How the determined Raiders can break through in their second season in Las Vegas
Maxx Crosby lounged on patio furniture during a recent afternoon in the backyard of his Henderson home, as tranquil as the waterfall pouring in the pool behind him.
The third-year defensive end showed no signs of the intensity that’s made him a fan favorite, if not potential franchise cornerstone, with the Las Vegas Raiders until one question slightly snapped him out of peaceful state. Crosby was in no mood to discuss why this upcoming year was going to be different, much less how the Raiders were going to breakout after a string of disappointing seasons.
“There’s so much talking,” Crosby said. “It sounds cliché to say this year is going to be different, so there’s nothing I really have to say. I just want everyone to tune in and see.”
Training camp starts today for the Raiders when the 90 players on the current roster report to the team’s Henderson headquarters. Outside expectations are low on the Raiders for the second consecutive year since they relocated to Las Vegas.
Most prognosticators have pegged them to finish last in the AFC West, and local sports books list them as one of the longest shots in the league to win the Super Bowl.
The Raiders arrived at training camp a year ago with youthful exuberance, all too ready to tell everyone that they were better than the widespread perception. They seem to be arriving this year with a hardened confidence, more concerned with eventually getting to show why they’re better than the widespread perception.
“I absolutely love (people saying) we had the worst offseason, all that kind of stuff,” quarterback Derek Carr said last month during offseason practices. “Time will tell, we’ll see, but we believe we’ve gotten better, and we believe we’re progressing. It’s an exciting time for me. I’m just going to keep downplaying it because I just get tired of talking about it.”
Even if it goes unmentioned by the Raiders’ players, they are keenly aware of recent franchise history — only one winning season and postseason berth with no playoff wins in 18 years. But there’s no
denying the Raiders have made progress in each of the three seasons since Jon Gruden returned for his second stint as coach.
It’s just been more methodical than fans would prefer. Gruden initiated a controversial-but-necessary rebuild in his first season, bottoming out with a 4-12 record. Since then, the Raiders have gone 7-9 in 2019 and 8-8 in 2020.
If they continue at the same pace this season given the expanded the 17-game schedule, that’s either a 9-8 or 10-7 record — quite possibly strong enough to get back into the playoffs.
Sure, that may sound ambitious if looking specifically at the end of last season when they lost four out of five games from Week 12 to Week 16 to bungle a wild-card spot. But it’s unfair to exclude a 6-3 start that included wins over a pair of Super Bowl favorites in the Chiefs and Saints from evaluation.
They also came less than two minutes away from beating the Chiefs again in a four-point loss that started the late-season slide. The two games against Kansas City alone showed Las Vegas can compete with any team at its best.
As for the collapse, Gruden and the team’s front office spent the offseason addressing the causes and bringing in players to help prevent it from repeating. Yannick Ngakoue, one of the best edge rushers in the world, was the biggest piece as the team hopes he can enliven what’s been far and away the league’s worst pass-rush collectively over the last half decade.
“Other years don’t matter anymore,” Ngakoue said after his first practice with the team last month. “It’s a whole new era.”
Nearly 10 different coaching staffs have tried to fix the Raiders’ defense over the last two decades to no avail, a trend nothing short of a statistical anomaly. Defensive performance tends to fluctuate significantly from season-to-season, and it’s only a matter of time before Las Vegas either surges or stumbles into competency on that side of ball.
It just might be this year, as there’s at least more reason for optimism than a year ago. Las Vegas pinned its hopes of defensive improvement last year on a free-agent haul that included a pair of linebackers (Cory Littleton and Nick Kwiatkoski) and an interior lineman (Maliek Collins).
Kwiatkoski was the only one of the three who thrived. Littleton had a disappointing season by his own admission but wasn’t as big of a liability as he’s been made out to be, especially given the pass coverage skills he flashed occasionally. Collins was the only abject disaster, and he was not resigned this year.
Still, the trio’s failure to lift the Raiders defensively was more ammunition for those who accuse Gruden of holding on to antiquated strategic beliefs. Finding impact edge rushers and defensive backs is typically a surer route to producing a wholesale upgrade in the modern NFL than beefing up the middle of the field.
No one can say Las Vegas targeted the wrong defensive positions this season. In addition to Ngakoue boosting the pressure potential, the Raiders signed a reliable veteran cornerback who looks poised to start immediately (Casey Hayward) and took a player most considered the best safety in the draft (Tre’von Moehrig).
“I think we’ve added some pieces in the whole organization that I believe give us a really good chance to win,” Carr said.
The offseason’s defensive additions came at the expense of the offensive line, which was gutted with the trades of three starters from last year’s team. Many have cited the exodus up front as a reason for why Las Vegas will underwhelm again, but the organization has rightfully dismissed such claims.
The Raiders’ offensive line wasn’t at full strength all last season and turned into a merrygo-round of veteran journeymen and unproven young players. It didn’t seem to matter, as Las Vegas ranked eighth in the NFL at 5.9 yards per play for the second consecutive year.
Carr is a luxury in that regard, as his quick release and comfortability in Gruden’s complex offense allows the Raiders to get by without one of the league’s elite blocking units. Going into last season, pundits called out Carr for a lack of downfield aggression and tendency to lock in on receivers on shorter routes.
The characterization was probably unfair, but Carr railed against it with both his words and his play on the field. He ranked in the top half of the league in intended air yards per target (17th out of 41 eligible passers), according to NFL Next Generation Stats, and used it to steal some games for the Raiders and keep them in others.
The offense has been efficient enough to deliver the Raiders to their goals and should be again this season. That Carr’s still mockingly being called names like “Captain Checkdown” heading into his eighth season shows a misunderstanding of what’s hampered the Raiders.
Carr is fiery and outspoken, so he could conceivably gripe about how he’s viewed in one of his five news conference scheduled throughout training camp leading up to the Sept. 13 season opener against the Baltimore Ravens. But based on how the Raiders have approached this season so far, it might be unlikely.
They’re done with describing how they’re going to turn their fortunes around and more focused on actually following through. It’s the right attitude, and with the trajectory the team is on and the personnel it’s brought in, Las Vegas has a real chance to do it.
“We’ll have to see it when we get to training camp,” Gruden said last month when asked if this was his best team. “Obviously, we like it on paper. We made some changes that are, in some people’s eyes, questionable. We’re younger. I think we’re faster. I think we do have more depth. It’s hard to update that question right now without seeing everything in pads at full speed.”