Week 3 Raiders @ Bills

[Aeyjay]

Kiffin's opinion wasn't down on the zone defense or prevent defense just the way we executed it. Bad tackling and without Warren and Burgess there was no pass rush so Edwards protection suddenly made the differance. Coupled with Hall giving a 20 yard cushion to their best receiver they marched down the field at will.

The criticism of Ryan's defense for the last 3 years is that whenever a team needs to score on us they can. He can't cut it when it counts.

[draft jedi]

again this is davis interfering with the defence he hates zone defence and insites on man.

[psj3809]

again this is davis interfering with the defence he hates zone defence and insites on man.

So when the defense does well we should give credit to Davis then ?  So for 3 and a bit quarters Davis was superb as the defense was playing well ?

I know people are anti-Al but he gets the blame for every single thing.  Davis isnt the one who wants Hall to go 10 yards back from his WR whereas Aso is up close to his.  Davis wasnt the one getting the front 4 to have no penetration on the final two Buffalo drives.

Davis isnt the one calling very very conservative plays and go 3 and out a few times in the 4Q.

I dont blame Al Davis for the loss on sunday.  I blame Rob Ryan for suddenly going into a 'prevent' defense in the 4Q and also Kiffin for YET again some very very lame play calling, we had chances to have a huge lead but instead its FG after FG like the KC game.  Other young QB's are getting a fair bit of time throwing the ball (Ryan, Flacco etc) and Russel had something like 74 yards entering the 4Q, ridiculous.

When we still had the lead and we were 'trying' to run down the clock, i think it was on 2nd down Russell took the snap with 11 seconds left !  11 SECONDS !  Snap it with 1 or 2 secs left on the clock not 11 ! 

[draft jedi]

Yes i would give davis credit . I'll give Davis credit for drafting Aso. Best man to man marker in the NFL.
When will you get in your head that we have to be conservitive. We have an inexperienced qb. Kiffin is trying to win as many games as possible with an owner who wants to win now. Facco and Ryan's stat are similar to russells.

[psj3809]

I dont blame Davis for the defensive collaspe at the weekend.  Dont blame Davis either for the offense doing diddley squat for most of the game or kicking FG's early on when we c0uld have had touchdowns.

When will you get it in your head though that theres conservative and then theres ultra-conservative.  No point paying Walker that amount of money (And Russell) is we're hardly going to use them, Walker started off hot with 2 catches in a row early on then disappeared.

Last year in his first start Russell threw i think 29 time against the Chargers and did well (17 completions).  This year hes hardly throwing the ball despite teams focusing on stopping our rushing attack which has looked good.

I dont want him throwing 40 times and getting pummeled but our o-line is doing okay, we have a rushing attack to also help him so hes not a sitting duck back there in a one dimensional offense but i just think we should open it up more.  I thought Kiffin was some young offensive whizz but our offense/play calling has been sooo conservative.  Specially last weekend late against the Bills.  The defense screwed up major but the offense didnt exactly help out.  McFaddens shoes seemed to be covered in grease or something !

[draft jedi]

When will you get it though your head that Kiffin or any coach with such a hard ass owner who is going to fire you given such a chance and wants to win now. Playing ultra conservative was what got the Steelers to a superbowl 2 years ago. What happened to the steelers when they let Rothersburger pass to much? They were beaten by Oakland. 

[psj3809]

Enough with the 'when will you get it through your head' crap.  You've got an opinion, i've got one, neither of us are neccessarily right but its a forum to discuss things.  You think its good Russell isnt throwing tons, i dont think it is.

Kiffin doesnt seem to care so much about the situation, its one thing Al making his life hell but another one with Kiffin talking crap to the media all the time.  As PFT said when Norv Turner was asked about his time with the Raiders recently he declined to answer instead of using the media to have digs.  Al's bad in all of this of course but Kiffin really isnt helping matters.  Playing ultra conservative might be what got the Steelers to the Superbowl, most other Superbowl teams thats not the case.   Roethlisberger was a 3rd year QB when he played against us that time (Still love Chris Carr because of that game !)  so that line of attack doesnt work, granted he had a great surrounding cast during his rookie season which helped....

Ben Roethlisberger Gamelogs and Game Logs - Pro-Football-Reference.com

But in his rookie year he didnt have any 17a, 8c 125 yards type of games.  I dont expect Russell to play like Big Ben did in his amazing rookie year as hes a great QB BUT i do expect Russell to at least throw the ball a fair few times to keep defenses guessing.

Look at any rookie QB the last few years who has started and they throw a few more times than Russell does. Russell in his first start threw 29 times against a very tough Chargers team last year, the last few weeks i just havent seen how Russell will progress much if we hardly throw the ball.  If anything the conservative play calling makes it more difficult for Russell as its run on 1st down, run on 2nd down then we all know Russell will attempt a pass.  I dont want Russell to throw 40 times but things are just so conservative at the moment.  Aikman was on a much much worse team than ours but he threw the ball a fair bit.

After all my long waffling post, i just think this years obviously a year for developing Russell and i didnt think we would get to the playoffs, next year is the year we should start to do something.  Developing Russell is important this year but throwing for 70 yards entering the 4Q wont help him as much.

[draft jedi]

Yes Aitkin was on a worse team but had a coach who in his first season did not care about results he just cared about rebuilding. Also went on record saying he wanted 1st pick in the draft. It still took him 3 years to get in the play offs. 3 years Al Davis will not waitfor he wants to win now. If you had seen the last 2 games you would have seen that Russells passes are not exactly laser guided. They are hurried due to us having a bad pass block and a Left tackle with less game experience than Russell. Look at Ryan and Facco both have similar stats and have coaches with run first offences.

[psj3809]

Well despite me moaning about the lack of attempts etc theres still a lot left in the season and i'm sure we'll see times when Russell has that type of situation.  He did well in mop up duty against the Broncos in Week 1 as he padded his stats, last few weekends have been the same kinda thing stat wise.

Should be interesting this week against the Chargers who are on a roll after a great win last week.  Would love to shock them and get the win at home.  Cant wait to watch the game.  Are you on Gamepass ?  Just love watching the games on that.  I do find it very difficult to avoid the scores of the other games though as because theres no deadline for archived games anymore on the HD version i enjoy watching some throughout the week.

[draft jedi]

No I live in the States my local shows all the game.

[psj3809]

We've been quite lucky in the UK lately, now theres something called NFL Gamepass HD, you pay a one off fee but you can switch between any games on a sunday (bar one or two) and the qualitys amazing.  Years gone by we used to listen to games on the radio which was often a bad reception, now getting live games of every Raider match is the best thing ever ! 

[draft jedi]

gone are the days of listening on the us armed services radio.

[psj3809]

Yeah that was 'funny' in a weird way, always heard some opera singer when it was a huge play or something !  My worst moment was when i was listening to the Raiders/Broncos monday night game (The reception for these was normally superb).  At 24-0 down i had to go to bed, i had work the next day (or few hours later) ,it was about 3.30am and i was knackered

Thought it was a mistake on teletext when i saw the score the next day !  Couldnt believe it.  From that day onwards i would never leave a game early !

Just saw your an exiled manc, i live up that way now, a few miles from Bury

[draft jedi]

 I am from Radcliffe.
I never leave a game. My Dad always left games early. You got half way to the car and you would here someone scoring a goal. Without fail.

[psj3809]

Very near to me, i live in Ramsbottom.

I would never leave a game early in person, on the radio listening to it at 3am in the morning is a different matter !  After the loss to the Pats in the playoffs, the Raiders played them the next year on SNF i think it was, game finished at 4am, had to get up at 4.30am to catch a flight.  Was soooo tired that day but happy as anything because we beat the Pats.

Must admit now because of work etc i wouldnt watch a MNF or SNF game live until 4 or 5am, quite happy watching the 9pm games till they end half 12 or that but cant do any 5am'ers again !