Dec 6, 2015; Oakland, CA, USA; Kansas City Chiefs wide receiver Jeremy Maclin (19) reacts after catching a touchdown pass against the Oakland Raiders in the fourth quarter at O.co Coliseum. The Chiefs defeated the Raiders 34-20. Mandatory Credit: Cary Edmondson-USA TODAY Sports
The Oakland Raiders do not deserve to be in the playoffs. They do not deserve to win their division. They don’t even deserve a Wild Card playoff spot in this awful year in which only 11 of 32 teams have winning records. Not after giving away Week 13’s game to the Kansas City Chiefs.
While there was some good to acknowledge against the Chiefs, there was much more bad and ugly left on the field by the Silver and Black. On the plus side, the Raiders defense played mostly strongly over the course of the game. The box score might indicate otherwise at a first glance, but many of the stats support Oakland’s defensive performance as being solid. The Raiders defense allowed only 232 total net yards from Kansas City’s offense. This breaks down into 89 yards rushing and an impressive 143 yards passing – including two forced fumbles for turnovers.
Certainly the four Kansas City touchdowns do not look good for Oakland, but two of those can more fairly be attributed to the offense. Out of 13 drives the Raiders defense only surrendered points on two drives in which Kansas City started outside of the Oakland 13 yard line. Despite some pretty atrocious tackling at times, the defense performed quite adequately.
Oakland’s offense, on the other hand, was sometimes very impressive & efficient, sometimes excruciatingly conservative, and sometimes downright amateur. Many of the mistakes of this offense are familiar and to be expected from a newly assembled team – dropped passes, confusion with routes, forced passes or bad reads. However, at this point in the season it is a struggle to see an offense with this much potential suffer from many of the same problems they dealt with in the preseason.
The first two offensive drives were a thing of beauty when it comes to play-calling. The entire first drive consisted of short passes and (mostly) inside runs. After marching right down the field to get the touchdown on their first drive, Musgrave followed up with a most aggressive approach for the second drive. On the second drive, Oakland attacked the secondary with mid-range and deep passes. It didn’t really stall until Cooper had the first of what would become many key drops by Oakland receivers in the game.
After the first two drives, it was much harder to tell what Musgrave was going for until they were behind at the end and had to push the ball downfield. It was almost as if the Raiders used the Bill Walsh strategy of planning out the first 10-15 plays of the game beforehand, but didn’t have a strategy for afterward. Even with some help from Kansas City defensive penalties (5 Raiders first downs came from KC penalties), the offense couldn’t get it done.
This game against Kansas City was a rollercoaster. At times the Raiders looked at their best. At times they looked at their worst. This week, we’ll look at it all in the film room: the good, the bad, and the ugly.
Next: The Good