during the draft, made some changes to what information will be available in the room and then tried to simulate what it will be like when the team is on the clock for real starting Thursday night.“I’m going to have peo

SANTA CLARA Bo Jackson Jersey White , Calif. (AP) — When Kyle Shanahan was looking to get into the NFL as an assistant coach more than a decade ago, his father, Mike, called Jon Gruden and asked him to hire his son for an entry-level job in Tampa.Shanahan joined the Buccaneers as a quality control coach in 2004 on Gruden’s staff and got his introduction to pro football on a staff that featured five assistants who have gone on to get head coaching jobs in the NFL.“It was such a good place for me to go to because Jon was doing everything,” Shanahan said. “It wasn’t just his stuff. He was always on top of it with the film, which everyone is now because of the computers and everything, but he was one of the first guys doing that stuff, probably being a little bit younger than most guys at that time and just introduced me to pretty much every play known to man.”Now 14 years later, Shanahan gets his first chance to coach against his old boss when the San Francisco 49ers (1-7) host Gruden and the Oakland Raiders (1-6) on Thursday night.Gruden said he took great pride in that staff that featured Mike Tomlin, Rod Marinelli, Jay Gruden and Raheem Morris during Shanahan’s two seasons there in 2004-05. The Bucs won just five games the first season before winning the NFC South with an 11-5 record in 2005.“We had a lot of fun back in those days. The woodshed, I called it,” Gruden said. “People are going to take me to the woodshed here pretty soon, if we don’t get this thing going.”Both the Raiders and 49ers are struggling heading into this matchup, with Oakland losing three straight and San Francisco on a six-game skid.Shanahan has struggled without starting quarterback Jimmy Garoppolo, while Gruden’s return to the NFL has been rocky after nine seasons as a broadcaster at ESPN.But Shanahan believes Gruden will turn the Raiders around if given time and sees no signs that the game has passed him by.“Jon lives and dies football,” Shanahan said. “He never got away from it. He probably had even more time to sit and look at everything, and not get so caught up in his own team. The whole league’s evolved since then. It evolves year to year. But, you watch his system, he has a foundation of what he used to do and things like that, but he’s kept up with everything.”Here are some other things to watch:BEATHARD’S HEALTHThe 49ers could be forced to go with their third-string quarterback this week. Garoppolo went down with a season-ending knee injury in Week 3 and backup C.J. Beathard is questionable this week with an injured right wrist. The next man up is Nick Mullens, who has never taken a snap in the NFL. Mullens spent last season on the practice squad and was promoted after Garoppolo’s injury this year. He has impressed his teammates with strong play in the preseason and practice.“He’s a baller,” running back Matt Breida said. “He doesn’t let the game get too big for him. I think he’ll do a great job if he has to play this week.”DRIVE THE CARRRaiders quarterback Derek Carr is coming off perhaps his best game of the season, throwing for three touchdowns and running for a fourth score in last week’s loss to the Colts. Carr completed 17 straight passes at one point and thrived in his first game after leading rusher Marshawn Lynch went down with a groin injury and No. 1 receiver Amari Cooper was traded to Dallas. Receiver Brandon LaFell, who wasn’t targeted at all in his previous two games for Oakland, had three catches for 39 yards and a TD after getting the start in place of Cooper.“He’s friendly to the quarterback,” Carr said. “He always runs friendly routes. He can play with anybody. I’m glad that we had some time to work and all those things, but he’s the kind of guy that you can just throw him in and just play.”SAFETY DANCEThe Niners go into this game thin at safety. Starting free safety Adrian Colbert is on injured reserve with an ankle injury and San Francisco could be without its top two strong safeties as well. Starter Jaquiski Tartt (shoulder) and backup Antone Exum (concussion) are out this week. Jimmie Ward fared well last week at free safety after moving over from cornerback. San Francisco is thinner at strong safety with Tyvis Powell, who has never started a game, and rookie Marcell Harris, who could be activated from IR to make his debut, the main options.DYING RIVALRYThis will be the final scheduled meeting between these Bay Area rivals before the Raiders move to Las Vegas in 2020. The teams have rarely been successful in their 36 seasons as NFL neighbors here with both making the playoffs in the same year only four times in that span (1970, ’72, 2001, ’02). The teams have combined for a winning record just once in 2003 and are on pace for the worst record for a two-team market since the 1970 merger. ALAMEDA, Calif. (AP) — Mike Mayock is used to being under the spotlight on NFL draft weekend.As the lead analyst at NFL Network, Mayock spent so many hours on the air each draft for more than a decade analyzing prospects and critiquing picks made by the 32 teams that he sometimes even lost his voice before the weekend was over.Mayock’s vocal cords won’t get quite the same workout this year, but he will be under far more scrutiny when he takes center stage starting Thursday night in his new role as general manager of the Oakland Raiders.With three first-round picks (Nos. 4 https://www.raiderslockerroom.com/authentic-derek-carr-jersey , 24 and 27), as well as the 35th overall selection, few general managers have ever come into the draft with this many premium selections and this little experience making them.“I don’t really worry about it in all honesty,” he said. “The way I look at this thing, from a ‘how do people perceive me’ perspective, is a lot of people doubted that anybody should come out of the media and go be a GM for any team. I know that, and I get that, but at the end of the day here’s the deal, if we win everything will be fine and if we lose I’ll get fired, and I’m perfectly fine with that.”Mayock grew up around football as his father Mike Sr. was a coach at the Haverford School and the University of Pennsylvania.That taught him from a young age to watch football in a more analytical way instead of primarily as a fan and gave him some insight to the mindset of coaches, which has come in handy leading up to this draft.Mayock says he has spent countless hours with the Raiders position coaches and coordinators to learn what traits they look for in players and he understands that he must balance the desire of coaches to fill all the needs on a roster with the approach of a scout looking for the best available players.“That’s my guy. Mike and I, we go back to 20 years, 25 years, to when I was offensive coordinator of the Eagles,” coach Jon Gruden said.“You like to be around people that have similar interests. And unfortunately I don’t have any other interests other than football. Neither does Mayock. So we have a lot of fun talking about just every aspect of football, all the time. And his relentless effort, his enthusiasm, has energized the building and it’s a blast.”Mayock also has the perspective of a player, having been a safety at Boston College and playing briefly for the New York Giants where he learned under current Patriots coach Bill Belichick.After his brief career, Mayock went into commercial real estate while dabbling as a broadcaster covering local high school and college games in the New Jersey area. He advanced to do some CFL and college games for ESPN and CBS before finally getting his big breakthrough in 2004 when he was hired by the NFL Network as its draft analyst.Mayock quickly developed into a television star in that role, spending 14 years as a well-regarded draft analyst where coaches and executives around the league sought out his opinion as much as Mayock tried to gather information from them.Those pre-draft conversations are still happening but happening in a much different way.“I think when you are a coach’s son and you kind of grew up going from field to field to field, breaking down tape by the time you were 8 years old. I think the coaches and the scout’s kind of open up to me because of that around the league,” Mayock said.“Those relationships I value, but at the same point now it is a little bit different, and I think it’s already changed. We kind of lie to each other a little bit instead of just sitting there and opening up our draft boards.”Mayock knows this job is new to him and is spending the last few days preparing for whatever might come his way during the three days of the draft.Besides finalizing the team’s draft board, he worked out the smaller details, including reportedly sending home the team’s scouts in order to prevent any leaks coming out of the draft room.He also wanted to learn exactly where everyone will be sitting during the draft, made some changes to what information will be available in the room and then tried to simulate what it will be like when the team is on the clock for real starting Thursday night.“I’m going to have people calling in on the phones and trying to get Jon and I rattled and propose trades,” he said.“Let’s be honest, I haven’t done it before. So, if I’m going to evaluate myself, I have to make sure I’m prepared. There’s two minutes left on the clock and three phones are ringing and there’s a trade, what is the process? How are we going to react as a team? Where is everybody even sitting in the room? What’s the feedback? How quickly am I going to get the information on the trades and the point values?“So, there’s a whole bunch of stuff and I’ve kind of got it, I said to Jon, it’s game week. We want to get in there and practice our game plan no different than the team would for a Sunday game.”