If your idea of offensive football is offense that offends the senses at multiple levels, you picked the right game to watch on Sunday, as the Las Vegas Raiders eked out a 14-12 home win over the Kansas City Chiefs in a game that will probably make both fan bases ecstatic that they don’t have to watch any more of this sort of thing.
The quarterbacks du jour were Aidan O’Connell and Kenny Pickett for the Raiders and Chris Oladokun and Shane Buechele for the Chiefs, which goes a long way toward explaining why no one scored a touchdown in this one. O’Connell was the only one who managed to make it over a hundred yards with 102.
The game also featured a total of five fumbles, and the winning margin turned out to be a Raiders safety when Buechele was sacked in the end zone for a ten-yard loss.
This was some bad, ugly football from start to finish, but the Raiders got a double-win of sorts when a victory by the New York Giants over the Dallas Cowboy by a 34-17 margin clinched the top draft pick for Las Vegas in this year’s draft.
The kickers had a field day of sorts, however. Chiefs kicker Harrison Butler started the scoring with a 36-yard field goal after a 36-yard, 8-play drive to give Kansas City a 3-0 lead in the first quarter.
His Raiders counterpart, Daniel Carlson, countered with two field goals of his own in the second, the first from 32-yards out, the second from 23 to make it 6-3 at halftime, but Butler tied the game in the third quarter with a 40-yarder.
The fourth quarter featured four more field goals, two from each kicker, to go with the epic safety that provided the final margin of victory. Carlson actually had an impressive day given his last two kicks, which were from 55- and 60-yards, respectively, with the lat one coming after a 5-play, 26-yard drive with just 53 seconds left.
The Raiders managed to snap a ten-game losing streak with the win, while the Chiefs closed out their season with a six-game losing streak as they dropped eight of their last nine games, thus proving how hideous they’d be if they actually had to go a whole season without quarterback Patrick Mahomes.
In other news and notes, Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce went out with a whimper, not a bang, catching three passes for 12 yards in this meaningless game. The lone bright spot for Kansas City was running back Brashard Smith, who gained 56 yards on 12 carries, which has to make Chiefs fans wonder why he didn’t get a longer look earlier in the season.
Embattled Raiders coach Pete Carroll did say he’s “love” to return to return next year, according to Ryan McFadden of ESPN, although it’s unlikely that ownership or the fan base loves that idea after what will likely be the final coaching game of Carroll’s previously estimable career.