Oakland Raiders 23, Denver Broncos 20
Liked:
The Raiders played an extremely physical game, and there’s nothing that I like more than a hard-hitting game of football. The Broncos were able to mount a charge in the latter part of the 3rd quarter, but the Raiders took the Broncos’ best shot and kept on plugging away. They were able to hang onto the ball, and they handled a hostel environment like a team that knows it’s headed for bigger and better things. Outside of the penalties, the Raiders looked like a playoff team.
Darren McFadden had his way with the Broncos’ defense, and he was able to run behind very good blocking throughout the game. Jason Campbell managed the game very well for the most part.
The Raiders were very aggressive on offense, and it’s something we haven’t seen from them for a long time. When it counted, they were able to pound the run enough to run out the clock. This is a team I’ll be watching closely the rest of the season.
Annoying:
There were way too many penalties in this game. The refs had about as much face time as Jason Campbell and Kyle Orton combined. I know their wasn’t a real off-season due to the lockout, but that shouldn’t happen in the NFL. Ever. The worst of it was in the first half, but it was hard to watch throughout.
The second annoying thing I want to highlight here is the Tim Tebow chant that erupted in the early part of the 4th quarter, while Orton and the rest of the offense struggled. I’m not sure what makes fans think that Tebow is the answer. The guy lost his job as 2nd string to Brady Quinn, unless you really buy that Tebow and Quinn are “co-second string quarterbacks.”
Hated:
The Broncos couldn’t hang onto the football. They didn’t help their quarterback out at all. They dropped passes, fumbled the ball, and did everything else they could do to sabotage any chance they had of winning the game. As good as the Raiders looked late in the game, the Broncos were equally as bad.
Another area of the game that the Broncos failed in was pass protection. Orton never had enough time to deliver the football. The Raiders were constantly hitting Orton, and when they weren’t, they were forcing the Broncos’ offensive linemen into holding penalties that back Denver up even further.
The Broncos gave the ball back to the Raiders with about 4 minutes left in the game, and they weren’t able to get the ball back. They needed one more stop on defense, and they couldn’t get it.
The last in a laundry list of dislikes is the Broncos’ run defense. Darren McFadden ate up big chunks of yardage against a weak defense that didn’t exactly help out it’s offense.
All around, it was a very poor 4th quarter effor from the Broncos in a game that was very close going into the final period.
Special Note:
One of the biggest story lines of the game was Sebastian Janikowski’s 63 yard field goal, coming on the heels of the Broncos first half interception. The kick ties the NFL’s longest field goal ever. End of half field goals are rarely noteworthy, but that was one that everyone should acknowledge. Kickers catch a lot of flack, but they deserve credit to.
