in the offseason and is entering his fifth NFL season. But he\u2019s a relative unknown to Raider fans. <\/p>\n

Even members of the media are trying to figure out what Burford brings to the table this year, and the former fourth-round pick made a unique impression on at least one media observer at Wednesday\u2019s OTA session. <\/p>\n

Silver & Black Sports Network\u2019s Jesse Merrick was a guest on the Raiders\u2019 flagship radio station on Thursday, and said Burford\u2019s athleticism stood out among his peers. <\/p>\n

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\u201cWe\u2019re at the stage right now where we\u2019re just now seeing the team out there with our own eyes and getting used to who\u2019s in what numbers and everything. On one of the running plays, and I forget what number he is off the top of my head, but I remember thinking like, \u2018Whoa, wait, who was that guy?’\u201d Merrick said on Raider Nation Radio\u2019s JT the Brick Show<\/a>. <\/p>\n

\u201cHe was moving for a big dude, and I looked him up, I was like, \u2018Oh, that\u2019s the new offensive lineman, Burford, they signed.’\u201d <\/p>\n

\u201cSo he caught my eye just in terms of the way that he\u2019s moving, which we all know is massive in this scheme, you know? His movement skills stood out to me. I understand who Tyler Linderbaum is and all this stuff and I hope no one takes this the wrong way. Burford caught my eye because of that movement more than any other offensive lineman in that particular moment and stretch of plays.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThe athleticism jumps off the page to me and I don\u2019t think it should be a massive shock that he\u2019s slotted in right now. Let\u2019s say May 21st as like a quote unquote starter, if you will, because he\u2019s got familiarity in this offense, with this staff, all those different things. And outside of that, it\u2019s young guys and Caleb Rogers that needs to prove who he is to this staff.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Message from inside the building seem to be that expectations are high for Burford among the coaching staff. <\/p>\n

Sports Illustrated insider Hondo Carpenter was the first to say he thought Burford would be in the starting lineup this year, and the California Post\u2019s Vinny Bonsignore added to that sentiment on Thursday. <\/p>\n

\u201cThey started the session, if you want to talk about the starting five that first went out there, Spencer Burford was at one of the guard spots,\u201d Bonsignore said on Raider Nation Radio\u2019s Morning Tailgate<\/a>. \u201cDoing some digging around, there\u2019s a real expectation inside the building that he\u2019s probably going to claim one of the starting jobs at guard. So what does that mean for Jackson Powers-Johnson? What does that mean for Caleb Rogers?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWhy Spencer Burford? There\u2019s a couple of reasons why he\u2019s looked at pretty favorably within the Raiders. Number one, he\u2019s only 25 years old. He\u2019s started on a Super Bowl team with the 49ers\u2026 but he also has plenty of experience playing in this offense. I think that\u2019s one of the big keys to all of this is that he comes from the offense that Klint Kubiak is running up there in San Francisco\u2026 and that included a year where Klint Kubiak was one of the key offensive assistants with the 49ers. So there\u2019s familiarity there. There\u2019s experience, a lot of starting experience, he\u2019s also just 25 years old and he has plenty of playing time in this particular offense.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI thought right off the bat, for me, that those two developments, Zuhn playing right tackle and Spencer Burford being one of the starters and could be in line to be one of the starters, jumped out.\u201d<\/p>\n

x: @raidersbeat<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Raiders kicked off OTAs this week and arguably the biggest storylines of the first few days involved…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":663083,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[63],"tags":[349,99],"class_list":["post-663082","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nfl","tag-nfl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/663082","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=663082"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/663082\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/663083"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=663082"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=663082"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=663082"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}