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Las Vegas Raiders head coach Antonio Pierce.
Feelings around the Las Vegas Raiders were good after they decided to promote Antonio Pierce to full-time head coach in the offseason. However, the returns have not been good.
The Raiders are 2-12 this season and have lost their 10th straight game, which is their longest losing streak since 2014. Monday night’s game against the Atlanta Falcons was very winnable for Las Vegas but in the end, they lost 15-9.
There have been rumors that Pierce could get fired after the season and he has to be feeling the pressure. He was clearly frustrated after the game and went on a passionate.
“Everybody. Coaches, players, staff, organization. I mean, guys are all in,” Pierce said during his postgame press conference. “Listen, man, just we’re not winning. I don’t know what else to tell y’all. We’re not winning. [Expletive], do I want to win? Hell, yeah, I want to win. Do I want to keep sitting here looking at the same [expletive] thing every week, having to same discussion with y’all? No. We got guys that’s battling, it doesn’t matter, next man up, right? You can poke armor, do all this stuff, but these guys are not budging. I’m not budging. We’ll keep chopping wood, and at some point, the [expletive] thing will break and go our way.”
Raiders Players Haven’t Given up on Antonio Pierce
While the Raiders have been eliminated from the playoffs for weeks and have the worst record in the NFL, it’s clear that players haven’t given up yet. They’re doing their best to keep games close, especially on defense.
The players fought for Pierce to keep the head coaching job after last season and they are still playing hard for him. At the end of the day, it’s just not the Raiders’ year.
“It really ain’t about me. It’s about the team,” Pierce said. “This is what we’ve been building on and working on since the offseason. … It’s a blue-collar group; it just hasn’t gone our way, which is now becoming transparent and redundant. But it’s not really about them fighting for me; we’re fighting for one another. … We got the ball with less than two minutes to go out there and, again, win a game.”
Raiders ‘Searching for a Win’
Desmond Ridder had to take over as starting quarterback with Aidan O’Connell injured. Despite playing poorly for most of the game, the Raiders had a chance to win at the end of the fourth quarter.
However, Las Vegas just can’t seem to catch any breaks this season and seemingly forgot how to win. Ridder spoke about how desperate the team is to get back into the win column.
“It’s tough being in the position we are in,” Ridder said after the Falcons loss. “We’re just searching … searching for a win, searching for positive energy. We fight every single week. But we just keep saying that we fight and nothing is happening where we can go push over the edge and get a win.”
The Raiders’ best chance to get another win this season comes on Sunday against a 3-11 Jacksonville Jaguars team.
