Raiders: 5 toughest matchups of the 2022 regular season
By Sean Basile
Raiders: 5 toughest matchups of the 2022 regular season
Week 2 vs. Cardinals
Week 1 is going to funnel directly into whether or not this is a win or loss for the Raiders. Both of these teams have extremely tricky matchups in Week 1 that could leave them at 0-1 apiece. That means this could very well be a game where one of the (believed to be) better teams of this season can start 0-2.
The Cardinals get the Chiefs at home to start their year. Who knows how Mahomes and Andy Reid are going to respond to losing their best weapon in Tyreek Hill. That is a game I’m certainly not ready to lean either way on as of this moment. It can certainly go either way at this point, considering the storylines behind both teams heading into 2022- the Chiefs obviously losing Hill and the Cards battling with Kyler Murray in the extension department.
If the Cards lose that game, I might be inclined to think they come back in Week 2 and defeat the Raiders at Allegiant. The Raiders, after all, are 2-3 against Cards at home, lifetime.
If we want to line up the Raider and Cardinal rosters side-by-side, I’d argue the Raiders have the edge. But for me, what happens in Week 1 is going to feed directly into what happens in this matchup for the Raiders and determine who comes out on top.
I don’t know if the Raider secondary is going to be quite ready yet to hang with Kyler Murray. That’s really going to put the pressure on Derek Carr and the offense to come through and keep pace with the high-scoring of the Cardinals.
Derek can certainly pull it off, but that doesn’t mean this isn’t still one of the tougher matchups for the Raiders this season. Opening up against two offensive juggernauts back-to-back is not ideally what the Raiders want to do to begin their 2022 campaign.