The Oakland Raiders were back at the team's Alameda, Calif. practice facility Tuesday to begin preparation for the Buffalo Bills. Tuesdays are also Head Coach Jack Del Rio's patented "Tell the Truth Tuesdays" where the players and coaches break down the bad and good from their performance.
Del Rio and Co. addressed some of the areas they feel they can grow in and improve as a whole. The Silver and Black might have a record of 9-2, but the team is more than aware that it can perform at an even higher level.
Head Coach Jack Del Rio
"That's one of the areas [fourth quarter play] where we've grown from last year to this year. I think it's smoother and maybe more confident. I think there's a level of trust that's been built and that is a part of what we do."
"I think the biggest thing from that standpoint is to continue to do what we do. What that is really, is you take it game by game, day by day with that process that you go through. And so right now, today, this is the day that guys are banged up will come in, we begin to recover from the game, the staff will turn our attention forwards, start game planning and dial in the preparation and then you do it again. That's what you do, and that's where all of our energy has to go."
"I think you do the things that we've been doing, which is you want to teach situational awareness. You want to make sure that we have the basic fundamentals that we're going to need to rely on and we harp on those, that we have the plays that we need to get to and that we've been able to take reps at them and understand the things they're going to do and how they'd counter it and what our answers are. It's really about having answers and then it's about the execution when you get to that moment."
Tight End Clive Walford
"I take pride in it [blocking], so that's something I go out and work on extra hard, before practice…The game's slowed down a lot for me. My hand placement, quicker footwork, and just staying on my blocks longer."
**Offensive Lineman Jon Feliciano
**
"It's just getting our technique right, we've been kind of out of sync up front, just a little bit. You've got to credit Houston and Carolina for the job they did up front. We've just got to get our technique right."
"I think we feed off of each other man, when they running game ain't going so well we've got great receivers and a great quarterback that can air it out."
Defensive Tackle Dan Williams
"One thing coach pointed out was eliminating the big plays, because you know when we don't give up the big plays we definitely play a whole lot better. A lot of those numbers that we give up are inflated just because if you take away three plays, and we hold them under 200 yards. We just made a few mistakes, and in the times we have made the mistakes teams made the big plays, so it's make sure we stay over the top and we're in our gaps so there's no big runs from the top down."
