Dennis Allen became the 18th coach in Raiders history on Jan. 30 when new general manager Reggie McKenzie hired him to replace Hue Jackson. At 39, Allen is the NFL’s youngest coach. On the eve of his team’s first training camp practice, Allen took part in an informal Q&A session Sunday with a handful of reporters who cover the team. Here are some of the highlights:
Question: Was assistant offensive line coach Steve Wisniewski’s departure something you knew was coming for awhile? Did it catch you by surprise, and did you think about adding a second line coach?
Allen: “No. 1, is, yeah, it was a little bit of a surprise. Obviously he has his personal reasons as to why he made that decision. I will say this -- it was totally his decision. It was nobody else’s decision. We thought about whether or not to bring somebody in or not, and we just felt like at this point, this late in the game, that the right thing for us to do is to stick with the coaches that we have and go forward, and I have every confidence in the world in Frank Pollack as an offensive line coach. Being able to watch him throughout the OTAs and minicamp, he did a great job and he’ll do a great job coaching the offensive line.”
Q: Are you comfortable for now with what you’re going with at running back behind Darren McFadden? There has been some outside speculation that Cedric Benson or somebody like that could be headed here to have a heavy-legged replacement for Michael Bush. Are you comfortable with the situation as it is now?
Allen: “Yeah. That’s what we have, and that’s who we’re going with. Mike Goodson’s been a guy that – a couple of years ago in Carolina we got a chance to play him a couple of times, and he did a nice job as a replacement there. Obviously Taiwan (Jones) is an explosive back. So, the key is hopefully is that we’re able to keep Darren healthy and then if we’re able to do that we’re going to be just fine.”
Q: What did you learn about Carson Palmer during the OTAs and the offseason that maybe you didn’t know before?
Allen: “No. 1 is he’s extremely smart. He’s a great leader. He’s way more athletic than anybody gives him credit for. And he loves the game of football. This guy, he’s a competitor and he wants to be great. He’s done everything you could possibly want your quarterback to do.”
Q: Does that give you a sense of confidence going into a season with a quarterback you feel that way about?
Allen: “Yeah. This is a quarterback-driven league. For you to sustain success in this league you’ve got to have a good one, and I think we do. So yeah, I think that gives you a lot of confidence.”
Q: With the penalty issue, do you hammer that from Day 1 or kind of take a wait and see approach?
Allen: “We’ve already talked to them about it. I’ve already tried to show them through different visual aids how that has an effect on winning and losing football games. And we’ll monitor that situation as we go through practices and we’ll make whatever moves we need to try and hammer that point home and make sure they understand it’s costing us games so we can’t have it.”
Q: Do you feel ready for your first camp?
Allen: “Yeah. Jacked up about it. We’re ready. It’s a start of a long journey and we’ll take it -- and I know this is cliché -- but we’ll take it one day at a time. And we’ll attack whatever challenges come up on a day-by-day basis and deal with them and keep pushing forward.”
Follow Raiders reporter Eric Gilmore on Twitter: @CBSSportsNFLOAK.