Raiders 27, Dolphins 13: Jeanty Scored Twice, Paye Lived in the Backfield, and I Swore I Was Done With This Team

Sixteen plays on the opening drive, two Jeanty touchdowns, five sacks, zero sacks allowed, and two Cousins interceptions that almost ruined my Sunday anyway. One and oh.

I said I was done with them. I said it in 2020 when the trucks pulled out of Alameda, I said it again last December somewhere around the eleventh loss, and I said it this morning to my wife, who didn't even look up. Then at 1:25 I was on the couch in my dad's old Tim Brown jersey, the one with the collar that's basically a rumor at this point, yelling at a punt return. So that's where we are. The Raiders beat Miami 27 to 13 in the opener and I'm 1 and 0 as a hypocrite.

And honestly? It felt good. It felt really, stupidly good.

The first drive told me something, and I'm going to hold onto it until somebody takes it from me. Sixteen plays. Ninety three yards. Almost nine minutes off the clock. Last year's team couldn't put together sixteen plays in a row without somebody jumping offsides or the whole thing just sort of wandering off. This one kept handing it to Ashton Jeanty, kept moving the chains, and on third and four Kirk Cousins hit Jack Bech over the middle for fifteen yards and the score. I stood up. I'm not proud of how fast I stood up.

Jeanty is the reason I can't quit this team, and today he was the whole show. Twenty three carries for 102 yards. Six catches for 45 more. Both of his touchdowns came through the air, a pair of thirteen yarders from Cousins, the first one on third and eight with 1:07 left in the half and the second one right after Miami had crawled back to within four. That second one mattered more than anything else that happened all afternoon. Malik Willis had just scrambled in from fourteen, the crowd on my TV went a little quiet, and my stomach did the thing it's been doing for about twenty years. Five plays later Jeanty was in the end zone again and it was 24 to 13. That's what a real player does. He takes the air back out of the other guy's balloon before it can float away.

Then there's Kwity Paye. I didn't know what to expect from him in silver and black and I'm a little embarrassed about that now. Two sacks, six tackles, four quarterback hits, and he basically lived in Willis's lap for sixty minutes. Maxx Crosby got a sack and a half, Nakobe Dean dropped Willis for ten yards, and the Raiders got home five times total. You know how many times Cousins got sacked? Zero. I had to read that twice. A Raiders offensive line kept its quarterback clean for an entire game. I'll let that sit for a second.

Okay. Now the part where I get to be mad, because it wouldn't be a Raiders Sunday if I didn't.

Cousins threw two interceptions and both of them were the same bad idea. Second half opens, we're up 17 to 6, the crowd's loud, and on the second play he floats one deep down the left side for Bech and Michael Taaffe just catches it like it was thrown to him. Four plays later Miami's in the end zone. Then early in the fourth, up fourteen, he goes deep middle for Jalen Nailor and Dante Trader Jr. picks that one too. Kirk. Buddy. You've got the best running back in the division and a lead. Nobody's asking you to be a hero out there. Twenty one of thirty for 160 yards and three touchdowns is a perfectly nice day, and he nearly talked himself out of it twice.

And the fourth quarter. Zero points. Interception, punt, punt, and then three kneels. I get protecting a lead, I do, but that's the exact kind of fourth quarter that gets you beat by a real team, and there are a lot of real teams on this schedule. Miami had the ball in the last six minutes with a chance to make it a one score game and the defense had to bail everybody out again. They held on fourth down at our 41 after Willis threw two incompletions, took a delay of game, and then threw one more incompletion, which, thank you Miami. Then on the Dolphins' last gasp Paye sacked Willis back to the one yard line, Willis found Malik Washington for 26, and Jeremy Chinn punched the ball out and Quay Walker fell on it. I screamed loud enough that the dog left the room.

The flags were their own little comedy too. A defensive too many men on the field. A pass interference on Walker in the middle of Miami's best drive of the fourth. A false start on the punt team. And my favorite, Matt Gay made a 25 yard field goal in the third quarter that got wiped out by an offsides call, so he backed up and hit it from 30 instead. He was perfect on the day, a 47 and a 30 plus three extra points, so I'll forgive him for having teammates.

Some stuff to watch that didn't show up on the scoreboard. Brock Bowers didn't play, out with a meniscus problem in his knee, and I don't love that the best receiving weapon on the roster is starting the year on the side. Darien Porter got hurt on that 30 yard catch by Washington late and he's questionable with a foot. Fernando Mendoza didn't take a snap, which is exactly right. The kid had a rough August in Houston, and we went through all of that in the preseason column. Let him sit. Let him watch Cousins force a couple of deep balls and learn what not to do.

The numbers I actually care about: 37 runs for 130 yards, almost 35 minutes of possession, Miami two for ten on third down, and a Dolphins offense that managed exactly one touchdown all afternoon. The Raiders were favored by three and won by fourteen. Every single one of those things would've been a fantasy this time last year.

So is this a good team? I have no idea. I wrote in the season preview that a 3 and 14 roster doesn't get fixed in one offseason, and one win over a Miami team starting Malik Willis doesn't change my mind on that. But Klint Kubiak's first game looked like a plan. The offense had an identity, the pass rush was nasty, and the ball kept going to the one guy who deserves it. That's more than I got for most of last season.

Next Sunday they're at the Chargers, 1:05 Pacific, and I'm already telling myself I won't watch. We both know how that's going to go. The rest of the football coverage lives on the NFL page, including the Niners, who handled their own business in Melbourne on Thursday.

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