Silver Minings: Raiders scored at high rate when losing in 2022

The 2022 Las Vegas Raiders’ season was weird.

There’s no other way of describing it.

The first year of Josh McDaniels’ tenure as the Raiders’ head coach is mostly remembered for the team blowing multiple double-digit leads and, in the end, for going from a 10-7 playoff team in 2021 to a bitterly disappointing 6-11 squad.

Here’s another aspect of the 2022 Raiders. They were among the NFL’s best teams when behind. According to a recent tweet NFL analyst Warren Sharp, the Raiders score rate on drives when losing games in 2022 was 45.6 percent. It was the fourth best rate in the NFL. Las Vegas was the only team in the top seven in this stat not to advance to the playoffs last season. Here is the full list:

The problem was the Raiders’ didn’t take advantage of this trait much. Yes, they were in most of the games last seasons, but they couldn’t close games out enough whether they were ahead or behind during key moments in games.

It’s up to McDaniels to change these trends in 2023.

In other Raiders’ news:

• Experienced: According to this study, the Raiders head into the season as the fifth most experienced team in the NFL.
• SF plan? The Las Vegas Review-Journal looks at if the Raiders will do some of the things that 49ers did with Jimmy Garoppolo.
• Wilson love: NFL.com thinks Raiders’ first-round pick Tyree Wilson is a top candidate to be defensive rookie of the year.