Raiders OTA week three practice notes

The Raiders are in their third and final week of OTA's so it was the final time to see the team prior to their three-day mandatory minicamp which comes up next week.

Injuries

There were still some players missing practice with injuries. The two new injuries were to Jacoby Ford and Christo Bilukidi. Both players were watching practice and Dennis Allen said Ford tweaked his hamstring and Bilukidi rolled an ankle.

Tracy Porter returned to practice after missing most of the first two weeks of OTA's with a strained calf. Stacy McGee returned from his foot injury and Johnny Jones returned from his knee injury.

The others still injured were Josh Cribbs (knee), D.J. Hayden (abdomen), Coye Francies (illness), Jon Hoese (calf), Nick Kasa (hamstring), Miles Burris (knee), and Isaiah Williams (unknown).

Offense

The quarterback play was still not all that sharp but it was better than it had been last week. Just inconsistent accuracy overall and nothing to write home about in a positive way.

The receivers started team sessions by dropping the first two passes from Matt Flynn. The second pass was a little high to Denarius Moore but he still should have pulled it in. Oddly enough, it was a running back who eventually had the first catch of the day when Darren McFadden caught a swing pass cleanly.

We had our first Juron Criner sighting. The star of last year's off-season activities pulled in a pass in traffic in stride across the middle.

Defense

There were no turnovers but there was some good defense played. Middle linebacker Nick Roach showed some nice skills in coverage on the tight ends. Kaluka Maiava also had a pass defended on Flynn.

At one time Pat Sims as well as Ryan Robinson knocked down passes at the line of scrimmage. Sims reached up and batted a low pass from Matt Flynn and Robinson came around the edge and got his hands up to smother a Tyler Wilson pass.

Special teams

Fielding punts today were Denarius Moore, Greg Jenkins, Tracy Porter, and Conner Vernon. Jenkins and Vernon - the two rookies - outshined the vets as Moore and Porter both had a couple muffs.

Marquette King was inconsistent as he was last training camp and preseason for the Raiders. He launched a 70-yarder at one point but also had a few duds including one that was a line drive right to the return man. That is a recipe for disaster.

Chris Kluwe is very consistent with his punts although today he did have one shank.

Since the team cut both of the long snappers they brought in this off-season, Stefen Wisniewski was doing some long snapping as emergency in case the team was to lose Condo. Not that that would ever happen (ehem).

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