Oakland Raiders LB Tahir Whitehead Supports Vontaze Burfict With Headwear

On the day that Vontaze Burfict’s suspension was handed down, the Oakland Raiders were caught by surprise. They expected some form of punishment and a fine, but losing the linebacker for the remainder of the season was far more severe than they predicted. However, his fellow players are striving to show support, as linebacker Tahir Whitehead showed on Wednesday when he posted a photo of himself in a Burfict hat.

When Burfict was suspended, there were many teammates upset about this decision. Quarterback Derek Carr talked at length about the decision during a press conference while Whitehead posted his thoughts on Twitter.

“This is straight bulls—,” Whitehead tweeted on Monday when news broke about Burfict’s pending suspension. “No way that hit calls for that. This s— getting out of hand.”

As Whitehead said in another tweet, he believes that the hit was not intentional. He saw Jack Doyle getting up and preparing to run when he was hit in the head in an unfortunate collision. Additionally, Whitehead says that Burfict is not the same player that people believe him to be.

Of the players on the Raiders defense, Whitehead may very well be the one most affected by Burfict’s suspension. When the former Bengals linebacker signed this offseason, he joined Whitehead in a very prominent role. The pair often discussed during Organized Team Activities the fact that they were dividing responsibilities in order to make this unit function far better.

Whitehead had played 99.7 percent of the snaps in his first season under defensive coordinator Paul Guenther, which gave him considerable experience. However, Burfict was far more experienced due to his many years working with Guenther in Cincinnati. Together, they were expected to form a talented tandem to lead this rebuilding defense.

“I think I’ve learned a great deal of the system,” Whitehead said in early June. “That experience last year, just basically playing 100 percent of the snaps really allowed me to grasp the system and understand the ins and outs of everything. Now when we are out there, I’m communicating with Vontaze, and he’s like, ‘ok, dang. You got it.’

“It’s not like either one of us, we’re taking on the brunt of the work, the whole thing. Taking on all that stress. We’re divvying it up. We’re just breaking it up to make it easier on everyone. Like, ‘you get this call, you handle these checks, I’ll handle the other.’ Then everything works a lot smoother.”

In these updated roles, Burfict was the man tasked with calling defensive plays. Guenther referred to him as the quarterback of the defense, which meant that he was in charge of getting everyone properly aligned. Now, that responsibility will fall upon Whitehead as he tries to account for the loss of Burfict.

Whether or not Whitehead is successful in this new role remains to be seen, but he will be continuing to represent his brother-in-arms in the coming weeks and months.