5 reasons Oakland Raiders will beat Tennessee Titans
By John Buhler
Innovative offensive play-calling
Oakland opted to make a change at offensive coordinator this offseason. Moving on from Bill Musgrave in favor of former Raiders quarterbacks coach Todd Downing was done to help add innovation to a growing Oakland offense.
From what we saw in the preseason, Downing does seem to have a knack for being a creative play caller. Of course, he did pull out every trick in the book during the preseason, but we did see the occasional end-around and the tight ends get more involved in the passing game.
The best way to describe the Downing’s offense thus far would be “free-flowing”. It allows his guy Carr to have more on-field creative freedom to work his magic at the quarterback position. Carr has a bit of that Aaron Rodgers improvisational flair. However, Mike McCarthy isn’t always keen on Rodgers’ innovative playing style while Downing almost embraces it coming out of Carr.
Tennessee’s offense is sound, but Titans head coach Mike Mularkey doesn’t seem to allow the same level of freedom to Mariota as Downing does Carr. Besides, it’s not Mariota’s quarterbacking style, as he comes from the up-tempo spread in college, striving for efficiency. If Carr loves playing in this offense of Downing’s, then we’re going to love watching him go to work on Tennessee on Sunday.