Silver Minings: Raiders coaching staff faces difficult challenge against Cardinals

In case you haven’t been paying attention to the news this week, the Las Vegas Raiders have been busy adding players to the active roster and practice squad. The reason for that is the Raiders have been bitten by the injury bug with Anthony Averett going on injured reserve, and Andre James, Tre’von Moehrig and Denzel Perryman were ruled out on Friday.

That means Las Vegas’ coaching staff has to bring a lot of new players up to speed on short notice, which isn’t an ideal circumstance while having to face a playoff team from a year ago in the Arizona Cardinals. But that’s where quality coaching comes in and head coach Josh McDaniels was asked about this during his final press conference before the game and went into how it will test his staff’s depth.

“The depth of the coaching staff is really important at this point in time and that will be the case the entire season,” McDaniels said. “Because when you get a new player either on the roster or on the practice squad that has a potential to elevate and play quickly, there’s really no rest for the weary here. So the normal meetings and the game planning and the prep for the next day, none of that is going to change, but you also have to put time aside for those people to try to get them caught up and help them acclimate as quickly as you can.

“So, our assistant offensive line coach and the young QC’s (quality control coaches) on the staff and some of the senior guys on the staff have taken time out of their day, and we just split the meetings up. So if there’s a game plan meeting going on with the staff, then there might be a few other guys that are not there, and that’s just what you’ve got to do at this point in time. We’ll always try to do what’s best for the team in that regard, but we can’t shortchange the new player, because they just don’t have the same foundation.”

We’ll find out soon how many quality coaches the Silver and Black have.

In other Raiders’ links:

• Raiders buy property: per the Las Vegas Review-Journal, the team purchased the lot across from them for $16 million.
• Proposed trade sends Chuck Clark to Vegas: Raiders listed as a “best fit” according to Bleacher Report.
• 4 Youngsters with big roles today: Moe Moton dives into a few guys who could be in store for a breakout performance.
• Raiders Cardinals connection strong: four players have played for both teams.