Oakland Raiders not rushing success

Darren McFadden hands off to Justin Fargas
Photo by Patrick A. Patterson/TFDSsports.com

Prior to the season, it was an accepted truth that the Raiders were going to be one of the top rushing teams in the league. The Raiders were sixth in the league in rushing in 2007, and the addition of Darren McFadden and the recovery of Michael Bush was going to push them over the top. Rather than excelerate as was expected, the running game has mostly fizzled as the Raiders offense faltered into a scoring drought. 

As of this writing, the Raiders are tenth in the NFL in rushing, putting them barely in the top third of the league. Their current average of 123.8 is 6.8 yards off of their average for last season. However, this season the Raiders are averaging 4.3 yards per carry, which is .2 yards per carry more than they had for last season. The truly disturbing statistic is that the Raiders only have 6 rushing touchdowns for the season which puts them in a four way tie for 27th in that category with Cleveland, Kansas City, and San Diego. Only Saint Louis (5) and Cincinatti (4) have fewer rushing touchdowns.

Darren McFadden was selected with the fourth pick in the draft to be an explosive threat on the ground to score touchdowns. However, he has only had three this season with two of them coming in last weeks game in Denver on short yardage situations. Justin Fargas, Michael Bush, and JaMarcus Russell each have one additional touchdown. What happened to the vaunted running game that the Raiders were supposed to have this season?

The Raiders rushing attack suffered a huge setback in the penultimate preseason game when fullback Oren O'Neal was lost for the season with an injury. His blocking was a key to the Raiders running the ball. Without him opening holes, the Raider backs have not had the same success moving the ball. Once Justin Griffith went down, the Raiders rushing attack continued its nosedive. Luke Lawton is not the blocking fullback the Raiders need.

One thing about Lane Kiffin's play calling was that he stuck to the run. Once he left and Greg Knapp and later Tom Cable took over the playcalling, the Raiders began to air it out more, and lost their identity as a running team. Once that happened, the Raiders were not able to run the ball as much. A great example would be the tale of the two Chiefs games. In Arrowhead, with Lane Kiffin as the head coach, the Raiders ran for nearly 300 yards on the Chiefs and brought home a win. In Oakland, with Tom Cable calling plays, the Raiders ran for 139 yards and lost.

As the Raiders offense continues to falter, one needs to look no further than the disentigration of the running game. There is no way to win in the NFL if a team can not run the ball.