The Raiders team that won three straight games before a 34-14 shellacking at the hands of the Miami Dolphins on Sunday, and it’s the same one that will show up Sunday for a game against the undefeated Green Bay Packers, coach Hue Jackson said. Read the rest of this entry »

The early signs of the Raiders getting back running back Darren McFadden and any of their other injured key players aren’t looking good, based on the first day of practice in preparation for the undefeated Green Bay Packers. Read the rest of this entry »

The Raiders policy is not to divulge the names of players not under contract. Therefore, it’s always a guessing game as to which players they work out, even if it is in front of coach Hue Jackson, and he is asked the players’ names. Read the rest of this entry »

As preposterous as it might sound, Raiders coach Hue Jackson can’t say for sure whether running back Darren McFadden will be back before the regular season ends. Read the rest of this entry »

What’s wrong with the Raiders? When will they get guys like McFadden, Moore and Ford back? Get the latest Raiders updates and analysis from Steve Corkran during Tuesday’s live chat at noon PST.

Here is an assortment of transcripts from Raiders coach Hue Jackson, quarterback Carson Palmer and other players after Sunday’s 34-14 loss to the Miami Dolphins. These are courtesy of the Miami Dolphins:

Oakland Raiders Head Coach Hue Jackson
(Opening Remarks) – “Injury update: (Jarvis) Moss had a hip pointer, didn’t finish. (Chaz) Schilens has a foot, didn’t finish. Very disappointed. I take total responsibility for this loss. This football team didn’t play well on offensive, defense or special teams. We got some work to do. I’m not going to blame it on anything. It’s not about coming to the east. It’s not about anything that went on this week. What it’s about is that team wanted to play harder than this team. I didn’t prepare this team as well as I can. We’ll get better. We got some work to do. We’ll get better. We win three, loss one…to a team that’s 3-8. I think that’s a better team than people think they are. They played well today. They did enough to beat us. We couldn’t run it. We couldn’t stop the run. We didn’t throw it very well. We didn’t play special teams very well. So when it gets like that, that’s just a bad day at the office. There ain’t no excuse to it. I’ll take everything on myself.”

(On his team’s lack of enthusiasm) – “I didn’t get this team ready to play.”

(On QB Carson Palmer’s development) – “I’m not going to make excuses. He’s our quarterback and today we lost. He didn’t produce a win for our football team. We didn’t play well. I’m not going to say it’s because he’s fatigued or anything. This is the National Football League. When they say ‘set hut’ you gotta play.”

(On if he knew early on in the game that his team would struggle) – “No, I’m not going to say that. I know this team, I’ve been around this team. Like I said, it starts with me. I didn’t make sure that this team had energy all the time. I think this team, in my opinion, came in ready to play. We didn’t finish. Again, that’s my responsibility.”

(On the Rolando McClain situation) – “The information that I have, that I gathered myself in dealing with him, is I feel that the player has an opportunity to be honest. I think at the end of the day there’s no question that he knows I’m disappointed with some things that occurred. And I will take care of that in- house. If the league decides to come down on him then I’m going to come down on him like you’ve never seen. But I’m truly backing my player on this. I trust the things that I know. I truly believe that when this is all said and done that there’s an opportunity…I know the league is investigating. When the league makes a determination then I will make a determination. Until then, I’m going to trust my player. But he knows there’s a part of it that I don’t agree with by no stretch of the imagination. And that’s where we are today.”

(On if the Rolando McClain situation was a distraction for the team today) – “No. That has nothing to do with getting beat like we just got beat.”

(On if the team’s injuries had a major impact in today’s defeat) – “There’s no excuses. It’d be easy for me to say a lot of things. I’m not going to. This is the National Football League. We have good players in that room and our good players have to play good every week. And we didn’t do that today. So at the end of the day it starts with me and it filters down to them.”

(On what the officials told him as to why DT Richard Seymour was ejected) – “That he took a swing at somebody on the ground. I didn’t see it, obviously. But they kicked him out of the game. As I told him, he can’t get kicked out. He’s one of the rocks of this football team. You can never do something to get yourself kicked out of the game when you’re one of the leaders of this football team. Again, back to the drawing board. The same things that have beat us when we lost have beat us today. Not being able to stop the rush. Not being able to run the ball. Penalties. So again, I take responsibility. I gotta fix it. And we’re gonna keep working at it.”

(On what specifically the Dolphins did to win the game) – “They beat us! They were more physical than we were. They pushed us around. That’s not something you want to have happen to your football team.”

(On his approach for the next game against Green Bay) – “I don’t need a lot of fire with these guys. These guys know what’s at stake. The locker room knows, the team knows. We knew coming down the stretch there’d be some tough games and we’re not going to back away from that. We know we’re playing the Green Bay Packers down there and we gotta get ourselves ready to play. When it gets like this you gotta go back to the foundation of this team. It starts at practice. It starts at meetings. We’ve been a decent road team this year. We’re 4-2 on the road. This is the first time I really felt that we didn’t play well on the road. It got away from us.”

(On if he thought about taking QB Carson Palmer out of the game when they trailed 34-0) – “No. He needs to play. He needs to continue to play. I think the more reps he gets the better he’s gonna be. They knocked him around a little bit, knocked him down. He keeps getting up. One thing I love about him is he keeps getting up, keeps competing.”

(On the recent struggles of the offensive line) – “I’m disappointed, again, in me for not getting those guys to play like I think they can. It starts with me. I gotta get the offensive line to play better. I gotta get the defensive line to play better. I gotta get this football team to play better. And I will. We’re gonna go back to work.”

Oakland Raiders RB Michael Bush
(On what the Dolphins did to stop their running game) – “They played well. They are a great defense. Coming into the game we knew they were the seventh ranked defense in the NFL and today they proved it. They did exactly what they needed to do and once we got behind we were behind the eight ball and unable to stay committed to running the ball.”

(On QB Carson’s Palmer progress in the offense and the importance of running the ball) – “Carson (Palmer) and the offense are fine. He knows the system. It was not an issue. We just need to move the ball on the ground and play better as an offense.”

(On the Dolphins improvement) – “I mean when you are hot, you are hot. The Dolphins are hot. Everyone in the league can see that. This team is playing well right now.”

Oakland Raiders LB Aaron Curry
(On Curry’s overall performance and team’s defense) – “Well we just have to play better. I mean all the credit to the Dolphins because they just flat out beat us. And then at the end there wasn’t even a point in the game where they weren’t beating us and they had a really good game plan. They executed some stuff and just handed us a loss.”

(On what they can learn or improve on to get better from this game) – “Really we just have to move on. We just have to move on mentally and physically.”

Oakland Raiders Safety Matt Giordano
(Thoughts on Dolphins offense and QB Matt Moore) – “They executed today and we didn’t. They came to play and we didn’t.”

(Strategies to do differently for next game) – “Differently? We would execute, simple as that. I know I left a couple plays out there that I know I should have (covered). And you know what, that’s a good thing about professional football…you learn from this, you get thick skin. We got to come in tomorrow, absorb as much as we can from this experience, and learn from it and moved on.”

Oakland Raiders WR Darrius Heyward-Bey
(On the Dolphins defense) – “They did exactly what they needed to do today. Stop our running game and make us throw the ball. They did that.”

(On the progression of the offense with QB Carson Palmer) – “We are fine, we just need to work harder, study film, keep getting a feel for each other and Carson and the receivers and this offense will be fine. We need to improve next week and we will. This offense just needs to work hard and get better next week.”

(On what the Raiders need to do to make the playoffs) – “Two words. Green Bay.”

Oakland Raiders WR T.J. Houshmandzadeh
(On the Raiders offense in today’s game) – “Nothing. They played well. We didn’t play very well at all. But when you don’t play well on offense, obviously the defense has, they play a part in that. They’re a good team.”

(On if the Dolphins surprised the Raiders today) – “No. We knew going in. When you watch them on tape, you ask yourself ‘how are they 3-8?’ They got a lot of good players on defense. I mean, me being a fan of football within itself, they got good players on offense. It’s weird how they have the record they have, and whether we were ready or not, they’re a good team.”

(On the Dolphins still relatively young defensive backfield) – “Well you know, I think they’re good. I somewhat know Sean Smith a little bit. He’s a big guy. But they’re talented. They’re young, they’re talented, and again, it’s the NFL. You can look at records and say whatever. But they’re a good team to be 3-8, or now, 4-8. Real good.”

(On where the Raiders offense goes from here) – “We just got to go back to practice and try to get better. That’s all you can do. You know, it’s the NFL. We got a game next Sunday. So get this out of the system, and tomorrow we got to get ready for Green Bay.”

Oakland Raiders QB Carson Palmer
(On the game today) “After a loss like this there’s really not much to say other than we just got outplayed in every phase of the game. We just got physically beat today, which is discouraging. It’s very disappointing obviously and we need to look at this and we need to figure out why and what happened because there’s not a whole lot of answers right now. After you lose a game like this, you have to think about it and look at it and move on. The good thing is if Green Bay wins today, you’ve got a chance for redemption if you beat a team that’s undefeated and get you back on the right track. It’s just a disappointing loss.”

(On how he felt out there today) “I felt like this was a great week and I felt like I broke through. You kind of go through that in training camp and then as the regular season comes down to an end you kind of fight through that and have to break through it. I felt great this week. I felt like I had gotten there and I just need to continue to keep working and keep getting better.”

(On the Dolphins play today) “There’s no excuse, we got outplayed. They played better than we did. Aside from their record this is a very good defense and we knew that coming in. We knew it wasn’t going to be an easy game and we knew it was going to be a physical game and we didn’t match their physical play.”

(On coming out flat at the start of the game) “It definitely looked like that from what happened to us in the first half, but I didn’t feel that way. As the three and outs happened in the first half, you kind of felt that we weren’t executing and that we weren’t playing very well. Anytime you do some of the things that we did, especially on offense, I had an intentional grounding which was unacceptable, we had a couple of holds that were unacceptable, and we put ourselves way too far back on third down. We had second and twenties, third and twenties and it’s one thing if you’re playing against a team that’s struggling defensively, but against a good defense we dug ourselves too deep of a hole.”

(On what the last two touchdown passes did for the team) “Nothing. They were well executed plays and we executed to get down the field, but need to do that in the first quarter, the second quarter, the third quarter and the beginning of the fourth quarter. It was just too little too late. It seemed like they had the ball almost the entire third quarter and when we got opportunities we didn’t take advantage of them offensively.”

Oakland Raiders DT Richard Seymour
(Statement on getting rejected from today’s game) – “I apologize to my teammates, coaching staff, and the organization, also the Raider Nation. I’m disappointed that I wasn’t there to finish the game with my teammates. I think that it’s an emotional game, and I shouldn’t have let my emotions get the best of me. No excuses.”

(On if he threw a punch) – “I have made my statement.”

(On the Dolphins performance in today’s game) – “They did what they had to do to win. They kept us off balance. They ran the ball. And, you know, they made the plays they needed to make. We make no excuses about it. We took one on the chin. We got to play better than what we did today.”

(On if distractions were a factor today) – “No. They just played better. They were more physical than us. That’s what the results were. That’s the bottom line.”

(On the Dolphins up and down season, and his perspective on the Dolphins performance today) – “We knew they got players in terms of their running plays. Who are their go to guys. But at the end of the day we just didn’t stop it. They kept us off balance. We never felt like we were, like we had any consistency. We give them credit. We knew coming into this game they were a good football team. They have a lot of good players on that side of the ball. They have won three out of the last four, or whatever the case may be. We were prepared but they played better today.”

Oakland Raiders T Jared Veldheer
(On the offense) – “There wasn’t a whole lot of rhythm; you can’t really put it on anybody. We just didn’t come out like we needed to today. I know this sounds cliché, but we need to look at this tape and really try to build on it and push ourselves. And use this to really be ready for the last 4 games of the season. We hit a bump here and it’s critical to fix all the mistakes that were made and really get good from watching that for the stretch run. Time to go back to work tomorrow, that’s for sure.”

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Middle linebacker Rolando McClain says he speaks only on Mondays during the season. Even then, that’s only on rare occasion. On this Monday, he declined an interview request seeking his take on his arrest last week. Read the rest of this entry »

The Raiders lost more than a game Sunday, with their 34-14 shellacking at the hands of the Miami Dolphins. They also lost their one-game lead in the AFC West, thanks to yet another chapter of Tim Tebow’s late-game heroics. Read the rest of this entry »

Dominated on both sides of the line of scrimmage, the Raiders’ march to an AFC West title hit in a 34-14 loss to the Miami Dolphins Sunday at Sun Life Stadium.
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Miami extended its lead with a 6-yard run by quarterback Matt Moore and a 34-yard interception return by Kevin Burnett as the Raiders have been reduced to pulling for the Minnesota Vikings against the Denver Broncos to hold on their AFC West lead.
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