The Oakland Raiders 2018 Season Thread

[The_Isomotion31]

Hahaha. Don't get me wrong. I hope Key and Irvin do their thing tomorrow.

 

[ajiiiplatinum]

Rodgers making plays

 

[ThePeoplesChamp_]

 

[DeadsetAce]

 

[raider5]

*****

Edit: G.T.F.O.H

 

[DeadsetAce]

for the 3rd time in his career, Aaron Fraudgers has comeback from being down a 10+ points. what a guy!!!

 

[ThePeoplesChamp_]

for the 3rd time in his career, Aaron Fraudgers has comeback from being down a 10+ points. what a guy!!!

Go away and you’re in wrong thread

 

[DeadsetAce]

i hate when the tubbos get mad excited and run down the field

 

[kayzeezay]

Thats the Mack we know also, straight Houdini status at times

 

[ajiiiplatinum]

F Gruden!!!!
Not worth the money my a**

Some people just dont get it.

1. If you want to blame anyone blame reggie for paying Carr and not Mack. Blame him for making Carr the 4th highest player in the NFL.
2. Blame Carr for sucking and taking up our Cap space.
3. If we paid Carr and Mack we would have used up over 25% of our Cap space on two players. Many supported Reggie blowing up our 8-8 team because he was creating cap space. Relief from Cap hell is what many of you called it.
4. If we were the Patriots and Belicheat the media would have said it was wise move and if we were the bears they would gave said we were stupid for giving a non QB $80+ guaranteed.
5. Gruden’s salay does not affect the Cap so even if we paid Gruden $1 million we still couldnt have paid both Carr and Mack.
6. Going all in on QB that doesnt produce sets a franchise back for years. We were all in on Jabusto and it set us back 6 years. We are all in on the undisputed franchise QB Carr and after 4 years have nothing to show for. Here’s to Gruden turning Carr around.

 

[ThePeoplesChamp_]

You thought Matt McGloin was legit
You thought carson palmer was taking us to the super bowl. Nobody wants to read your trash post man.

 

[InTheHallway]

I hope Dallas does not make the same mistake ... Although I would still take Carr over Dak 10/10 ...

 

[Johnny_Cakes]

I cannot believe Aj is back.

This is how I know the team is on the wrong trajectory.

 

[DeadsetAce]

hey guys...Mack looked great tonight, for a half. i think we'll see him get EVEN BETTER once his conditioning gets up. have a good night and good look tomorrow!

 

[The_Isomotion31]

AJ McCarron? He was never with the Raiders before.

NVM.... I get it. LOL

 

[DeadsetAce]

Go away and you’re in wrong thread

yooooo...my bad

 

[Johnny_Cakes]

Putting in the hours: A ‘completely different’ Derek Carr is making good use of his new office


Vic Tafur Sep 6, 2018

26

He gets into the building early, trudges upstairs to his new office and sits down in front of his computer. He finally has his own login and fires up the film, with the images raining down on him from the 6-foot television monitor.

Derek Carr smiles at his new office space.

“I can make my own cutups now,” the Raiders quarterback said Wednesday before practice. “Give them to the wideouts and the other quarterbacks. Now, I can keep everything that I watch. It’s been really nice. Four years from now, I won’t have to remember what I wrote down. Now I have proof.”

The fact that the Raiders’ video operation team recently gave Carr his own office is proof of just how often he was in that part of the building last offseason, cutting up and ingesting all the elements of Jon Gruden and Greg Olson’s offense.

“I think he’s one of the best, in terms of processing information,” Gruden said of Carr at training camp. “I think he craves new things. He wants … ‘What do we have today? What are we doing today? What’s new? What do we got?’ He has a photographic memory. It comes so easy to him. He’s got the offense mastered more than I do, that’s for sure.”

That will come in handy when the season starts Monday night against the Rams. Because other than Gruden, coaching his first game in 10 years, most of the pressure is on Carr, the fifth-year quarterback. Especially after Khalil Mack was traded last Saturday.

Owner Mark Davis called Carr and Mack the “foundations of the franchise,” and while Gruden had said he quit broadcasting for a chance to coach Carr and Mack, he then took out one of the foundations before the season even started.

Now, there is only Carr, the $125 million man.

But Carr said he doesn’t feel any pressure.

“No, honestly forever, since Day 1, I’m so focused,” Carr said earlier this week. “It sounds funny, but since Day 1, I’m so focused. There’s so much at the quarterback spot to do. Not just out on the field, but in the locker room. With the coaches, the extra meetings, putting plans together, making cutups so guys who are watching … there’s just so much to do that I really have never felt the pressure of playing alongside of (Mack).”

Derek Carr insists there is no extra pressure now that former co-foundation piece Khalil Mack has been traded away. (Ezra Shaw/Getty Images)
Saying that, Carr fully realizes how great the former Defensive Player of the Year was.

“He’ll be one of the best to ever do it,” Carr said. “It was never any pressure because just being a quarterback, there’s so much to handle that that alone is enough. Now with him gone, if you stand back and look at it like, ‘Well what do you have to do now?’ I still have to do my job. So, I don’t feel any different, but I understand what you’re saying.”

Carr grew up watching game film with his older brother, former NFL quarterback David Carr, so getting a look at Gruden’s extensive video collection early in the morning was a thrill.

“Jon said it’s the most impressive transition of a first-year quarterback he has ever had,” Olson, the Raiders offensive coordinator, said last week. “There were a lot of early mornings, but I think that’s what Coach was so excited about, It wasn’t like he had to pull teeth to get this guy into the building. He just kept coming in on his own. …

“That’s why Joe (Harrington) and Jason (Negus) set him up with his own office space. He was always in there.”

Harrington, the Raiders video operations coordinator who came from Tennessee this offseason, had already given Carr a gift at training camp, helping arrange the visit of former Vols and NFL legend Peyton Manning. This present might be even better.

“I can store up all the stuff that I want,” said Carr, who quickly chucked his iPad like a defensive end was in pursuit. “What worked against a certain defense. And then I have player cutups.”

Carr said he has personalized his office space with photos of his kids just like any 9-to-5’er. Or in Carr’s case, a 6-to-6’er.

“Joe said, ‘Hey, I got you an office.’ I was like, ‘What, what are you talking about?” Carr said. “I have never asked for anything like that. But they had extra space and got me a nameplate and everything.

“So I said, ‘When is the Christmas party? Tell me what I need to bring.’”

There was something different about Carr when he came to training camp in Napa in late July. It took a while for several teammates to put a finger on it, and some still haven’t.

“A new season is like a breath of fresh air and he’s excited to play football,” tight end Lee Smith said. “He and Coach Gruden are having a lot of fun together, and Derek is being challenged.”

Carr definitely needed the energy that Gruden puts in the air with his loud words, sense of humor and expressive face. Last year was terrible, as the Raiders went from Super Bowl contenders to a team that was lucky to win six games. Carr was already coming off a broken leg, and then an inexperienced offensive coordinator in Todd Downing and a back injury in Week 4 left him a shadow of himself, looking to get rid of the ball in the back in the pocket.

Many players have said there was a disconnect between head coach Jack Del Rio and Downing and the offensive players, and when Del Rio tried to reprogram the offense on the run, the whole thing went off the rails. Worse, Carr and receiver Michael Crabtree, once very good friends, stopped talking for a while. And the locker-room leadership went silent.

Carr doesn’t want to talk about last season anymore, and teammates say he jumped into training camp with a new approach.

“Derek looks like a completely different person in my eyes, just from the way he’s attacking the game,” tight end Jared Cook said at training camp. “From the way he’s attacking the challenges that Gruden has been giving to him. Every time that Gruden asks him a question, he gets it right, no hesitation.

“Every time Gruden asks him to get up in front of a meeting room and call out a play, run a play, get to the right check, get to the right audible, he does it every time. That’s a responsibility that Derek never had last year. You see a totally different player out of him. He’s attacking the game differently mentally and he has a totally different attitude going into this year.”

Receiver Amari Cooper added that Carr is “more seasoned. He can see the defenses and he’ll be better at that.”

Carr, when he appeared on our “State of the Nation” podcast at training camp, agreed that he is different this season.

“Yeah, I do feel different,” he said. “You know and I thought … you don’t know what you don’t know. I always give it my best, I always give it my best shot and you go at it with everything that you have. Having the head coach being a quarterback guy, we make practice around the quarterback, we make meetings around the quarterback.”

And Carr loves it when Gruden challenges him in front of his teammates.

“He demands a lot and so while at the same he loves you and he’ll build everything around you, he’s going to demand a lot from you,” Carr said.

The other players love it too, Smith said.

“You can tell when Coach Gruden thinks, ‘I’m going to get him on this one,’” Smith said. “Derek kind of winks at him and is like, ‘Oh no you’re not, pal.’ And that’s a lot of fun for us to watch.

“Derek Carr wants to be challenged and he wants to be elite. When Peyton was here, that was one of his big things. He wanted to know how he could get better, whether it was Year 1 or Year 18. Derek has that same mentality.”

Gruden helped turn Rich Gannon into an MVP in his first stint as Raiders coach but didn’t have a lot of success with quarterbacks later at Tampa Bay. They weren’t as good as Carr, who says he is ready when Gruden turns into Chucky — like he did in the famous clips with Bucs quarterbacks Chris Simms and Jeff Garcia.

“You see in the past how guys, it was hard for them to play in his offense,” Carr said. “But if you love ball the way he does, him and I have gotten along great because I love working hard. I told him, ‘Coach, I don’t know everything.’ I said, ‘Just fill me with knowledge and I’ll give you everything I have.’ And I think that’s why we’ve gotten along so well.”

General manager Reggie McKenzie thinks Gruden has given him a shot in the arm that was sorely needed after last season.

“I can feel Derek’s confidence,” McKenzie said at training camp. “He knows everybody is on board, so he doesn’t have to go around trying to pep guys up.”

Players know what they have to do and have complete faith in Carr, McKenzie said.

“The coaches have everybody focused on the big picture, so it doesn’t have to always come from Derek,” McKenzie said. “He feels good that Oly and Gruden are in his corner and they are feeding the players the same thing that Derek would feed them …

“Everybody is on the same page. And I think that’s where his confidence is going to grow even more.”

Carr took a long breath and smiled when I read him what McKenzie said.

“Yeah, yeah. Absolutely,” Carr said. “I think that that right there is huge. Mr. McKenzie, he’s been so great to me. He’s very smart. He doesn’t say much, but he pays attention to every detail. He sees everything. There were times I didn’t have to say anything and he would come up to me and he would see things …

“Being able to speak the same language from a leadership standpoint, when it comes from the head coach — I’m telling you, from the owner, GM, head coach, coordinator all the way down to me, we’re saying the same things, like, literally, identically. … It’s been refreshing to see all those relationships, even me from afar just watching everyone else interact, if I’m standing next to a conversation, it’s the same message and that’s huge for a football team.”

Derek Carr and Jon Gruden are speaking the same language and that should help the Raiders. (Kirby Lee/USA TODAY Sports)
The message was coming in loud and clear on the television, and on social media on Carr’s phone during the offseason: The Raiders were signing every old player available. And, oh yeah, Carr was going to wilt the first time Gruden yelled at him.

“You sit there on your couch, and it keeps popping up on your phone – who’s coming, who’s going,” Carr said on Monday. “You sit there and everything is against you. Everything is saying, ‘It’s going to be hard.’ Everything is saying, ‘You can’t do it.’ I think it makes me even more determined and motivated.”

The Raiders had an interesting training camp, to say the least. Pro Bowl left tackle Donald Penn was moved to right tackle, as he was coming back from a foot injury and the new right tackles were out with injuries. First-round pick Kolton Miller was handed the left tackle job. A few weeks after Carr had said this was the most talented receiving corps he has had in Oakland, slot receiver Ryan Switzer was traded to the Steelers and much-ballyhooed deep threat Martavis Bryant was released.

Carr will rely on Amari Cooper and Crabtree-replacement Jordy Nelson, as well as tight ends Cook and Derek Carrier. And Carr will fake handoffs to Marshawn Lynch and Doug Martin and use play-action passes like he used to in the Bill Musgrave days.

“I want it to look like Coach Gruden and I have been together for 10 years,” Carr said. “Obviously, there’s going to be bumps because we’re new at this. But hopefully not too many because I do feel 1,000 percent ready to play a game. The way that the coaches teach. The way they install. The way we walk through. The way we practice. You can ask any of our players, if they don’t feel ready to play since April, the guys that have been here, then there’s something to worry about. The way we do things, guys should be ready to play.”

Gruden is keeping most of his new offense and whatever surprises it has under wraps, because all the tape on him is nine years old. The starters barely played in the preseason.

But Carr gives Gruden the confidence that everything is going be OK on Monday night.

“He has set a real tone here behind the scenes in terms of his desire,” Gruden said at training camp. “He’s working. He’s all business. He has a cannon and he understands what he’s doing. There’s not a lot we can’t do systematically with him. We have to make sure Kolton Miller, the young receivers, the new tight ends, everybody is up to the same speed. I think they’re excited about the possibilities with Derek Carr having some freedom at the line of scrimmage.”

When Gruden was asked Sunday about the Mack trade for future draft picks, he admitted that the team is trying to win this season and build for the future. He does, after all, have a 10-year contract, in case you forgot (he is well compensated, too.)

Carr can’t wait to grow old with Gruden.

“It is so nice, man, because, you know, we’ve grown so much in just, what is it, six months we’ve been together? Six, seven months,” Carr said. “We’ve grown so much and I see where we’re at as an offense now. And then I think of Tom Brady, who’s been in the same system for 20 years almost, and I just think, ‘Man, now I’m in a position where there’s no doubt that that’s what we’re gonna do.’

“I’m gonna be speaking the same language with the same guy, year in and year out. That right there for me and for my career, just having that stability, you know, it’s huge. I think we all know that. I think it’s been hard for the first four years, there’s been a lot of changes and a lot of different styles and things like that, and so now to wipe it all clean …”

Those are Gruden’s exact words, Carr said.

“Coach Gruden said, ‘Before this, you had some … we’re wiping the slate clean. It’s you and me from here on out. Let’s build this thing. Let’s get the thing on the track, let’s start moving forward and let’s see what we can do with it.’”

And the loss of a Mack truck doesn’t change that.

“Obviously, when he got traded it was a punch to the stomach because he was your friend,” Carr said. “But all the work that we put in and all the reps that guys have gotten, you sit there and think, ‘Well man, we’ve put in the work. Let’s go. It’s time to play.’

“My expectation never changes. I don’t care if I’m out there with my two sons, 5 and 2 years old playing receiver. I expect us to be excellent. I expect them to know what to do. I expect us to do it. Thankfully, we have a really talented group of not only players but coaches as well.

“It’s going to be good.”

 

[Thats My Word]

4 wins max

 

[njavier03]

at least the niners and chargers lost yesterday...

 

[The_Isomotion31]

Game day.

A A Ron showed why it's called QB money last night. DC better do the same thing.

 

[raider5]

I cannot believe Aj is back.

This is how I know the team is on the wrong trajectory.

this thread has come full circle.

 

[Kingof402]

Mack balled as usual last night. But resulted in a L we need the Bears to go 4 and 12 and that's not a stretch. They have a solid D but that offense isn't lighting up any scoreboards. Happy Mack got paid but hope they lose every game. We need a top 10 pick from them

 

[HNL HI]

what I hope to see tonight:

Derek to establish himself as the leader of this team
Cooper to prove that he can be a #1 guy
Jordy to fill that Crab role
Beastmode with 20+ carries
Irvin to put some fire in this young defense
Someone to step up on D, lots of names with a lil buzz who need to prove it

 

[laker4lifeman]

We definitely need our 2 receivers show up but Cook also has to step up. Pray Conley stays healthy and we need the young DL to develop fast.

Also Johnny is at the game today wearing a Goff jersey the Mack trade changed him.

 

[Kingof402]

what I hope to see tonight:

Derek to establish himself as the leader of this team
Cooper to prove that he can be a #1 guy
Jordy to fill that Crab role
Beastmode with 20+ carries
Irvin to put some fire in this young defense
Someone to step up on D, lots of names with a lil buzz who need to prove it

Spot on. I'm excited to see Arden Key and Irvin together on each edge.
Coop for sure gotta show. Or he's gone after the season.
Carr needs to return to 2016 form and he'll be fine.
Defense has a ton of new names. Let's see if they can put something together.
Special teams also with new faces, so all 3 phases are gonna be interesting all season.
With all that said I'm saying 10 wins and a wild card birth.....