Raiders try to right ship after abysmal performance

The Oakland Raiders had a chance to get back to .500 last Sunday.  The defense didn’t show up.

Philadelphia torched the Raiders defensive backfield for 414 passing yards and quarterback Nick Foles tied the NFL record for touchdown passes in a game with 7.

Something that might be overlooked — and rightfully so in a 49-20 loss – is the fact that Oakland actually had more yardage than Philadelphia at a 560-542 clip.  But, allowing 7 touchdown passes is just unacceptable, something Oakland defensive coordinator Jason Tarver addressed to ESPN.com’s Paul Gutierrez.

"“There are some basic things that we’ve done pretty well for six for sure, and part of seven weeks, and then one week we just didn’t do it and that’s what it comes down to. It’s not what you do; it’s how you do it … when you’re supposed to set the edge, set the edge. When you’re supposed to tackle the quarterback or the running back when they do their read scheme, tackle whichever one you’re supposed to tackle. And those are the biggest things. That’s it. We talk about top-down coverage every day. We had done a great job of top-down coverage for seven games, and we will come right back and do a good job of top-down coverage because we learned our lesson.”"

Oakland is at the New York Giants this week, a team coming off a bye – after they beat Philadelphia 15-7 – and looking for just their third win of the season.  If the Raiders want to salvage a respectable season, there is no better time than the present to learn from last week and put it to use before they fall too far below .500.

Technically, Oakland still isn’t out of the playoff race in the AFC, yet.