The Las Vegas Raiders put together yet another hapless performance on Monday Night Football in Week 11. The Dallas Cowboys outclassed them in every facet of the game, as they practically sleepwalked to a 33-16 win, even though the game wasn't nearly as close as the final score indicated.
Chip Kelly and the offense were completely ineffective for the second straight game, as they scored just 7 points last week on Thursday Night Football against the Denver Broncos. National audiences, unfortunately, have had the displeasure of sitting through two straight abysmal Raiders outings.
Most find themselves puzzled when watching the Las Vegas offense, as seemingly nothing makes sense. Of course, things tend to be much harder than fans understand, but for the Raiders, they really aren't. This team just won't do what they're good at, and the fan base knows it.
Troy Aikman didn't hesitate to point out Raiders mind-boggling offensive play-calling
Apparently, so does ESPN's Monday Night Football announcer and former NFL quarterback Troy Aikman. At halftime of the broadcast, he said the quiet part out loud about the Raiders' play-calling, which has been a lingering nightmare throughout the 2025 NFL season.
"They threw the ball 90% of the time there in the first half. Hard to believe that this is a Pete Carroll-coached football team that ran the ball on called runs just three times," Aikman said. "Ashton Jeanty just two carries. ... I think we're gonna see more of the run game (in the second half). (But) they just can't hold up, as we saw in that first half, with that offensive line."
Aikman hit the nail on the head. It is completely nonsensical for Las Vegas to never run the ball, even with a patchwork offensive line. Against a high-powered Dallas offense, time of possession is key, and the Raiders just couldn't get anything going through the air, stopping the clock and continually giving the ball back to the Cowboys.
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Las Vegas ran the ball just four times in the first half, one of which was a Geno Smith scramble, so it wasn't even a designed run. According to the Associated Press's Josh Dubow, the team's four rushes in the first half were their fewest since 2008, and the second fewest since 1991.
Jeanty went two entire quarters of game time without running the ball, which just confounds reason. Their 8.8% run rate in the first half of the contest was the lowest such rate since Week 14 of the 2021 NFL season, according to NFL Next Gen Stats.
This wasn't just an issue on Monday; this has been a problem for the Raiders throughout the season. Las Vegas is seemingly unwilling to change its ways or make any adjustments, so it will continue to reap what it sows.