5 takeaways from the Raiders’ blowout loss to the Patriots
By John Buhler
This is not a well-coached football team in Oakland.
To beat an elite team like New England, you have to play your best type of ball. Oakland had two weeks to get ready for the Patriots, but it didn’t look like they put in the work schematically. The Raiders do have talented sprinkled across the gridiron, but it’s safe to say that this is not a well-coached football team.
We will start with the defense. Even though they have been undermanned in the secondary pretty much all season, we are seeing no adjustments in the back-end of this awful Raiders’ defense. Tom Brady got to put the ball wherever he wanted to in the passing game, as he was rarely pressured.
Offensively, this team can only go as far as the passing game allows itself to. The dropped passes are starting to border on the line of ridiculous. It’s either bad ball placement by Carr or a lack of attention to detail by the receiving corps. Frankly, a lack of attention to detail defines this 2017 Raiders team.
What has been most troubling is that we’re not seeing players getting better as the season progresses. One would think that the coaching staff would put its players in better positions to succeed. If you don’t adjust versus New England, you’re going to lose and that’s exactly what happened.