Know Your Enemy: The Las Vegas Raiders

When the Las Vegas Raiders hired Pete Carroll for the 2025 season, I was confident they would turn things around pretty quickly. Start a trade for Pro Bowl QB Geno Smith. Draft RB Ashton Jeanty. Mix it all into a Raiders bouillabaisse with current Raiders Pro Bowl TE Brock Bowers and future Hall of Fame DE Maxx Crosby and it looked like the Raiders would be a dark horse contender.

Then the Raiders went to New England, won the first game and everything seemed like the plan was coming true. But suddenly things went wrong. The offense couldn’t score. The defense couldn’t find any stops. As a result, the Raiders kept losing. Carroll’s group lost five of six heading into the eighth bye week.

They have not won since, eight consecutive defeats and 12 L in 13 matches. Last week was a rock bottom as the Raiders were shut out for the second time this season. The Eagles made short work of it, literally, beating the Raiders 31-0 in about two and a half hours, sending the Raiders to Houston in an attempt to redeem themselves from a season gone wrong. The Raiders may have only won two games this season and only one since September 8 of this year, but as they say “Any Given Sunday.” As such, the Raiders are as dangerous as any team the Texans could face in Week 16, because NOBODY sees them winning this game and they need to atone for last week’s embarrassing loss in Philadelphia.

So, before Sunday arrives, let’s take a look at the Texans’ Week 16 foe – The Las Vegas Raiders.

• Week 1 – W @ New England Patriots 20-13
• Week 2 – L Los Angeles Chargers 20-9
• Week 3 – L @ Washington Commanders 41-24
• Week 4 – L Chicago Bears 25-24
• Week 5 – L @ Indianapolis Colts 40-6
• Week 6 – Tennessee Titans 20-10
• Week 7 – L @ Kansas City Chiefs 31-0
• Week 8 – BYE WEEK
• Week 9 – L Jacksonville Jaguars 30-29
• Week 10 – L @ Denver Broncos 10-7
• Week 11 – L Dallas Cowboys 33-16
• Week 12 – L Cleveland Browns 24-10
• Week 13 – L @ Los Angeles Chargers 31-14
• Week 14 – L Denver Broncos 24-17
• Week 15 – L @ Philadelphia Eagles 31-0
• Week 16 – @Houston Texans
• Week 17 – New York Giants
• Week 18 – Kansas City Chiefs

• Rushing Yards per game – 70.8 ypg (32nd in NFL)
• Passing yards per game – 173.4 ypg (29th)
• Total offense per game – 244.1 ypg (32nd)
• Lost Turnovers – 18 (15 INT, 3 Lost Fumbles)
• Raiders expected to start offense for Week 16
• QB – GENO SMITH
• RB- ASHTON JEANTY
• WR – TYLER LOCKETT
• WR – Tre Tucker
• WR- JACK BECH
• TE – Brock Bowers
• LT – PIERRE FORSYTHE
• LG-Dylan Parham
• C-Jordan Meredith
• RG- CALEB ROGERS
• RT-DJ Glaze

• QB – KENNY PICKETT
• WR- DON’T THORNTON
• RB – Dylan Laube
• RB – Raheem Mostert
• TE – Michael Mayer
• TE – IAN THOMAS

ALL CAPS – New to the team in 2025

1. Best TE in Football – Last week against the Cardinals, the Texans defense faced one of the three best TEs in the NFL: Cardinals star Trey McBride. Although we discussed how good McBride is across the board and how he should be number one on the bucket list, the Texans defense still gave up a career day to McBride (12 receptions for 134 yards and two touchdowns). Enter Raiders star TE Brock Bowers, another top three TE in the NFL. Bowers and McBride are different, although dominant at the same position. Bowers is more of a flexible receiving threat and that goes back to his days at Georgia, while McBride is an athletic, physical running back and bull in the ring after the catch. So maybe it works more in favor of the Texans defense that Bowers lines up a little more on the outside and plays more like a big WR than a TE inside the formation like McBride. But it’s still 100,000% clear that Bowers needs to be slowed down if the Texas defense is going to put together a strong performance on Sunday.

2. The Human Broken Tackle – Two years ago I began my preliminary study on Boise State RB Ashton Jeanty and within three plays I was hooked. While I know that RBs who run with his strength of nature and contact balance take a lot of beating and punishment at the next level, thus shortening their overall NFL careers, I always enjoyed watching him carry the rock. The first guy almost never attacked him and he put up Barry Sanders-like numbers at Boise State. In Las Vegas, he still breaks tackles, but unfortunately for the Raiders, he breaks those behind the LOS or at the LOS and picks up two to three yards per carry. These runs might be TFLs for the defense, but Jeanty is actually getting positive mileage from them. But, he can also make long runs AFTER breaking a tackle attempt or three. No Texas defense has faced the Boise State recruit, so, at first, he will shock them with his power, speed and contact balance. But this defense must work to eliminate its ability to produce ANYTHING positive after first contact as the play continues.

3. Geno’s Play – The Raiders went out and traded for former Pro Bowl QB Geno Smith ahead of the 2025 season and I thought it would be a great move for the Raiders. But the lack of consistent, quality protection and erratic actions from the OC haven’t helped Geno in 2025. He missed last week against Philadelphia and the offense presented a bagel against the Eagles. He should be back for this game against the Texans. While he was relatively well protected against Jacksonville, he threw four touchdowns and lit up the Jaguars secondary like a Christmas tree. He had time to throw and it showed when he used everyone in the progression to find open receivers. Since then, however, Smith’s offense has scored seven, 16, 10, 14 and 17 points with Smith at the helm; in the same span, he’s thrown just five TDs with three key INTs. Due to the protection issues, Smith, who holds the ball quite a bit, hasn’t been able to get more throws to rush Tre Tucker down the field or even Bowers deep as well. It’s imperative that the Texans rush Smith like the Broncos, Chargers and Browns did to prevent him from finding a rhythm in his first-ever start against the Texans.