Oakland Raiders Attempt to Rebuild Franchise in 2009

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What can we say about the Oakland Raiders? After an amazing start to the decade (think back to the dominant days of Gannon, Rice, Brown, Garner, Woodson, and others), the Raiders simply haven't been what they used to be. As a Jets fan myself, I can remember fearing the presence of the almighty Raiders year in and year out. Times have obviously changed.

Even bringing in high caliber players like Randy Moss at wide receiver and LaMont Jordan at running back failed miserably, as the Oakland Raiders have had more consecutive seasons of losing football than I can count at this point. They do have a very talented secondary, but there's not much else to say that's good about the team. Their offense is simply horrible.

The bad finishes to each season have given the Oakland Raiders the benefit of some early draft picks. Take two of their picks in recent years, JaMarcus Russell (quarterback) and Darren McFadden (running back), both very talented football players and arguably tops in the nation at their positions while in college. It looks like both players are finding their ways as they've improved so far this season.

While Russell hasn't been as good as they'd like him to be, he's undoubtedly better this year than last, and he's making less mistakes than he did in 2008.

The Raiders somehow almost beat the Chargers during the first game of the season. In front of the entire nation on Monday night football, they carried a lead into the 4th quarter and would have won if not for the heroics of Philip Rivers on the final drive. In week 2 though, the Oakland Raiders beat the Chiefs.

While a win against the Chiefs is nothing to brag about, I do believe that the Chiefs are better this year than last, thanks to the addition of Matt Cassel at QB. Dwayne Bowe seems to get better by the year too. Despite this, the Raiders came up with a nice win over the Chiefs.

We'll see where things end up at the end of the season, but for now, the Raiders have a sense of hope that they haven't had in years. Raiders nation will gladly take that.

Stop in at the Oakland Raiders forum at RootZoo, where you can answer over 15,000 original NFL trivia questions.

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