Gruden: Raiders ‘aren’t tanking’

Back-to-back lopsided losses have given Oakland five losses in six games. The Raiders have already traded away their best player, and there are reports that other key pieces could be dealt soon.

Very little has gone right in the first season of coach Jon Gruden’s second stint in Oakland. But as the Raiders left town for a bye week, Gruden had a message to his legion of critics calling 2018 a lost season in Oakland.

“I’ll say this — we aren’t tanking anything,” Gruden said Tuesday. “I hear the hatred out there, some of the rumors that we are tanking it to get a first-round pick or a higher pick. We are not getting up at 4 o’clock in the morning to tank it. Ain’t nobody tanking it. I don’t know who wrote that or who said that or who thinks that, but that isn’t the case here. We are going to continue to work hard, continue to build our team and that was part of the message.” registering 17 combined tackles.

But Johnson’s snap count went down in previous weeks in favor of 2017 fifth-round pick Marquel Lee, who takes over Johnson’s starting role.

In a corresponding move, the Raiders signed linebacker Jason Cabinda to the active roster from the team’s practice squad.

Raiders keep up morale

The Raiders seem to be maintaining a positive locker room, according to Jalen Richard. The third-year running back is looking to use the bye week as a time for the team to reset after its poor start.

“I try to talk to the guys and make sure nobody’s really worrying on this and that,” Richard said.

“To me, shoot, we’ve got food and we’ve got water at the house, so there’s nothing to worry about. It’s a high focus on just trying to turn this thing around, and, like I said, using this bye week to our advantage to really just clear out minds, come back and be ready to compete and just have fun and play ball.”

Contact Chris Booker at cbooker@ reviewjournal.com. Follow @ Bookerc94 on Twitter.