Raiders win their second game

Photo above: on the first place of the game San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick had his pass picked off by Oakland Raiders safety Brandian Ross. He has quite a professional career. He was originally signed by the Green Bay Packers in 2011 and was relegated to their practice squad. He was then picked up by the Oakland Raiders who put him on their roster. He was then waived by the Raiders in 2012 and picked up by the Miami Dolphins, who waived him in September of this year, when the Raiders signed him once again. (YouTube) 

On Sunday the Oakland Raiders won their second game of the season, impressively, over the San Francisco 49er’s. Two weeks ago the Raiders got their first win against the Kansas City Chiefs, a game they led most of the day and were only tied once in the fourth quarter.

In this last game against the Niners, the Raiders scored first with an impressive 57-yard field goal by Sebastian Janikowski. But the Niners followed with a touchdown when Bruce Miller scored on a seven-yard pass from Colin Kaepernick. That would be the only TD for San Francisco.

Oakland would out score San Francisco in the next three quarters with rookie quarterback Derek Carr leading his offense to three more scores. He threw touchdown passes to Donald Penn (three yards), Marcel Reece (nine yards) and Mychal Rivera (five yards). The young QB had 245 yards passing on the day, with no interceptions. His offensive line is doing its job too; Carr was only sacked once.

Before the game I thought the Raider defense is good enough to beat almost any offense, but after Sunday’s shut down of the San Francisco offense the Oakland D can cover any team well.

Colin Kaepernick had only 151 yards passing and was intercepted twice and sacked five times.

Tight end Mychal Rivera had seven receptions for 109 yards and he could be Carr’s favorite receiver in the years to come. Running back Latavius Murray is becoming a big part of the Raiders offense as the passing game of Derek Carr really gets into gear. Darren McFadden had four runs for five yards.

On their defense tackle Antonio Smith had two tackles and two sacks Sunday, as did Kahlil Mack and Tarell Brown. Brandian Ross and Charles Woodson picked off two of Kaepernick’s passes, Ross’s on the first play of the game and Woodson getting the 59th interception of his career.

One Oakland trademark that continues are the penalties. They had ten for 84 yards Sunday. It seems no matter who plays for or coaches the Oakland Raiders, they are going to get a lot of penalties. The Raiders Nation might like the reputation, but it must drive the coaches crazy.

San Francisco needed to win this game to keep themselves in the playoff hunt. Now that is not likely and they need to win two of their last three games just to have a winning season. That will be tough because they play the Seahawks in Seattle and then the San Diego Chargers and Arizona Cardinals at home. All three of those teams are playing very well right now so even that is in doubt for the Niners.

After the game San Francisco QB Colin Kaepernick wasn’t in a talkative mood. He was asked why his team didn’t do well Sunday, he replied, “I have to play better.” He was asked if he understood why he hadn’t played better. He replied, “I haven’t been playing well.”

Raiders free safety Charles Woodson was feeling pretty good after the game. He told the media around his locker, “The way that we were able to bounce back from the way we felt last week was big for us. To win this game, the Battle of the Bay, your cross town rivals — it’s a big win for us.”

The Raiders are just playing to be spoilers now and having beaten two top teams they are starting to have a lot of fun doing it. Their next game is in Kansas City against the Chiefs and we can expect they will want to make up for the loss in Oakland. It should be a good game.

The final score in the Battle of the Bay: San Francisco 49ers 13, Oakland Raiders 24.

(All photos by Claudia Gestro unless otherwise noted.)