Neither offense nor defense effective in Raider 24-16 loss to San Diego

November 1, 11:01 PMOakland Raiders ExaminerPatrick Patterson

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The Oakland Raiders losing streak against the San Diego Chargers has grown by yet another game. The Raiders offense showed glimpses of success, but could not get the job done. On defense, it was the same story as they would go for a stretch where they would stymie the Bolts, but after a series or two the Chargers put together a drive that just gutted the Silver and Black's pride and poise.

(AP Photo/Paul Sakuma)

The Raiders started off running the ball well, as they rode the combination of Justin Fargas and Micahel Bush to midfield in the opening drive and looked posied to take an early lead. However, on first and ten from the midfield stripe, JaMarcus Russell stepped back to pass and threw one up for grabs that was brought down by Antonio Cromarte.

After the game, JaMarcus Russell said, "The interception didn't hurt us that badly." However, that pick set up a two play drive for the Chargers that reuslted in their first touchdown. Rivers had a 53 yard bomb, and chronic Raider-killer LaDanian Tomlinson punched the ball over the goal line for the touchdown from 5 yards out.

The Raiders would take advnatage of a Chris Johnson interception of Phillip Rivers to score a tying touchdown. That would end up being the Raiders only trip across the goal-line to extend their streak of games without multiple touchdowns to seven. The Chargers would answer that touchdown with two of their own to take a 21-7 lead. The Raiders pulled to 21-10 with a Sebastian Janikowski field goal at the end of the first half.

The third quarter would completely belong to the Raiders, as the Bolts would only run run 9 plays. The Raiders were aided in this domination of the quarter by a Darren Sproles fumble on a punt return. Despite completely owning the quarter, the Raiders could only manage two more Sebasitan Janikowski field goals to bring the score to 21-16. The Chargers broke the Raiders back with their first drive in the fourth quarter when they started at their own eight and mached 14 plays down the field. The Raiders defense would ultimately stiffen and hold San Diego to a field goal, bit the damage had been done.

The Raiders got the ball back for a final drive with about 3 minutes left, two timeouts, and needing a touchdown and two-point conversion. It started promising as the Raiders pushed the ball from their own 23 to midifeld. To get to midfield they converted on a fourth and seven. However, once they hit midfield they disintegrated into shambles. On first down, Russell was sacked and fumbled the ball. Khalif Barnes recovered the fumble to give the Raiders a second chance. Barnes was called for a false start to move them further back. On second down, Johnnie Lee Higgins and Louis Murphy collided to help set up another Russell sack. On thrid and 28, Russell hit Zach Miller for eight yards. On fourth and 20, Russell appeared to hit Johnnie Lee HIggins short of the first down marker, but Higgins in an attempt to lateral the ball to a nearby Darrius Heyward-Bey batted it to the turf aborting the Raiders comeback attempt.

There were moments where it looked like the Raiders running game was set to take over the game. However, they could not get the job done when it counted. They were only able to gain 99 yards on the ground. The Raiders could only generate 180 total yards, as Russell went 14-22 for 109 yards and an interception. With the 28 negative yards from sacks, the Raiders had yet another game where they could not penetrate the two hundered yard barrier. That makes five out of eight games where the Raiders could not achieve that pleateau.

The Raiders need to get more from their offense, and these games where they can can't score more than one touchdown, and can't get at least 200 yards. Until the offense can get it together, the Raiders are going to continue to lose.

The defensive side of the ball has shwon flashes, but they are way too inconsistent. When they could not get pressure on Phillip Rivers he was able to pick them apart. This happened on the drives where the Raiders most needed a stop.

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You can also find Patrick Patterson on Thoughts from the Dark Side.