Raiders beaten up by Browns for fifth loss in a row

The Raiders couldn't get anything going in the first half. Slow starts have become the norm with this team. The Browns have a pretty good defense as well but as usual it was more about the Raiders failings than anything the opposition was doing.

The Raiders defense had the first big play of the day when Matt Giordano put himself in position to intercept a badly thrown Brandon Weeden pass.

The Raiders offense could do nothing off the turnover and the Browns answered with a drive for a field goal. Then after a three and out by the Raiders, the Browns had a two and in. That is, a two play, touchdown drive capped off by a 44-yard touchdown catch by Josh Gordon to put them up 10-0. That long touchdown catch was courtesy of Ron Bartell who was torched on the play.

The Raiders were able to add a score of their own on a 51-yard Sebastian Janikowski field goal.

The Raiders defense was able to take another one away from the Browns when pressure by Lamarr Houston forced a bad throw and a Phillip Adams interception.The Raiders drove into Browns territory to set Janikowski up for a 61-yard field goal attempt but he missed wide right.

The third quarter started off as most third quarter have for the Raiders this season-with a score by the other team. The Browns got the ball to start the third and drove down field to kick a field goal and take a 13-3 lead. They were lined up to add another field goal on their next possession but Desmond Bryant blocked it.

As also often happens, one good play yields another. The Raiders took the ball at the 20 yard line off the blocked field goal and turned it into a touchdown. On the third play of the drive, Palmer put a ball up for Rod Streater who made a great correction on the ball and hauled in the pass over the shoulder and took it for a 64-yard touchdown.

The Raiders couldn't score again in part due to a very costly interception in which he threw the ball right to Sheldon Brown. Juron Criner had him beat down the sideline and Palmer didn't lead him but rather threw a perfect pass right to Brown instead. That would prove to be the most critical mistake in this game.

"I was trying to take a shot there, go for the touchdown quickly and just didn't put the ball in the right spot, didn't give Juron a chance to make a play on the ball," said Palmer. "just didn't put the ball there."

"We can't turn the ball over like that," Said Dennis Allen. "We've got all the momentum, we're moving the ball, and we can't have that self-inflicted wound right there. It's not there we've got to get rid of it, but we can't make that mistake."

The Browns would take the ball off the turnover at their own 6 yard line and drive 94 yards for a touchdown. The drive was a march that took 6:04 off the clock to give the Raiders just 3:27 to get two scores.

The final drive consisted of several short catches, all of which were in the middle of the field to keep the clock running. The Raiders had no timeouts left and the drive drained the clock.

It came down to a 4^th and one decision with :32 seconds on the clock. Dennis Allen opted to go for it and then try to score a touchdown even though the Raiders needed two scores. The result was a Raiders touchdown but not until after the clock had ran down to :01 seconds which left them with almost no chance to win the game.

"We thought about [kicking the field goal]," Said Allen. "But we were down there trying to get 7 points there. Unfortunately we didn't have enough time on the clock to be able to execute an on-sides kick and still have time."

Janikowski lined up for the onsides kick and saw the ball skip across the wet turf out of bounds to end the game.

The Raiders have now lost five in a row and have a short week to prepare for Denver coming to town on Thursday.

The Raiders defense was playing terribly to begin with and then lost three defensive backs to concussions-Matt Giordano, Mike Mitchell, and Phillip Adams. Dennis Allen also benched Ron Bartell at halftime after he was burnt for big catches a couple times, including the big 44-yard touchdown by Josh Gordon.

The weak secondary aided Brandon Weeden put up a career high 364 yards passing.

For the Raiders, Brandon Myers had a whopping 14 catches for 130 yards and a touchdown. Unfortunately, most of those catches came on the final drive when the Browns were more than happy to surrender catches over the middle and the touchdown was useless with just :01 second remaining.

Carson Palmer also had big numbers, throwing for 351 yards, 2 touchdowns, and 1 interception. But only because he put the ball in the air 54 times. Also, that interception was a back breaker rendering most everything else pretty much pointless.

Janikowski's 51 yard field goal made his 40^th career field goal of over 50 yards which ties him for third all time with Morten Anderson.

Box score

Cleveland Browns (4-8-0) Oakland Raiders (3-9-0)

Browns

Passing CP/AT YDS TD INT

B. Weeden 25/36 364 1 2

Rushing ATT YDS TD LG

T. Richardson 20 72 1 9

M. Hardesty 5 39 0 19

B. Weeden 5 11 0 7

Receiving REC YDS TD LG

J. Gordon 6 116 1 44T

B. Watson 6 80 0 22

M. Massaquoi 2 60 0 54

G. Little 4 48 0 18

J. Cameron 2 30 0 23

T. Richardson 3 23 0 21

T. Benjamin 1 6 0 6

A. Smith 1 1 0 1

Fumbles FUM LOST REC YDS

K. Maiava 0 0 0 0

Kicking FG LG XP PTS

P. Dawson 2/3 41 2/2 8

Punting NO AVG I20 LG

R. Hodges 2 34.5 1 43

Kickoff Returns NO AVG TD LG

J. Cribbs 1 18 0 18

Punt Returns NO AVG TD LG

J. Cribbs 2 8 0 9

Defense T-A SCK INT FF

T. Gipson 7-1 0.0 0 0

E. Hagg 7-0 0.0 0 0

S. Brown 5-0 0.0 1 0

J. Haden 4-0 0.0 0 0

D. Jackson 4-1 0.0 0 0

C. Robertson 3-0 0.0 0 0

B. Skrine 3-0 0.0 0 0

K. Maiava 2-1 0.0 0 1

F. Rucker 2-0 0.0 0 0

T. Ward 2-1 0.0 0 0

J. Hughes 1-0 0.0 0 0

J. Parker 1-0 1.0 0 0

A. Rubin 1-2 0.0 0 0

J. Sheard 1-0 0.0 0 0

P. Taylor 1-0 0.0 0 0

Raiders

Passing CP/AT YDS TD INT

C. Palmer 34/54 351 2 1

Rushing ATT YDS TD LG

J. Stewart 9 46 0 14

M. Reece 7 36 0 12

C. Palmer 1 3 0 3

Receiving REC YDS TD LG

B. Myers 14 130 1 21

R. Streater 3 96 1 64T

D. Heyward-Bey 4 40 0 11

D. Moore 2 31 0 20

J. Criner 4 26 0 8

M. Reece 5 20 0 11

D. Hagan 1 6 0 6

J. Stewart 1 2 0 2

Fumbles FUM LOST REC YDS

J. Criner 1 0 1 0

Kicking FG LG XP PTS

S. Janikowski 1/2 51 2/2 5

Punting NO AVG I20 LG

S. Lechler 5 33.2 2 51

Kickoff Returns NO AVG TD LG

C. Francies 4 21 0 32

J. Stewart 1 16 0 16

Punt Returns NO AVG TD LG

D. Moore 0 0 0 0

Defense T-A SCK INT FF

T. Branch 8-4 0.0 0 0

M. Burris 6-2 0.0 0 0

J. Hanson 5-0 0.0 0 0

L. Houston 3-2 1.0 0 0

M. Huff 3-1 0.0 0 0

T. Kelly 3-0 0.0 0 0

B. Ross 3-0 0.0 0 0

R. Bartell 2-0 0.0 0 0

A. Carter 2-0 0.0 0 0

O. Gaither 2-0 0.0 0 0

M. Mitchell 2-2 0.0 0 0

P. Wheeler 2-1 0.0 0 0

C. Bilukidi 1-0 0.0 0 0

M. Giordano 1-0 0.0 1 0

P. Adams 0-0 0.0 1 0

D. Bryant 0-2 0.0 0 0