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The Raiders wasted no time getting into gear against the Chiefs, the call from Oakland Radio announcer Greg Papa, “Bush gets the handoff on the lead, breaks a tackle and he may go 30,20,10 and he’s brought down inside the Chiefs five yard line.”
Justin Fargas followed it up with a one yard touchdown run to give the Raiders a 7-0 lead with over 12 minutes left in the first quarter.
On the Chief’s following drive, the Raiders defense was stingy, and cornerback Chris Johnson intercepted a deep throw from Matt Cassell at the Oakland 32 yard line.
The Raiders went into a wild hog formation on their next drive and it was not effective. In the first half of the first quarter, there was a barrage of penalties on both teams including four against Oakland for 25 yards, and two against the Chiefs for ten yards.
Following a Chiefs field goal later in the in the quarter, the Raiders go for a three and out series. Upon the Shane Lechler punt, Chiefs return man D. Savage muffs the punt and it’s recovered by Hirum Eugene at the Chiefs 37 yard line.
That was followed up by a Sebastian Janikowski’s fifty yard field goal that split the uprights. Janikowski has now made 20 field goals in a row dating back to the 2008 season. The score was 10-3 Raiders with 2:10 left in the first quarter.
On the following Chiefs possession, we saw the first sack of the game coming from defensive tackle Tommy Kelly, who had previously been called for two offside penalties. The radio call from Greg Papa was, “Right now the Raiders defensive line is devouring the Chiefs offensive line.”
Suprisingly, despite the return of former starter Darren McFadden and the recent success of tailback Justin Fargas, the Raiders chose to start running back Micheal Bush who had four carries for 66 yards in the first quarter.
After a few stalled drives by both teams, the next score came from a 44 yard run on fourth-and-one from the Raiders 44 yard line by the Chiefs starting halfback Jamaal Charles. It was with 12:25 left in the second quarter. The score tied the game at 10-10.
Greg Papa, “You kind of expected this, after the fast start, the Raiders have gone flat here.”
After words, the Chiefs pass happy offense started to take the momentum. Matt Cassell connected with Dwane Bowe for 41 yards. Two plays later Cassell hit Chris Chambers for 24 yards to the Oakland six yard line.
Following a Matt Cassell fumble in shotgun formation, the Chiefs go three tries for misses inside the Raiders ten yard line and end up kicking the second Ryan Succop field goal to take the lead 13-10 with 6:48 left in the half.
Controversial quarterback JaMarcus Russell continued to struggle despite the return of Raiders number on receiver Chaz Schilens, Oakland could not convert third downs early, as they failed on their first six attempts on third down. His throws were going behind receiver and over their heads.
JaMarcus started the game 6 of 15 for 36 yards and was lucky not to be intercepted on his off-target throws. The defensive penalties continued for Oakland and with 5:18 left in the second quarter, the Raiders had already racked up 54 yards worth of penalties, mostly on their defense.
The Raiders attempted to get back on track by running the explosive halfback Darren McFadden. However, left tackle Mario Henderson got called for a holding penalty on 3rd down and two yards after McFadden had run for Oakland’s first third down conversion. It was followed by a pass from Russell to Johnnie Lee Higgins on which Henderson was again called for holding, forcing a Raiders punt yet again.
Following the Lechler punt, the Raiders started to use timeouts to try and get a positive momentum moving in their favor. They were fortunate to get the Chiefs punt following a seven yard run by Kolby Smith who nearly picked up the first down for Kansas City.
“Lot of punts today for both sides; 11 punts so far in this game,” said Raiders radio announcer Greg Papa.
After taking a 10-3 lead, the Raiders fall flat on their faces and give the Raiders fans more to boo about after failing on another third sown conversion, forcing Shane Lechler to punt for the eighth time in the first half.
Following back to back one hour quarters, the Raiders-Chiefs game went to halftime with the Raiders playing an inept second quarter in which they were outscored by Kansas City 10-0. The two teams combined to go 0-18 on third down conversions.
The second half started off with the Chiefs getting the ball and converting the first third down of the game on a 13 yard pass from Cassell the Bowe. The Raiders defense, inspite of the 44 yard touchdown continued to play well against the run, allowing only 1.43 yards on every carry aside from the TD run.
The opening drive of the half by the Chiefs ended up in a 4th and seven field goal try that was missed by rookie kicker, Mr. Irrelevant Ryan Succop.
The Raiders started off their first second half drive with five straight runs by Michael Bush, driving deep into the Chiefs territory and achieving Bush’s second career 100 yard rushing game. Bush drove the Raiders to the Chiefs 22 yard line before taking a breather.
Two busted plays from that point were followed by the first Raiders timeout of the second half. It was called as a result of the play clock running down to two seconds as the Raiders approached the line of scrimmage. “There’s just no excuse from that,” called former Raiders coach Tom Flores over the radio waves.
The drive led to a missed field goal by Sebastian Janikowski which was his first miss since November 16th, 2008 against Miami. He had made 20 field goals in a row leading up to the miss from 46 yards away.
The following drive, Oakland continued their penalty ways, when Stanford Routt illegally contacted a Chiefs receiver. Routt has been the suspect of many penalties for Oakland this year and has labeled himself on the outs with the fans.
The drive led to a failed fourth down attempt from the Oakland 14 yard line, which failed. The Raiders took over on downs at the Oakland 14 yard line with 3:23 left in the third quarter. Oakland certainly needed to regain the momentum at that point, as Kansas City attempted to win their seventh straight game against the Raiders in Oakland.
Unfortunately, the boo birds had arrived in Oakland, following nine drops from Raiders receivers which led to a short punt from Shane Lechler, which only went 43 yards and allowed the Chiefs to start their next drive in Raiders territory at the 48 yard line.
Raiders back-up QB Bruce Gradkowski came in after a turnover on a fumble from the Chiefs. At that point in the game, there was 2:13 left in the third quarter. It marked the second time in the last four games where JaMarcus Russell had been pulled from the game for poor performance. The change made little difference, as the Raiders continued to struggle on third down.
“The Raiders have not taken advantage of any good field position, and they’ve had some good field position,” replied Tom Flores in the call for the game on KSFO 560.
The third quarter ended with the Chiefs on their own 23 yard line facing a third down and one to go. Both teams had been inept on third down conversions up to that point. It continued, with the Chiefs missing a deep pass to Chris Chambers.
The game began to look eerily similar to the teams’ first match-up of the year, when the Chiefs outplayed the Raiders, but lost 13-10 in Kansas City.
“Fargas straight up the gut, breaks a tackle, picks up the first down and more, breaks another tackle and converts the Raiders first third down conversion of the game,” called radio announcer Greg Papa.
It was followed up with a Bruce Gradkowski interception courtesy of Kansas City safety Mike Brown.
On the Chiefs drive, Matt Cassell received the second sack of the game courtesy of Raiders rookie defensive end Matt Shaughnessy. However, the Raiders continued their penalties with a 19 yard pass interference call on All-pro cornerback Nnamdi Asomugha, who had a rough game up to that point.
It put the Chiefs in good position on the Raiders 20 yard line with 9:45 left in the game. The interception drive for the Chiefs led to a field goal attempt by Succop which led to a 16-10 lead for the Chiefs in the final quarter.
Oakland needed to lead a touchdown drive in the final minutes to finish the game with a win. With only two combined third down conversions by both teams, the odds were not in favor of the Raiders winning the game, especially not with their back-up QB in the game.
The next Raiders drive led to a 4th down and 15 yards to go, after a Gradkowski sack. At that point, Tom Cable might have been thinking about bring JaMarcus Russell back in. The Chiefs, however, muffed the punt again, but this time, they recovered their own fumble.
The Raiders fans continued to puke in their own mouths, before washing it down with shots of Schmirnoff’s Vodka.
The Raiders defense forced a punt on the Chiefs next drive, they received a punt following the two minute warning, with one timeout left at their own 20 yard line. The Raiders put together one of their best drives of the day, with Darrius Heyward-Bey making his biggest pro catch with a long ball to the Chiefs 26 yard line with 38 seconds left.
The following play, Bey bobbled the play up on the air and it was intercepted by the Chiefs Mike Brown to ice the game for the Chiefs.
Now, it might be time to start talking about the 2010 draft for the Oakland Raiders. Chiefs win 16-10.
