Josh Jacobs joined the Green Bay Packers in 2024 after spending his first five years with the Las Vegas Raiders. He was part of the running back resurgence last season and made the Pro Bowl.
Things are going well in Green Bay, Wis., but Jacobs recently told a weird story about how his time as a Raider ended.
Josh Jacobs Tells a Strange Story About a Raiders Staffer
The then-Oakland Raiders then selected Jacobs in the first round of the 2019 NFL Draft. He finished second in Offensive Rookie of the Year voting after totaling 1,150 yards and seven touchdowns while adding 20 catches and 166 receiving yards.
A steady performer once the team moved to Las Vegas, Jacobs was named first-team All-Pro in 2022 after leading the league in rushing yards with 1,653. He scored 12 rushing touchdowns and added 53 catches for 400 yards that year.
The Raiders didn’t pick up his fifth-year options heading into that season, and put the franchise tag on him the following offseason rather than giving him a big contract.
He played 2023 on the one-year, $12 million franchise tag and missed the final four games because of a quad injury. He finished the season with just 805 yards and six rushing touchdowns.
Jacobs tested free agency and signed a four-year, $48 million contract with Green Bay, but this came after a strange interaction with a Raiders staffer. The running back detailed his encounter on a recent “Bussin’ With The Boys” episode.
This is WILD…
Apparently Josh Jacobs caught a former Raiders staffer trying to secretly record a call with a reporter right before he was set to sign his 5th-year option pic.twitter.com/MS4sMrC9TQ
— Bussin' With The Boys (@BussinWTB) May 6, 2025
Jacobs said, “What’s crazy is when they were trying to get me to come sign, this is crazy. Before I came to sign, me and Maxx [Crosby] on the phone. Maxx trying to make it work. He was like, ‘Man, please. Just come.’ So we come up there, and we got like an hour left before we gotta sign the paper on the deal.
“Me and Maxx is in the car. Dude comes up to my car, and he’s talking to us, but he’s moving his phone around. He’s on the phone with an interviewer. Literally on the phone with a reporter while he’s talking to me. I know it’s one reporter over there, any time he had anything to say and it’d be like, ‘Where people getting this information from?’ I’m like it’s coming from them,” Jacobs said.
“It was just a weird situation, bro. It has nothing to do with the Raiders organization. It’s more so the people that they had in there at the time. And you know what made it worse, I seen it and I didn’t say nothing. Maxx was like, ‘Bro, did you see who he was on the phone with?’ I said, OK, so I’m not tripping. That’s when I knew the relationship was over with.”
Jacobs is happy to be out of Las Vegas and proved it in his first year with the Packers. He posted 1,329 yards (6th-most in the league) and was second in the NFL with 15 rushing touchdowns. He added 36 catches, 342 yards, and his first career receiving score.
This was a bizarre situation that Jacobs experienced, and is not a good look for Las Vegas. Raiders fans should be hoping that Pete Carroll and Tom Brady clean up this nonsense.