OAKLAND, Calif. (AP) -Three times this season, the Oakland Raiders have taken the field the week after a win full of confidence, only to end up on the wrong end of a lopsided score.
There was the 23-3 loss to Denver the week after a win in Kansas City. A 38-0 debacle against the New York Jets following an upset against Philadelphia. And finally a 24-7 loss in Dallas following a victory against first-place Cincinnati.
With the confidence once again flowing coming off a 27-24 victory at defending Super Bowl champion Pittsburgh, the Raiders (4-8) head into this week’s game against the Washington Redskins (3-9) looking to avoid another letdown for a team that former Raider Warren Sapp says can’t handle success.
e out that process of how to win two, put two together and get something going here a little bit.”
To that end, coach Tom Cable had signs plastered all around the locker room proclaiming Sunday as the day the Raiders finally break through. “Back-to-back wins set Raiders on path to future success! If you believe it, it will happen,” the signs concluded.
The Raiders did win back-to-back games to finish last season, but a win Sunday would give them their first stretch of three out of four since Norv Turner’s final season in Oakland in 2005. The Raiders haven’t won three games in a row since going to the Super Bowl seven years ago.
“If you can win this one, it’ll give you a chance to win a third in a row and start to build, and that’s what the focus is really on,” Cable said. “Stay the course and do the things you do every week to prepare, and eliminate distractions and then go out on Sunday and put forth a great effort.”
The Raiders will once again be led by Bruce Gradkowski, whose three fourth-quarter touchdown passes led Oakland to last week’s comeback victory.
d the comparisons to the 2002 NFL MVP.
“He’s on a different level,” Gradkowski said. “He’s proven himself. He’s been a consistent leader, a consistent winner in the NFL, and I’m trying to get there. To be named in the same sentence with him is an honor, even though it’s kind of like, OK, that’s not realistic yet, let me get going first.”
The Raiders are facing a team this week that often seems like a mirror image. Both Washington and Oakland are once-proud franchises with three Super Bowl titles, meddling owners and big-name acquisitions that have done little to reverse recent struggles.
Washington cornerback DeAngelo Hall has a unique perspective having spent a half-season in Oakland before being released last year and joining the Redskins. Hall was an up-close witness to some of the Raiders’ dysfunction, including watching in person when owner Al Davis gave his lengthy two-part news conference to fire coach Lane Kiffin. He also was in Atlanta when Michael Vick was arrested for his role in dogfighting.
“In Oakland, you never know what’s going to happen. Al Davis come down there holding a press conference. Everybody’s ready to go to work, and we see 30 news cameras out there,” he said. “So it’s a little bit different as far as those two situations go as opposed to here. Here it’s just a product of not winning football games.”
three weeks. They lost three games by a combined seven points, blowing fourth-quarters leads of six, eight and 10 points along the way to Dallas, Philadelphia and New Orleans.
“It’s frustrating to say the least, especially as they add up,” coach Jim Zorn said. “Most teams can handle a game or two like that. We’ve had to handle several. Those are the problems that we face and we have to face them just like everybody else does. They’re difficult.”
Last week’s 33-30 overtime loss to undefeated New Orleans might have been the toughest of all. The Saints shanked a punt that happened to hit a Washington player in the back. Drew Brees threw an interception that turned into a New Orleans touchdown when Robert Meachem stripped Kareem Moore of the ball on Moore’s return and ran it into the end zone. Shaun Suisham missed a 23-yard field goal that would have iced the game in regulation, leading to his release this week.
Safety Laron Landry and the secondary got beat on a 53-yard touchdown catch by Meachem with 1:19 in regulation that tied the game. Officials then needed extreme freeze-frame slow motion to determine that Mike Sellers had fumbled, putting the Saints in position for the winning drive in overtime.
“A lot of weird things just been happening to us,” quarterback Jason Campbell said. “Good teams always find ways to win those games and it seems like we’ve just been struggling down the stretch. The effort is there, things just haven’t bounced our way.”
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AP Sports Writer Joseph White in Ashburn, Va., contributed to this report.
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