former coordinator Tom McMahon being shown the door<\/a>. And the trio of Young, Olubi, and Heyward bodes well for DeCamillis\u2019 initial tenure as the special teams boss under Kubiak as each spent a majority if their time in the league in specialist roles.<\/p>\nYoung is no stranger to the Raiders\u2019 new head coach, having spent his first four years in the league with the Seattle Seahawks. His combination of size \u2014 6-foot-2 and 224 pounds \u2014 and speed \u2014 clocked a 4.47 40-yard dash time \u2014 the Lenoir-Rhyne product rarely got offensive snaps for Kubiak\u2019s offense but notched 156 snaps on special teams.<\/p>\n
Using his physical gifts, Young became a special teams mainstay and served as an imposing gunner on punt coverage and he\u2019s totaled 27 special teams tackles over his four-year career thus far, including a career-high nine stops in 2025.<\/p>\n
The 26-year-old wide receiver also made the most of his opportunities as a return man with 10 kickoff returns for 322 yards (32.2 yards per return average) this past season, including a long return of 60 yards and a 43-yard return in the Seahawks\u2019 Super Bowl LX win. Young was the gunner that recovered a muffed punt Seattle\u2019s NFC title win over the Los Angeles Rams, too.<\/p>\n
Flipping it back to Olubi, and the Raiders landed themselves a speed demon who plays with a frenetic energy on special teams. Clocking in a 4.45 40-yard dash time during San Diego State\u2019s Pro Day, his electricity is present when the linebacker is on the field.<\/p>\n
You saw Olubi blazing in and blocking Cole\u2019s punt above and that marked the second swatted boot in his career. The 26-year-old special teams maven paced the Indianapolis Colts with 11 special teams tackles in 2025 and has 30 stops over his four seasons in Indy. Alongside that, he\u2019s forced two fumbles and recovered two loose balls as a special teamer.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s that nose for the ball, determination, and energy that the Raiders didn\u2019t have enough of in the special teams room and Olubi\u2019s presence multiplies that exponentially as he is the fleet-footed maniac to go alongside incumbent linebacker, thumper, and special teamer Tommy Eichenberg (who led the Raiders in special teams tackles in 2025).<\/p>\n
Olubi notched the most special teams snaps off the new trio with 362 in 2025 and 1,095 total in his four years in the league. In comparison, Young totaled 156 special teams snaps this past season and 697 total in four seasons while Heyward notched 290 snaps in 2025 and 1,124 in his four years with the Pittsburgh Steelers.<\/p>\n
Speaking of the 27-year-old Heyward, he\u2019s expected to make a full-time transition to fullback with the Raiders after playing hybrid H-back (fullback and tight end) role with the Steelers. And the fullback spot is a position that Kubiak holds near and dear to his heart.<\/p>\n
Heyward himself, holds special teams near and dear to his own heart.<\/p>\n
In Pittsburgh, Heyward served as the personal protector for the punter and was a productive member of the kickoff and punt coverage groups. While \u201csmaller\u201d at 6-feet and 230 pounds, the Michigan State product is a physical and tenacious tackler racking up nine special teams stops in 2025 (28 total for his career) along with a fumble recovery this past season.<\/p>\n
Expect Heyward to play for both Kubiak on offense and DeCamillis on special teams. And don\u2019t be surprised if his participation rate on DeCamillis\u2019 units being higher than on offense.<\/p>\n
But it\u2019s refreshing to see Spytek and Co. bolster all three phases of the Raiders\u2019 game in the early portion of free agency. The trio in their mid 20s should foster competition and turn around a Silver & Black special teams group in dire need of improvement. Free agency continues and there\u2019s also the 2026 NFL Draft in late April which provides the Raiders more opportunities to improve the roster.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The additions of center Tyler Linderbaum and linebackers Nakobe Dean and Quay Walker provide a tremendous boosts to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":824135,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2065],"tags":[7,1744,393,5050,4242,2455,2454,6,525],"class_list":{"0":"post-824134","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-las-vegas-raiders","8":"tag-football","9":"tag-las-vegas","10":"tag-las-vegas-raiders","11":"tag-las-vegas-raiders-free-agency","12":"tag-las-vegas-raiders-roster","13":"tag-lasvegas","14":"tag-lasvegasraiders","15":"tag-nfl","16":"tag-raiders"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/116264369119299673","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/824134","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=824134"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/824134\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/824135"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=824134"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=824134"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=824134"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}