It wasn’t the ideal way for the Las Vegas Raiders to enter their bye week.
The Raiders (2-7) lost 41-24 to the Cincinnati Bengals at Paycor Stadium on Sunday.
“At the very end, ‘Just keep competing, fellas. Fight and have some pride,’” Raiders coach Antonio Pierce said via the Raiders website. “I thought they did that.”
Here are a few takeaways from the Raiders’ loss to the Bengals:
Ridder or Minshew?
Desmond Riddler relieved Gardner Minshew at the quarterback position in the third quarter.
“We were trying to get a spark for our offense,” Pierce said.
Minshew went 10-for-17 forf 124 yards.
Ridder went 11-for-16 for 74 yards with a touchdown that he threw to Brock Bowers late in the fourth quarter.
“We didn’t see the athleticism until late,” Pierce said of Ridder. “But you did see him move around the pocket and the strong arm. He’s 10 days into building. Obviously, he’s competing.”
Pierce will likely evaluate the quarterback position during the bye week.
Offense remains inconsistent
The Raiders again started the game off on the right foot. They scored their fourth opening-drive touchdown of the season, tying them for the second most in the NFL.
Then things went haywire.
The Bengals outscored the Raiders 24-3 over the next two quarters. A Jack Jones interception brought the Raiders within two scores, but the Bengals pulled away with 10 unanswered before Bowers’s late touchdown catch.
“That wasn’t a good enough effort. The score tells you that. It felt like that the entire game, except maybe the first quarter,” Pierce said. “We’ll have to reset over the bye week. We got enough time to sit there and really, really dive into what to fix this because it can’t continue.”
Pressing the Reset Button
Pierce said the word ‘reset’ multiple times during his press conference, and the bye week will offer him and his team a chance to do so.
He said everything will be assessed during the week off and he didn’t commit to making any changes until after the bye.
“We got to reset. That goes for all us. It’s a team effort,” Pierce said. “We all have to find a way to better from coaches, to play callers to players, to execution to situations. We all need to do a much better job to put ourselves in a position to get into the fourth quarter and have a chance to win and not play catch up.”
Paul Delos Santos is the Las Vegas sports insider for Dice City Sports. Follow him on X at @PaulDelos_.
