I have to agree with you. If you'll look at the Raiders, Broncos, and the Cardinals, the commonality in those 3 games was how incessantly long their drives were. Aided by penalties big time, but so many 3rd and longs were converted per drive that I keep shaking my head. I can accept Denver was a fluke that just kinda happened that we were due for, but I think we win vs the Cardinals and Raiders if Murray and Carr didn't just keep those long drives going with endless penalties and 3rd down conversions. The one that Cardinals scored a TD on in the 2nd quarter vs the Cardinals lasted 8 minutes 25. I guess in the Raiders case, it was more penalties than anything. Maybe our secondary wasn't used to the type of offense that the AFC West ran, but they had by far their worst game against the Raiders. I didn't see our secondary duplicating a performance like that in other games of the year. I mean, some games they were subpar in, but vs the Raiders they had no choice but to pull and grab and Jordan Lewis just can't cover receivers running wide in the open field. On slant routes, he tends to be better tho but he's not a deep cover corner. He gets exposed badly doing that.
I don't see Jimmy as the type of Quarterback to make multiple 3rd and longs per game. But then, I didn't see Teddy being the type that can do it either, but he was excellent on 3rd and 10 against us... looked like he converted one every drive. That might be a fluke as I don't see him repeating that type of performance again. Hopefully Jimmy is inept on 3rd and longs. And equally inept in the redzone as his 20 TDs indicate he's not much of a redzone threat, but who knows.
the denver game was kind of an anomoly. if you watched tape of the broncos you would think, we got this one in the bag. they came out flat. not ready and got punched in the mouth and denver came out to play. by the time we got our bearings together it was way too late and they had full momentum......however, that game also exposed something, we were a finesse offense and defense and when someone played us physical we struggled. KC took note and did the same defensively. they played the WRs physical and were able to rush with 4 and drop 7 into coverage. most fans here who want to attack Dak, will point to that game and denver, etc. but if you watched how their defenses played, it was not only Dak, but entire offense struggling with physicality.
Raiders game was a mess. 28 penalties. 7 not accepted, meaning the refs called 35 penalties. that's ridicuolous...they also missed 5-8 blatant holds on raiders.......if refs called that way, every snap, I mean every snap would have a penalty....its football, sometimes you just got to let them play. I don't care what anybody says, the refs gave raiders that game.
also, like you said, AZ, they played phsyical. two things that worry me...one, their defense was able to stop the run and generate pass rush just with the front 4. we had 12 runs in that game and 6 times the defender was in the backfield hitting the RB right after snap. and they were able to rush with 4, dropping 7 into coverage. its hard to throw to 3 WRs against 7 defenders.....and then that 2nd quarter 8.5 minute drive.... defense can't allow that.
and to your point penalties...against AZ< we killed our own momentum with 3 penalties that negated 1st down conversions....and a 3rd and short and a 1st down turned into a 3rd and long.....
Grapolo doesn't worry me as much. we have to just have to take away the deep game, force them to work their way down the field and grapolo will make mistakes. we just can't allow them to convert 1st downs just running the ball, which will force us to bring extra men into the box opening up their deep game..
this is a tough match up (for both) and it will go into the 4th quarter. both good teams. I expect us to win some battles. lose some battles and perhaps the one that has the ball last will have a chance to win the game.