Is It Officially Time to Hit the Panic Button on Oakland Raiders Franchise?



The Oakland Raiders had looked very good in their last two weeks, winning two consecutive games against the Kansas City Chiefs and Jacksonville Jaguars to move their record up to 3-4.

Oakland was only one game behind the Denver Broncos in the AFC West, and one game out of the AFC's playoff race behind the Miami Dolphins, Indianapolis Colts, and Pittsburgh Steelers. Their Week 9 contest against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers was a must-win game, for they knew going into it that Denver had already beaten the Cincinnati Bengals, the winner of Dolphins-Colts (which would be Indianapolis) would move up to 5-3 and the Steelers had an important game against the New York Giants.

Despite the stakes, the Raiders still wound up losing 42-32 to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, and in the process gave up 515 total yards (including 251 yards on the ground to Doug Martin).



Now standing at 3-5, the Raiders are now two games back of Denver in the AFC West, two back of Indianapolis and Pittsburgh for the final wild-card spot (which is a pity as they own the tiebreaker over the Steelers) and one game back of Miami (who own the tiebreaker over the Raiders).

It might be time to hit the panic button from Oakland, at least that's how it looks right now. But the saving grace for the Raiders is the fact that their schedule does get a tad easier from here out, and their offense, while turnover prone, can move the ball well.

The Raiders only have three games left all season against teams at .500 or above, with the only downside being the fact that they've already lost to two of those teams (the 4-4 San Diego Chargers and the 5-3 Broncos), and have to play two of these games on the road (one against San Diego, the other comes next week against the Baltimore Ravens).



If Oakland can go at least 2-1 in those three games, they will be in very good shape. Their other games on the schedule include the New Orlean...

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