By Sebastián Vallejo. Follow your project on @HolyRollerNFL
Las Vegas Raiders have played two games in a row with the interim head coach Rich Bisaccia and they have registered two consecutive victories, showing something that they did not have in the first moments of this 2021 season: a complete and empathetic team.
After beating some poor and very erratic Philadelphia Eagles By a score of 33-22 this Sunday of Week 7, the Raiders have their first consecutive double-digit victories in four years. They also go 5-2 and are tied for the best AFC record in their bye week.
The two-game losing streak and the sudden departure of coach Jon Gruden looks like it was a long time ago for the Raiders and that’s good, because the mindset is different.
Balance is the key to the Raiders’ success
Las Vegas’ offensive line showed improvement last week in Denver, and then had its strongest game of the season this Sunday against the Eagles, who have a solid defensive line. The ground unit seemed relaxed and calm. This helped the Raiders quarterback, Derek Carr, to another monster game, as he had a clean protective bag and lighter workload for much of the game as Carr completed 31 of 34 passes for 323 yards.
Derek Carr completed +15.5% of his passes over expected, his highest CPOE in a game over the last six seasons and the highest by any qualifying QB this season.
Carr avoided pressure with quick, short passes (2.25s time to throw, 5.0 air yards/att).#PHIvsLV | #RaiderNation pic.twitter.com/AbkvkM43on
— Next Gen Stats (@NextGenStats) October 24, 2021
The final result does not reflect what the game was
It’s not fair to blame the young quarterback entirely Jalen Hurts for this match. In the middle of this Sunday afternoon meeting, the game was almost lost for Philadelphia by serious decisions by the head coach. Nick Sirianni and a defense that could not keep up with the rhythm of its rival. The Eagles wasted an opportunity to catch up by losing the ball in the first half and also had a noticeable loss in their running attack losing to Miles Sanders.
Good teams take advantage of mistakes and attack those weaknesses to compete, the Eagles are not a good team.
Beating bad teams is what good teams do
The Raiders are in the middle of a big schedule opportunity and are taking it. The Eagles and Broncos are bad teams and the Raiders treated them such, eliminating them easily.
Good teams don’t play at their opponent’s level: The Raiders suffered that mistake earlier this month in a home loss to the Chicago Bears. This Sunday, the Raiders were in charge of raising the level of their frontal defense, which had stellar performances of Yannick Ngakoue and Maxx Crosby against a lousy team, as a true playoff contender should. That is a good sign and you should definitely take advantage of it.
How about this post-Jon Gruden two-game Raiders revival? We read you in the comments under this article and on our social networks.
