Silver And Black Pride
The Las Vegas Raiders won just their third game the entire season, and 1st in nearly 2.5 months on Sunday in a wild 14-12 victory over the Chiefs where the only Raiders player to reach the endzone was Tyree Wilson on a safety sack.
The Raiders have seen ups and downs from their rookie class over the last season and notably a lack of playtime till recently. On offense, rookie Ashton Jeanty broke the Raiders rookie all purpose record crossing a 1320 mark this season and he also tied the NFL record for TD receptions by a rookie runningback with the 5 he had coming into today. Jeanty posted 26 attempts for 87 yards and forced 8 missed tackles bringing him to 66 on the season and likely top four in the NFL. Additionally Jeanty finished the game with 56 yards after contact bringing him to 814 yards on the season, bringing him 9th in the NFL for yards after contact despite ranking 2nd in elusiveness this season while also dead last in yards before contact. Rookie lineman Caleb Rogers did struggle allowing a sack, hit, and 2 pressures facing Chris Jones and the third rounder from Texas Tech has allowed 2 sacks and 10 pressures in his 179 attempts this season. At 24 years old Rogers is going to compete for a starting spot in 2026 and his athleticism has been a key note, especially as a run blocker where despite the Raiders struggles he’s having 4.1 ypc as a lead blocker. Fellow rookie third round OL Charles Grant finally earned the chance to play as the starting LT for the Raiders allowing just 1 pressure in 22 attempts with 5.8 ypc lead blocking. Grant finishes his season with just 59 total snaps though his film has been impressive and going into the off-season with a dominant performance to end the year has to be key for motivation and Grant will compete for a chance to start and play in 2026.
Defensively, the Raiders saw five rookies land real playtime to end the season. Third round cornerback Darien Porter logged 607 snaps this season after rotating in to start the year. Porter finishes the season with just 17 receptions allowed for 241 yards, 0 TD, and 5 PBU along with a 81.1 QBR. Porter allowed just 1 target over the last two weeks. Porter has looked notably comfortable at the position, also ranking 58th of all CBs and 7th in rookies for separation allowed. The soon to be 25 year old stands at 6’4”, 205 and showed a notable ability to break out of cuts, tackle well, and showed some high level instincts as a defensive back. Additionally fellow rookie CB Greedy Vance started earning playtime at the back end of the season with 57 snaps in the last two weeks and he allowed just 4 receptions for 36 yards on 5 targets. The 5’10”, 175 nickel cornerback will compete for the roster on 2026 and did show flashes...
