Jon Gruden is bringing the Over The Hill Gang back together.

Gruden has assembled the oldest 53-man roster in the NFL in years.

Jimmy Kempski of PhillyVoice.com Braydon Coburn Jersey , who has been calculating the average age of every opening-day NFL roster since 2012, reports that the Raiders’ average age of 27.4 years is the oldest roster as far back as his records go.

It’s been a strange offseason for Gruden, the head coach who also has final say over personnel. He has targeted several older players in free agency Colt McCoy Jersey , and acquisitions of younger players, like 26-year-old receiver Martavis Bryant, haven’t panned out.

The decision to trade away pass rusher Khalil Mack has been widely criticized by Raiders fans Mario Lemieux Jersey , although that trade did bring in two first-round draft picks. Gruden needs those picks, because he’s going to need some young talent when all his older players reach the end of the line.

Jets rookie quarterback Sam Darnold got a nice review of his work from one of the team’s older players at the position on Tuesday and it was offensive coordinator Jeremy Bates’ chance to talk about the third overall pick’s progress.

The word was once again positive. Bates said that Watching Darnold “execute football on the practice field is pretty exciting” and that the rookie has “been able to handle” everything the team has thrown his way since the draft in April. He also made it clear that they’ve been throwing everything they can in his direction.

“Are we giving him bits and pieces of the offense or are we throwing everything at him? We鈥檙e throwing everything at him,” Bates said Montae Nicholson Jersey , via Manish Mehta of the New York Daily News. 鈥淚f he can handle it, if he can prove that he鈥檚 the starter, then that will take place when the time comes.”

However much Bates and company have come up with the last couple of months patrick mahomes stitched jersey , there’s only so much a team can throw at a quarterback in OTAs and minicamp before the lack of contact and opposition forces them to a ceiling.

Before any serious thought can be given to Darnold starting a game in the regular season, he’ll have to show he can handle what other teams are throwing at him in the preseason. The Jets kick off that portion of their schedule on August 10 against the Falcons.

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