Raiders Week 3 Slay and Bomb

It’s time for the Week 3 slay and bomb for the Las Vegas Raiders. A lot of Raiders went out and had slay performances, and quite a few had bomb performances. Stars like Davante Adams shined under the bright lights. But week 3 for the Las Vegas Raiders resulted in an agonizing 23-18 loss to their long-time rivals, the Pittsburgh Steelers.

Raiders Week 3 Slay and Bomb

The Steelers came into Allegiant Stadium for the first time ever and walked out with their first road victory against the Raiders since 1995. Like most games, the crowd was absolutely taken over by Steelers fans. Steelers fans travel great no matter what, but the Raiders still have struggled to make Las Vegas feel like home despite making the playoffs in 2021.

This was a very winnable game for the Raiders. The game was close until later in the second half. The defense showed up and managed to hold the Steelers’ offense to multiple field goals. The problem is that the Raiders offense, which was ranked in the top 10 last season, has managed to become the 32nd-ranked scoring offense in the league.

The offense has been stuck in quicksand from the start of the season. Jakobi Meyers and Davante Adams have been the only players who have been productive thus far for the offense.

Let’s look at who went out there and had an absolute slay of a performance or who unfortunately had a bomb in week 3.

Slay

Davante Adams

Once again, Davante Adams showcased why he’s the best wide receiver in the NFL. Adams had a slay performance, and no matter who the Raiders have at quarterback, I don’t anticipate many bomb performances from him. The receiver finished the Sunday night showdown with a whopping 13 catches for 172 yards and two touchdowns.

He’s now 2nd all-time behind Antonio Brown and Andre Johnson for most games with 10+ catches in NFL history, and he’s 5th all-time in red zone touchdowns in NFL history.

Adams is showing any potential naysayers he had when he left Green Bay that he can succeed without Aaron Rodgers at quarterback, and he’s showcased he also didn’t need his college quarterback Derek Carr to go off statistically as well.

Adams is an all-time great who’s unfortunately trapped on a team that seems to have no direction. But expect him week in and week out to have a slay performance. Adams after the game did express some frustrations with the team’s performance which might be something to monitor going forward.

Maxx Crosby

“Mad Maxx” once again showcased why he is one of the most feared edge rushers in all of football with another slay performance. He was all over the field looking like a wild man and constantly making plays. Crosby was seen chasing down ball carriers from across the field, getting 1 sack and multiple pressures.

Crosby did his best to make sure that Steelers quarterback Kenny Pickett was uncomfortable all evening long. He constantly got A gap pressure by starting from his natural position lining up off to the outside of the tackles and utilizing his speed rushing the center/guard spot. Doing this proved to be effective quite often as Pickett would tend to vacate the pocket and make off-balance throws on the run.

Maxx Crosby is a rare athlete. Not many guys are able to produce like he is able to despite the lack of help around him on defense. I hope the Raiders get this man some more help defensively because it is certainly inspiring to see Crosby out there almost every single play giving 110% no matter the score or the circumstances.

Jakobi Meyers

Once again, Jakobi Meyers popped off with a slay performance. Not since 2017, when the Raiders had Amari Cooper and Michael Crabtree, have the Raiders had a wide receiver duo like Meyers and Adams.

Meyers has played in two out of the Raiders’ three games thus far and has established a great rapport with quarterback Jimmy Garoppolo. He finished Sunday’s game with seven catches for 85 yards on 12 targets. He hasn’t had a bomb performance yet, being one of the team’s more consistent players.

Meyers has helped provide a heck of a 1-2 punch with Adams and does a great job getting open over the middle when Adams gets double-covered on the outside. He’s not shying away from any contact out there and has done a commendable job since coming over from New England. Hopefully, he will have more slay performances going forward.

Bombs

Jimmy Garoppolo

This was definitely a massive bomb performance for the books. Jimmy G threw for 304 yards, but he threw three costly interceptions. All three were ugly to witness as well. He also took a couple of horrific hits and appeared to get injured after one of them, but fought on.

Jimmy now has thrown six interceptions on the year, sitting amongst the league leaders. The Raiders are not getting a positive return on their investment from the offseason. The difference in salary between Jimmy and former quarterback Derek Carr isn’t seemingly being justified, considering the team last season was ranked in the top 10 in scoring offense while this year they sit at dead last in the league.

The team had a chance to take over the game at many different points. The interceptions and overall lack of execution on offense killed any momentum the team had.

Where Jimmy really struggles is that he still stares down Davante Adams or Jakobi Meyers and doesn’t try to utilize anybody else on the field. Hunter Renfrow was wide open again on many occasions and got two targets that both resulted in receptions. Michael Mayer caught a pass on a 2-point conversion but otherwise only saw one other target the rest of the game. After an entire week of emphasizing how the Raiders needed to get everybody involved, the Raiders once again didn’t really get anybody else involved besides Adams and Meyers.

It was at the point I genuinely wondered if Meyers and Adams were on the sidelines that Jimmy might still look to throw them the football. Hunter Renfrow was genuinely looked off several times, even when he was wide open over the middle of the field, just for Jimmy to throw the ball into congested coverage to Adams. Adams also once again took a massive shot over the middle after an overthrown pass into triple coverage by Jimmy. If this keeps up, Adams might get hurt. He was already in concussion protocol after Week 2.

It’s at the point where you might have to consider other options at the quarterback position. Rookie Aidan O’Connell is currently the string quarterback, but at some point, he might be entrusted with the starting job. The other option is 40-year-old backup Brian Hoyer, but I don’t think he would be handed the keys to the Raiders offense at this point.

Josh McDaniels

The head coach of the Las Vegas Raiders had a bomb of a performance on Sunday night. Even with Jimmy’s interceptions, the Raiders still were down by eight with 4th and four inside the Steelers 10-yard line. There were just over two minutes left in the game. All of America was anticipating the Raiders going for it. After all, they had just wasted a bunch of clock driving down the field, even accepting a drive-extending penalty almost a minute earlier rather than keep the field goal they had made earlier in the drive.

Instead, the Raiders became the first team down by eight points since they invented the 2-point conversion in 1994 to kick a field goal rather than go for a touchdown inside the opponent’s 10-yard line. The reason? McDaniels oddly believed they needed multiple possessions to tie up the game. McDaniels also believed that the decision to kick didn’t matter if the team wasn’t able to execute well.

Was the team executing their game plan well on Sunday night? No, they were not, and I don’t think anybody else would argue that they were. They gave up 23 unanswered points after going up 7-0 to the second-lowest-scoring offense in football, ahead of only the Raiders. However, not knowing that you only needed a touchdown and a 2 point conversion to tie up the game is an absolutely egregious offense. That’s the sort of thing that gets you on the unemployment line.

On top of that, after a whole week of talking about how the team desperately needed to get Hunter Renfrow involved, he got two catches off of two targets. Adams and Meyers continued to get 10+ targets through the air, while 2nd round rookie Michael Mayer got two targets if you count the 2-point conversion he caught, plus a pass that got intercepted.

McDaniels didn’t do enough to get the entire team ready on Sunday night. But he also proved to be one of if not the biggest factor in why they lost. He got outcoached by  Steelers head coach Mike Tomlin. This is the first time I’ve listed him under the bomb category for a bad performance. I hope it’s the last for the sake of the Raiders.

Tyree Wilson

It’s still early in the young man’s career, but it’s been ugly thus far. In 3 weeks, Wilson has registered 1 QB pressure(week 1), 0 hits, and 0 sacks as a pro football player. The 6th overall pick in the draft has been pointed out as appearing several steps too slow off the snap. He was drafted so early in the first round because he showed explosive athleticism at Texas Tech prior to an injury he suffered to his foot. He hasn’t shown any of that since being drafted by the Raiders.

Instead of lining up opposite Maxx Crosby, the Raiders tried several times to have him line up next to Crosby. The idea was that Crosby would attract attention by going from the outside to the inside to generate pressure, with Wilson rushing off the edge. This would cause the tackle to pause to decide if he was going to block Crosby or Wilson. The problem was that even this didn’t work.

Wilson was supposed to be the other side of an unstoppable duo with Crosby. Much like Chandler Jones the prior season, this has unfortunately not lived up to its expected billing. Perhaps Wilson might be better as an interior rusher rather than an edge rusher. The problem is the Raiders need him to step up his performance to justify taking him in the top 10 of the draft. He’s gotten significant playing time but simply hasn’t arrived yet.

Next week, the Las Vegas Raiders travel to their home away from home when they go to Los Angeles to play the Los Angeles Chargers. Games in Southern California have tended to be an extra home game for the Raiders for years, thanks in large part due to their tenure as the Los Angeles Raiders from 1982 to 1994. In a battle between 1-2 games, hopefully, the Raiders can get back on track.