Las Vegas Raiders vs Washington 2021 Week 13: Studs and Duds
Duds – Greg Olson and Derek Carr
There was plenty of blame to go around for this offensive performance but it has to be equally shared by both Derek Carr and Greg Olson. Coming into this game, Washington had the 30th ranked passing defense in yards allowed and the 3rd ranked rushing defense in yards allowed.
So how do Greg Olson and Derek Carr decide to attack their defense? They went horizontal trying to beat Washington out on the edge of the defense rather than attacking vertically which has been the strength of the Raiders offense.
On the first drive of the game, the Raiders came out throwing but on a 2nd and long, they ran with Jacobs to try and set up a 3rd and short but could not execute and had to punt. This was a consistent theme as they kept trying to run the ball on 2nd and long rather than continuing to be aggressive and keep the ball in Carr’s hands.
Carr’s raw numbers look good on paper as he finished the day 28-38 for 249 yards and 2 rushes for 24 yards but the team’s inability to score touchdowns in the red zone doomed them once again. The Raiders had trouble moving the ball in general but settling for field goals at home against the 24th ranked scoring defense in the NFL is just not acceptable.
The worst case of this failure is when the Raiders were driving to score the go-ahead touchdown or field goal and they failed to get in the end zone. A few big plays got them down to the Washington 20 and what followed was a short run by Josh Jacobs, a screen to Peyton Barber, and a deep shot to Zay Jones that fell incomplete.
It was poor execution in the biggest drive of the game as the screen to Barber was late when it could have been a big gain and an overthrow to Jones in the endzone who was relatively open. The Raiders and Carr have been bad at the little things this season and that drive was indicative of that as better execution could have let the Raiders run down the clock and score the go-ahead touchdown or field goal and left Washington with no time to come back.
It was a poor performance all around and is inexcusable at this point in the season.