Oakland Raiders: Some Numbers Important To The Team’s Success In 2017

6,001

Overall, the Raiders fielded the league’s twenty-sixth best defense. Or put another way, the sixth worst, in terms of total yardage given up. In this case, the 6,001 represents the total number of yards surrendered by the Raiders over the course of the season – roughly, about 375 yards per game.

If you wanted to put a positive spin on it, considering the fact that the team gave up a little more than 1,000 yards in the first two games alone, that means that they were slightly better the rest of the way, giving up “just” over 354 yards a game over the last fourteen.

Oh, they put together some good games where the defense really clamped down and made life tough for opposing offenses, but this defense was a dumpster fire for much of the season. As a defensive unit, the Raiders had three games where they gave up more than 400 yards of offense, two games where they gave up 500 plus, and six more where they surrendered more than 350 yards.

Oakland’s defense gave up roughly 266 yards through the air and 117 yards on the ground per game in 2016, which made them them twenty-fourth and the twenty-third best units respectively.

Although the Raiders have a world-class offense, one able to light up the scoreboard seemingly at will, it’s defense that helps win championships. You need to be able to get stops at crucial times and the Raiders, by and large, proved unable to do that in 2016.

To be a contender, they’re going to have to stop the opposing offense from moving the ball up and down the field at will.

Because giving up 6,001 yards in a season isn’t going to get it done.