After five games, the Raiders find themselves sitting at 1-4 going into their bye week. Head Coach Josh McDaniels and his staff have a week to assess and make adjustments before resuming their season with 12 games remaining. Despite their record, McDaniels acknowledged that the team has been doing a lot of promising things so far.
"Learning lessons the hard way sucks," McDaniels said following the one-point loss to the Kansas City Chiefs. "I think our team realizes you can compete with them, but there's a difference between being in the game and being able to close the game. Those are the lessons we're going to have to learn hopefully soon."
Read through for more quotes from Coach McDaniels' Tuesday morning media availability.
On priorities going into bye week:
"I think the big thing obviously for us is – first, would be bumps and bruises. We got some guys with bumps and bruises from yesterday. I mean, we're going to need to take some time to make sure that we're healthy as we go into the following week against Houston. And then you take this short period of time, and you try to evaluate, what are we doing well? Let's keep doing that. What are we not doing well enough that we have to keep doing? And then we have to try to find a solution and see if we can make some progress and improve those things. I think there's always a bucket where you say, 'What are we not doing well enough that maybe we don't need to do anymore?'"
On the progression of offensive line:
"I really think they're battling, giving Josh [Jacobs] the opportunity to get started. Some of the plays – we always talk about keeping the line of scrimmage clean and getting the back an opportunity to hit the hole and have an entry point. And I thought that was some really good blocking done up front. I would add Jakob [Johnson] in there, I would add the jumbo tight end did some really good work for us there."
On Josh Jacobs:
"Josh makes some great runs. I mean, he sees things that some other backs just may not see, and God blessed him with that ability to do so."
On learning how to win close games:
"I think experience and actually getting it done under pressure gives you confidence that you can do it again. We did some of those things a week ago against Denver, and we had our chances yesterday. Nobody can sit here and say we didn't have opportunities last night, that's not a true statement. ... I don't think anybody here is discouraged about the fact that we're not close. I think now it's about, what do we need to do in practice? What do we need to do carry it over to the games to be able to really make the plays that are winning plays at the end so that we have an opportunity to close out a lot of these close games? Because that's what the NFL is, it's a lot of close games every week. And when you start learning how to win them, and finishing them, you start to get a confidence and swagger about yourself. Then when you get in the next one, you feel good about it.
On the team's mindset going into bye week:
"I think whenever we have the bye, whenever they give it to us, it's always the right intentions to just, 'Hey, take your mind and get it away from football for a few minutes here, a few days, and try to regroup and get ready to go.' Obviously, we're going to have a long stretch here when we come back. So, that's really going to be the goal; find some things we can do better, get our minds off of football for a little bit, allow the players to kind of rest and recover, and then get ready to go and try to play our best football as we go forward."
