Signed, sealed, and delivered, the Oakland Raiders have officially submitted and announced their 53-man roster to the NFL league office, and there are some surprises.

All throughout training camp and the preseason, Head Coach Jon Gruden and General Manager Mike Mayock knew they would eventually have some difficult decisions to make. It's a good problem to have when there's talent everywhere you look, but it's never easy letting someone go.

Following the initial roster being made public, Mayock hopped on a conference call with the local media to field questions regarding the team's decision to roll with the players they kept.

"I did all of it myself. I was cut three times and you have no idea how I empathize with these kids," Mayock said with a sobering tone. "Every cut was brutal, I had tears in my eyes with several of these kids. Every one of them handled it with class and distinction. My style is pretty much very direct, I told every one of them where I thought they were as a football player, and what I thought they needed to improve upon. They were all direct conversations, some longer than others. You're right, I've had to do some cutting before since I took this job there's been several moves — a lot of moves. The last two days for me has been emotionally draining because I know what those kids feel like sitting in that chair and I feel just as bad as they do."

It's the nature of the business, but no amount of experience can make telling someone they've been let go any easier. As the general manager of the Raiders, Mayock had gone through similar situations in the months prior with all the roster moves the team had made, but it's hard to prepare for cutting 37 players over the span of 24 hours.

Among the many to be released or waived, the team decided to part ways with tight end Luke Willson, linebacker Brandon Marshall, and wide receiver Keelan Doss, which may come as a shock to many; however, there's always the possibility the Raiders sign Doss, and some other familiar faces, to the practice squad. Mayock shared why Marshall — a Super Bowl champion — was among the first players to receive a call notifying him he'd been released.

"Brandon Marshall is a guy that took a while to get his flexibility and speed back," Mayock explained. "He worked through the OTAs and the early part of training camp, and we were just starting to see that burst that we're used to. I think what really happens is we're only going to keep four or five linebackers, which is the way the NFL is going these days because of the spread offenses. That fourth or fifth linebacker has got to be a special teams player, has got to be a core special teams player. And if Brandon wasn't going to be the first guy in on base and play a high percentage of snaps then we were going to need him to play almost all the special teams and we didn't really see that for him. Rather than try and force it we wanted to get him out the door early so he had the best opportunity."