Jene Bramel
Footballguy
massraider posted some Raider thoughts in another thread and I thought we might get some homer eyes-on reports to chew on during the preseason in a new thread.Although it's not worth putting too much stock in the preseason with the vanilla defenses and mismatched ones on twos or twos on ones in some series, there are some valuable observations that can be made.Reposting massraider and my reply from the Raider linebacker thread here to kickoff the discussion.
Very little to be taken from the first preseason game. Morrison barely got his jersey dirty, Howard and Williams both looked quick, and Clark got a few reps with the 2nd team.Darnell Bing actually looked very active. Missed a tackle badly, but stuck his nose in there a few time.FWIW, I saw no switching of the LB's, aside from one play, when Williams blitzed. Just Howard at ROLB, and Williams at LOLB.I think there are a few things worth taking away. First, and maybe most important to the prospects of any of the Raider backers, is that Tommy Kelly looked bad. Morrison blew a tackle, but he was getting blistered by interior linemen with a running start on him. Agree with massraider that Howard, Williams, and Bing all looked pretty good. Bing in particular showed a willingness to mix it up and beat Clark to the play more than once. Howard and Bing both played in the nickel with their respective units. And if this game is any indication, all three backers may be blitzed on any down. Morrison narrowly missed a sack and Irons, Williams, and Howard all came on other downs.And, while I don't disagree with WisWolvrns that putting too much stock in preseason happenings is asking for trouble, I see no reason for the Raiders to move Morrison to the middle and give Howard first team reps from the first snaps of camp just to see what they have. Unless one of the current first teams is injured or flops horribly, Clark is a backup.Also, FWIW, Simoneau and Barber were the nickel backers for the Eagles and McCoy looked pretty good to me. Gaither also looked okay against the Raider twos, but got swallowed up one-on-one by bigger linemen more often than not. Looked to be pretty aggressive though.