Offensively, the Las Vegas Raiders are searching for answers. Rookie running back Ashton Jeanty is struggling, and the leaky offensive line has new quarterback Geno Smith running for his life much of the time.
This wasn’t supposed to happen with a revamped offense designed by new OC Chip Kelly. Head coach Pete Carroll hired Kelly based on what he saw at Ohio State, and the Raiders made Kelly the highest-paid assistant coach in the NFL based on the success of the Buckeyes scheme, which helped produce a national championship.
But Kelly hasn’t been able to fix the blocking or the communication issues that have plagued the Raiders offensive line. In a detailed film study by Ted Nguyen of The Athletic, he broke down these problems and questioned Kelly’s protection schemes in the process.
There’s also been a lot of shuffling going on in the offensive line configurations. Linemen Alex Cappa, Jackson Powers-Johnson and DJ Glaze were flagged as players who have struggled in different ways, and offensive line coach Brennan Carroll (son of Pete) is in his first season in that role.
One problem Nguyen identified was the lack of motion in the Raiders offense, which is odd given that this was a staple of Kelly’s college schemes early in his career. The Raiders are using option on just 14 percent of their snaps, which isn’t helping the line or Jeanty a lot.
Geno Smith is another conundrum in all this. He clearly needs to get the ball out quickly given the current issues, but Smith likes to hold the ball for as long as possible to hit big plays down the field. Jeanty is struggling with blitz pickups, which isn’t surprising given that he’s a rookie, but the Raiders also aren’t using the Boise State product in the passing game, which is yet another issue in this offensive chess game. The Raiders are basically playing checkers, and it shows.
Kelly was lauded for his in-game adjustments at Ohio State, but those mostly haven’t happened so far in Las Vegas. The new OC has been out of the NFL for six years, so a slow acclimation process is understandable.
But there isn’t much time to get this right. If Chicago Bears quarterback Caleb Williams continues to produce the way he did against the Dallas Cowboys, the Raiders will need to punch and counter-punch to win this one. So far that hasn’t happened, though, and another loss would land Las Vegas at 1-3 and put their season in serious jeopardy as well.