Raiders podcast rewind: Wide receiver Rico Gathers

Editor’s note: Every Wednesday, as part of her “Vegas Nation: Takeaways” podcast, producer/videographer Heidi Fang talks to a Raiders player or personality. This week Fang talks to second-year wide receiver Rico Gafford. This has been edited for clarity and completeness.

HF: Rico, First off I’ve got to ask you what was it like opening Rico’s, your restaurant in your hometown of Des Moines, Iowa?

RG: Honestly, it was never my idea. It was my team. At first I’m like, I mean, that doesn’t seem like something I would do. But you know, they told me the ins and outs of it. They told me how we would pretty much run it, and I was on board for it. So they pretty much handle the business side of it, the marketing side and all that. Pretty much, I’m the face. So it’s great, now. It’s going very, very well.

HF: How did the coronavirus pandemic change your plans?

RG: Pretty much what we did was during the time when the city was locked down, we went in and just completely sanitized everything. Every day. We did it ourselves. We just went back over everything and continued to sanitize and make sure everything was clean. Make sure that once we opened we had everything in place so we could prevent COVID from reaching our door. What we do is make sure everyone wears masks.

HF: Do you have any concerns about how COVID-19 will affect the football season?

RG: I honestly feel like it’s hard for us to go out there and play without fans. We do it in practice all the time, but that’s a different scene. Like all of us are entertainers. We are literally out there for the fans. So for us to go out there and not have any fans, it’ll be different.

HF: With the addition of Henry Ruggs, the questions arises who is faster, you or Henry. If I read it correctly, at your pro day at Wyoming,you ran a 4.19-second 40-yard dash. That’s faster than the 4.27 Ruggs ran at the NFL combine. Do we need to have a footrace between you two?

RG: It’s a little bit crazy. I never owned that. Whenever someone asks me what I ran, I say 4.22 because that’s what the majority of scouts had. It was only one or two scouts that had 4.19. So I can’t claim that. But, sure, I would love to race Henry. I’m pretty sure we’re going to race anyways at practice.

HF: With the addition of rookies Ruggs and Bryan Edwards, how much do you think you can contribute to this offense?

RG: I honestly feel like it can create a lot on the field. Say me and Ruggs are out there at the same time. He’s on one side, I’m on the other side. We got Darren Waller on the inside, with Josh Jacobs in the backfield, like, how do you cover that? You can’t double-team Darren Waller and double-team Henry Ruggs at the same time and then just leave me single. It doesn’t work like that. So if the coaches were to put a combination like that together, it would be crazy. I feel like our front office has done a very good job with recruiting and getting the players that they want. And they’re getting players that they feel can make a difference, and I’m pretty sure we’re going to do that a lot this year.

Heidi Fang can be reached at hfang@reviewjournal.com. Download the Vegas Nation podcasts three times a week at www.LVRJ.com/podcasts.