A Raiders “same-position” redraft reframes the 2023 class, and the No. 7 pick is the focal point

The offseason NFL conversation often turns into speculation, but one recent exercise focused on something more specific than mock drafts. A “same-position” redraft of the Las Vegas Raiders’ 2023 class keeps the original team positions for each selection while exploring alternative players who were still on the board at those times. The premise is simple: you do not get to change what position the Raiders chose, you only get to reconsider which player best fits that role.

The author frames the 2023 class as the first draft for Dave Ziegler and Josh McDaniels as established front-office and coaching leaders, with the additional context that the decisions came with a full year of preparation behind them. From there, the re-draft becomes a critique tool. Rather than judging the class only by its final roster outcomes, it asks whether the Raiders’ position choices locked them into underwhelming picks, or whether the original players could be replaced by closer-to-ceiling alternatives without changing scheme needs.

Round one drives the exercise’s most concrete line. At No. 7 overall, the original pick was EDGE Tyree Wilson. In the “same-position” redraft presented, the Raiders would instead take EDGE Tuli Tuipulotu, identified as the player the author would select based on who was available with that positional tag. The write-up also notes that the immediate surrounding selections included players such as Bijan Robinson, Jalen Carter, Darnell Wright, Peter Skoronski, and Jahmyr Gibbs, and that Devon Witherspoon went immediately before the Wilson slot. The underlying argument is not that the Raiders missed a random talent, but that the EDGE room could have been rebuilt in a different direction while preserving the original decision to draft an end.

The re-draft also emphasizes how the author treats “whiffs.” The concept allows any player to be selected, but it includes restrictions intended to keep the redraft rooted in reality, such as not selecting a player who would not have been available at the original pick. It also includes a rule against swapping out an option for one that would require assumptions about trades, and a limitation around “busted” first-round choices being too far down the value chain to be moved into later rounds. That is why the exercise reads less like wishful thinking and more like a position-by-position alternate draft board.

The broader 2023 class is discussed as one that includes players who remain with the team, alongside others the author believes would be part of the Raiders’ future under the redraft framework. Along with Tuipulotu, the author names multiple members of the original 2023 group in the introduction, including Michael Mayer and Byron Young, suggesting the project is meant to revisit the roster implications of each position pick, not just the top of the draft.

Even with those guardrails, it is still an analytical re-draft, not a league update. It does not represent a Raiders roster plan, a front-office statement, or an official assessment of 2023 outcomes. It is best read as a snapshot of how one evaluator thinks the Raiders’ 2023 draft could have been approached differently if the team stayed fixed on position requirements but tightened the player selection process.

Looking ahead, the only real “next step” is whether the Raiders’ actual personnel decisions continue to align with the positional identity the exercise assumes. For fans and analysts, exercises like this tend to matter because they highlight how much the draft is about availability and fit, not just about position. In Vegas, the first-round EDGE question remains the most actionable storyline, and it will continue to be revisited as roster construction and development narratives evolve.

If you want, I can also produce a version focused strictly on the “same-position” method and how it differs from standard mock drafts, using the same Raiders 2023 framework.