Raiders at Broncos 2023 Week 1: Studs and Duds

The Las Vegas Raiders started their 2023 campaign with their seventh straight victory against the Denver Broncos. Here are the studs and duds from a Week 1 nail-biter.

Sep 10, 2023; Denver, Colorado, USA; Members of the Las Vegas Raiders and the Denver Broncos line up / Ron Chenoy-USA TODAY Sports

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Raiders Indiscipline - Dud

In a game where most things were nearly equal, the Raiders are lucky that the Denver Broncos are just as undisciplined as they are. It seems that no matter who the head coach is, the Raiders will struggle with boneheaded penalties, and they had their fair share of those today.

The Raiders and Broncos ended the game with 10 penalties each, but Las Vegas outdid them in penalty yards with 97 compared to Denver's 83. The costliest of these penalties was a foolish roughing the kicker penalty by young linebacker Luke Masterson which resurrected a Denver drive on fourth and 15. We always respect hustle, but Masterson has to be smarter than that in that situation, and the same can be said of a few other costly penalties.

Against a subpar offense like Denver, it’s not a fatal blow to give them a few extra plays, and even a couple of extra drives, but it could be disastrous against the better teams in the division and the conference. I’m sure we sound like a broken record at this point, but the Raiders as a team and organization need to make it a priority to cut down on these penalties.

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