Maxx Crosby sides with Gardner Minshew despite not being "good enough"
It's been a rollercoaster two weeks for Maxx Crosby and the Las Vegas Raiders. First, the Raiders beat last year's AFC Championship runner-up team, and then the following week were defeated by the team that was at the bottom of the league last season.
Gardner Minshew was blamed for the Raiders' woes and speculation ran wild that he would be replaced by Aidan O'Connell in the coming weeks. But the Raiders dismissed all rumors and said that the team is going to stick with Minshew.
In the latest episode of the "Let's Go!" podcast, which Bill Belichick and Maxx Crosby took over from Tom Brady, Crosby spoke about the situation and what he thought of Minshew:
"Gardner's our guy. We know that. Obviously, we love Aidan. You know, Aidan's a stud. He won, you know, helped us win a lot of games last year. But Gardner's our guy. At the end of the day, I just want to win Gardner's our quarterback is our captain, and he's done a hell of a job so far."
But Crosby admitted that Minshew's performance was far from perfect. But he didn't put all the blame on him. Instead, he said that the entire team as a whole was to be blamed for the loss against the Carolina Panthers.
"I mean, it wasn't perfect, it wasn't good enough, but it's across the board. It's not just Gardner, it's not just the O-line or receiver, whoever it is, you know, it's a collective group, you know, effort."
Antonio Pierce steps in for Maxx Crosby after Panthers loss
The edge rusher was limited to 82% of the snaps in the humiliating loss to the Panthers. He had been nursing a high ankle sprain ever since he injured it in the Raiders' victory over the Baltimore Ravens.
"Every time I go out there, I'm going to try to be out there with my teammates," Crosby said after the Panthers game.
When speaking about his star defensive end, coach Antonio Pierce defended him, saying:
"We didn't play bad because Maxx wasn't, like, Maxx [against Carolina], right? Maxx is still, at 80 percent, a lot better than any defensive end in the National Football League."
Instead, he blamed it on the lack of energy and passion of the team, collectively:
"Our effort, our energy, our passion, did not show up [Sunday] and that just can't always be 98."
As the Raiders prepare to take on the Cleveland Browns on Sunday, Maxx Crosby hasn't been ruled out as of now.