Oakland Raiders: Top 5 takeaways from Week 2 loss to the Kansas City Chiefs
1. The Raiders secondary has a lot of holes
It cannot be emphasized enough that Mahomes is a very capable quarterback. His MVP honors last season were no fluke, and he’s going to be a thorn in the side of Raider Nation for years to come.
That being said, there was absolutely nothing that the Raiders secondary could do to thwart his offensive outburst.
Mahomes would go 30-for-44 with 443 yards and four touchdowns. Much of that came in the second quarter.
With Tyreek Hill being sidelined with injury, it seemed that the Raiders’ defensive game-plan was to eliminate Sammy Watkins and let some other receiver beat them. In that sense, the Raiders were successful.
Unfortunately, all the other receivers flourished.
While Watkins was held to 49 yards on six receptions, both Demarcus Robinson and Travis Kelce were serious problems for the Raiders this week — each going for over 100 yards each.
Kelce continues to establish himself as one of the top tight ends in football today. He played physically and explosively and had his way with whatever defender was tasked with defending him.
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Robinson had a career game, too, putting up 176 yards and two touchdowns. Last season, Robinson put up a total of 288 yards and four touchdowns. It was a career day.
While Watkins was limited to a long of 14 yards, four different receivers had receptions of 32 yards or more.
One way to look at this is that Mahomes has the touch to thread whatever needle he needs to in order to make the big play — which is true. But the other way to view this is to accept the fact that the secondary did not have a good game.
There were several blown coverages that left receivers wide open down the field. There seemed to be a revolving door of players attempting to stop any of these receivers and ultimately getting embarrassed.
While the Raiders were able to stuff the running game in spurts, they were getting toyed with when it came to the long ball.
While some may argue that the Raiders were successful in that they shut the Chiefs offense down for three quarters, this largely seems like a mirage.
There was no point where the Raiders seemed to come up with an answer against Mahomes and his gunslinging. The Chiefs probably could have kept on bombing downfield and getting whatever they wanted if they chose to.
As much as it might hurt to hear, it felt more like the Chiefs were letting off the gas pedal. There were improvements in the defense going into the second half, sure, but the damage had been done.
And the Raiders knew that if Mahomes wanted to go deep, he could go deep again.
The second quarter immediately highlights an area of concern for the Raiders moving forward. In the lengthy absence of Johnathan Abram, the Raiders will need to find a way to limit the number of big plays for the opposing team.
Raider Nation can be reassured by their pressure in the backfield. They recorded two sacks on Mahomes to go along with nine tackles for losses.
But the secondary is going to need to improve if the transformation of the defense is ever to be complete.