Las Vegas Raiders at Jacksonville Jaguars 2022 Week 9: Studs and Duds
Las Vegas Raiders at Jacksonville Jaguars 2022 Week 9: Studs and Duds
Dud – Josh McDaniels, Patrick Graham, and the entire coaching staff
The big stat that is going around this week is that the Raiders have given up three leads of at least 17 points this season, tying a record for the most times a team has done that in a season and there are still 9 games to go. The Raiders had previously done so just 5 times in 60 years from 1960 to 2021 but due to several factors have done it 3 times this year.
The primary factor among the multitude is the failure of the coaching staff to make the necessary adjustments and put the players in positions to succeed once those leads are in place. Whether it is an utter failure on defense to generate pressure and take down the QB or a failure on offense to put together scoring drives, the Raiders coaching staff has failed their players multiple times throughout this season.
As mentioned earlier, the defense is on track to be historically bad especially on third down and in the red zone and they fail to put up any resistance once the opposing offense gets rolling. Opponents’ drives either end with a rare turnover or an increasingly common touchdown and that gets very hard to match for an offense that is still coming together.
The Raiders have scored 23, 20, and 29 points in the games that they blew these leads in, and their offense, if you throw out the bizarro Saints game, has averaged over 24ppg which would be good enough for the top 10 in the NFL. Even with that goose egg on the board, the offense is 15th in points per game but it is damn near impossible to win with a defense that offers such little resistance on third down or in the red zone.
Even if the Raiders had beaten the Jaguars their playoff chances would still be slim but at the very least, they would have a chance coming into the back half of the season. Now, thanks to the failures of everyone from staff to players, they are staring at yet another wasted season and the prospect of having to blow everything up in the offseason.
Next. Las Vegas Raiders vs New Orleans Saints 2022 Week 8: Studs and Duds. dark
We came into this season with realistic expectations of a playoff berth and a team that had a chance to win every game but instead, we are looking at mock drafts and college prospects before we even hit Thanksgiving. This has been a quick and dramatic fall for a team that showed so much heart despite the off-field drama in 2021 but all of the goodwill from that season is gone and has been replaced with the bitter taste of constant disappointment.