OAKLAND, Calif. — NFL preseason games are about as meaningful as a Lindsay Lohan vow of chastity. But there is a modicum of significance to the third exhibition contest. Starters play for extended periods. Opponent game plans are installed. Coaches expect signs of rhythm, timing, execution. Then they yank the first teams at halftime and put them on ice until
Week 1.
All of which made Saturday’s surreal 45-7 New Orleans Saints’ takedown of the Oakland Raiders at a stifling hot, mostly empty Oakland Coliseum even more disturbing for those expecting to see, well, anything of substance from the always rebuilding home team.
Even the NFL Network pulled the plug on this Raiders’ total meltdown by halftime. Early in the second quarter, Saints quarterback Drew Brees, who completed 14-of-17 passes for 179 yards and two touchdowns, already had finished his assignment and more. His team had outgained the Raiders 225 yards to 44. The Brees-led Saints offense had piled up 14 first downs to the Raiders’ two.
Have a seat and a cool drink, Drew! You’re done for the day.
“I think the expectation was for all of us to play at least a half,” Brees said of the New Orleans’ offensive starters, “but once we got those three quick scores, we felt like we had run a lot of plays.”
Translation: The Saints scored on their first three drives. Fullback Heath Evans strolled four yards into the end zone right past Oakland’s high-priced defensive tackle Tommy Kelly, who was otherwise occupied, what with being hoisted in the air by guard Tim Duckworth and all.
Brees looked like he was playing against himself in Madden NFL 10. He found tight end Jeremy Shockey on passes of 21 and 23 yards, then hit wide receiver Devery Henderson on a 40-yard touchdown strike.
“We had probably run the equivalent number of plays as if it had been a half,” Brees said of his quick appearance. “Then at that point we’re thinking, ‘Hey, there’s still a lot of guys we want to evaluate here. Let’s just go ahead and pull our first-team guys out, walk away healthy and let those young guys get some work.”‘
If only it were that simple for the Raiders.
This is a franchise still waiting for big-money quarterback JaMarcus Russell to decide how and when to deliver the ball, either to a back or a receiver. His opening-drive fumble, when he was sacked from behind by Roman Harper and coughed up the ball to Saints linebacker Jonathan Vilma, was symptomatic of a longstanding weakness.
“You know, that one he probably could have put in the back’s hands a little sooner,” said Raiders coach Tom Cable, who admitted his team’s play was “disappointing” in such a significant dress rehearsal. “He held it, trying to find Zach (Miller), I believe. He should have put the ball in the back’s hands and went on to the next play.”
The Raiders had hoped to put the ball in any back’s hands. But when the offense lost three fumbles and the team fell behind 31-0 by halftime and 45-0 before veteran backup Jeff Garcia threw a 43-yard scoring pass with 6 minutes, six seconds remaining to salvage some credibility, the running back playbook was tossed aside in a hurry.
In Russell’s defense, there were at least three drops by Raiders’ receivers on third down. His favorite and most dependable receiver, promising second-year wideout Chaz Schilens, is out at least six weeks with a foot fracture. The protection was terrible; Russell was sacked three times. His team committed its usual spate of penalties, 10 for 94 yards.
When he got in sync, Russell looked very, very strong. He threw a tight, on-the-money spiral to Miller for 35 yards just before the sack-fumble, and completed 12-of-18 passes for 153 yards.
And while an out-of-uniform Russell continues to look like an overpaid young quarterback who could stand to 1) Lose at least 25 pounds, 2) Lose at least 10 of those by removing some of the oversized diamond-and-platinum jewelry, and 3) Lose another pound or two by shaving off the ridiculous Mohawk hairdo, he is displaying an admirable sense of duty when it comes to delivering the goods to the paying customers.
“Everything that could have possibly went wrong, went wrong today,” Russell said. “When things like that happen you have to go back to your fundamentals, and as a team you have to buckle down and become one. It was a tough situation and for young guys to do that, sometimes they go into a cubby hole,but the thing is, by you being there for awhile, and being a leader, you pull those guys up.
“It was very embarrassing today. It was disrespectful to our fans, ourselves and our family to go out and perform that way, but look on the brighter side, another day to go to work tomorrow, and days to come, and hopefully will pick it up from that end learn something from it, be positive about it.”
Raiders defensive players owned up to their poor tackling. Cable summed it all up pretty well: “Obviously, I’m embarrassed about that effort,” he said.
Said Miller, the talented tight end who knows he can do better than this: “It’s an embarrassment. As an offense, we didn’t do what we normally do. Way too many mistakes, myself included. Penalties, turnovers, something kept happening that killed the drive.
“I don’t think it was any one thing. I think a lot of different things had to do with it but we just got to, we can’t let those types of things happen. And if something bad happens, we can’t let it snowball and keep turning it into worse things. We’ve got to turn it around.”
If it seems like you’ve heard this before, you’re right. It’s standard practice in Oakland, where the word embarrassment is tossed around in a Raiders’ post-game locker room like a wet towel, and where the impetus for that description plays itself out on the field far too often.
