HENDERSON, Nev.-The Las Vegas Raiders entered the 2022 season with high expectations.After a disappointing lo s in the first game of the season, none of those expectations are thwarted. It was only one game of a 17-game season.Josh McDaniels directed the lo s after watching the film and looked ahead to the coming week.You can watch his entire pre s conference below, and read the transcript.Head Coach Josh McDanielsOpening statement: After looking at it (the film), much like we talked about last night, didnt get off to a great start and then I think there were really some key things that we needed to do well in the game that we didnt really do well. And so, good opportunity for us today and these first few weeks of the season to Josh Harrison Jersey really learn from the things that we see on film that if you do them a little bit better here or there, it would certainly change the outcome of an individual play and it could change the outcome of a po se sion and it certainly would change the outcome of a game. That goes both ways, Im sure theyre saying theres some things that they left out there as well. But today will be a good opportunity for us to see what we can do better, which wont be very hard to see. So, well be hard at work today and try to improve from this and be a better football team going forward.Q: On Derek Carrs interceptions, was that the result of being too aggre sive or was that more of a timing i sue?Coach McDaniels: "There's a lot that goes into pa sing the ball obviously; reading the coverage, making a decision on where you want to go with the ball, and then the actual mechanics of throwing it the way you want to throw it. Any number of those things could deter us from having succe s. The deep one to Davante Tae Adams was a little underthrown on that one. Same thing with the one down the middle to Darren Waller. Again, that was more of a decision of how to throw it than underthrowing. He put more zip on that one as opposed to touch, and those are decisions that happen in a football game. Like I said, we're going to learn a lot from this because there are hidden opportunities within po se sions offensively, defensively to create a different situation. And what I mean by that is you have a second-and-three play and you might have executed that play a little bit better, and Miguel Cabrera Jersey maybe it was first-and-10 because you gained eight, or 12, or 15 yards, instead of third-and-three. I think there's a lot of those that happened yesterday where we ended up in a situation, but it could have been prevented had we had more succe s earlier, or on defense done a better job of stopping them in certain situations. There's a lot that goes into that, but we'll try to fix all of it, certainly. There's nothing more important than us than taking care of the ball. There's no question about that, it's hard to win when Lance Parrish Jersey we do that."Q: How much of that was lack of in-game reps from the preseason?Coach McDaniels: "I don't know if we would have simulated that a ton, anyway. Again, I'm not going to look back on it and regret anything. Like I said, I think we were a healthy football team going into yesterday, I was happy about that. There were definitely players that didn't play in the preseason, but I also thought we had a lot of guys that didn't play in the preseason that played well yesterday. There were a few plays, like I said, here or there, that you say, 'Man, if we were to change the outcome of that.' But that's football, that happens every week. Unfortunately, we are on the short end of those yesterday, and we're going to take the right attitude and approach here and try to fix those things and be better for it."Q: How optimistic can you be about the way the team fought until the end?Coach McDaniels: "You're never going to hear me talk about moral victories, or anything like that, because I don't believe in that. But I liked the competitive spirit of our team. I liked the character that we displayed yesterday. I mean its football; you fall behind, you keep playing. Our job is to catch up, play better, coach better, and catch up. We had a chance to do that. And for that, like I said, I respect the way we played and competed. But that's every week. We're going to play another good team this week and so if we do the right things, we'll have a chance. And if we don't and we put ourselves in a hole, it'll be hard. Learning how to win is not something you get to carry over from one year to the next, not as a coach and not as a team. That's something that you acquire through work and trust and repetition and habits. I really believe that and so we're going to work hard at it again this week."Q: How would you a se s the overall play of the offensive line? Were there combinations that you liked?Coach McDaniels: "I think they all played competitively; I really do. Like I said, we're not searching for Spencer Turnbull Jersey anything. We're playing the guys that deserve to play. There are seven guys that played yesterday because they earned the opportunity with their performance throughout the course of the preseason and in training camp, and they've done it through thousands of reps. So, if something were to break and say, 'Hey, these five are clearly different from the other five,' then we could go in that direction. But I thought the two young players acquitted themselves decent. There are going to be things that we're going to correct today acro s the board, all five guys, all seven guys that played. I also think they did a lot of good things in the game that gave us opportunities to make plays, both in the running game in the pa sing game. We can blitz pickup better; we had a couple i sues with our backs just in terms of overall protection. We had a couple of things where we're trying to help the protection and didn't Brandon Dixon Jersey do it nece sarily the way that we wanted to do it. And then we had a couple of i sues where we probably could have gotten the ball out a little quicker based on something that was available to us. So, I've always believed that protection is a team thing, it's not just on the offensive line. I've coached in a lot of games where we've thrown it 50 times and never have been touched, and the reason we didn't get touched is because the whole design of the play was to get it out fast. Maybe the offensive line got a ton of credit that day, but I'm not really sure that it was just on them. It's a function of everybody doing their job, it really is. It won't ever be any different. They got to do their job, but so do the skill guys, so do the backs in blitz pickups, so do the tight ends. But I thought those guys competed hard, I thought they gave us an opportunity to win. And again, we're going to fix a lot of things today and correct them so hopefully we'll be better for it."Scroll to ContinueQ: An
