Oakland Raiders: The Good, The Bad, And The Ugly vs. Chargers

The Good: Ballhawks

Oakland’s dynamic offense is giving their porous defense a lot of cover this season. Carr and company have managed to pull their backsides out of the fire time and time again. But something else that’s helping this defense out is their ability to create turnovers.

The Raiders have been on the losing side of the turnover battle more times than we can count over the last decade plus. But this season, they are making some significant strides in turning that around, and they’ve been doing a very good job of taking the ball away from the offense.

Against San Diego, the Raiders managed four takeaways in the game. They picked Rivers off twice — rookie Karl Joseph notching his first pick as a pro — and also forced fumbles out of Gates and Gordon. Carr threw his second interception of the season, but the Raiders won the turnover battle for the game.

Next: Raiders Continue to Play With Fire

And when your defense can force four turnovers on a given day, usually you’re going to win the ballgame. We say usually, because even though this defense did force four turnovers, they still very well could have lost the game thanks to their many other defensive deficiencies.

For the season though, the Raiders are the third best in the league in the turnover differential department. They’ve taken the ball away ten times and have given it up just three times, for a differential of plus seven. Only Minnesota (plus eleven) and Buffalo (plus nine) are better.

Turnovers can help cover up some defensive deficiencies, and the Raiders are proving adept at being able to take the ball away so far. Which is a good thing, given the state of their defense.