3 Raiders to blame for dumbfounding loss to Chiefs

The Kansas City Chiefs, um, outlasted the Las Vegas Raiders on Friday afternoon in what can only be described as an extremely lucky victory. Under no circumstances did the Chiefs "deserve" this win, but as the football gods would have it, the Raiders squandered two prime opportunities to take the lead in the game's final minutes.

Let's not beat around the bush. This Raiders team is bad — now 2-10 on the campaign with a single victory outside of Sin City. The Chiefs are 11-1, their only defeat coming at the hands of an extremely dangerous Buffalo Bills team. On paper, this was always a Chiefs W.

It has become something of a habit for the Chiefs to play down to their competition this season, however. Kansas City barely squeaked out a victory in Carolina last week. Only two of their 11 victories in 2024 have come by more than one score. The Chiefs are so used to eking out close wins that Patrick Mahomes is openly yearning for more blowouts.

The Chiefs are battle-tested, but this game was ripe for the taking and the Raiders couldn't execute when it mattered most. There is blame aplenty to be tossed around, but we can simplify the procedure here. A few players stand out as directly responsible for cementing the Las Vegas collapse.

Daniel Carlson botched the go-ahead 58-yard field goal

With 2:21 left in the fourth quarter, Daniel Carlson lined up the 58-yard field goal with his team trailing by two. The Raiders' kicker left it embarrassingly short for this third miss of the afternoon. That handed the football back to Patrick Mahomes and a Chiefs offense that has executed extremely well late in games all season.

There's really nobody else to concretely "blame" here. If Carlson doesn't go 1-for-4 and miss everything beyond 30 yards, the Raiders walk away with a rousing victory. This could ultimately benefit Las Vegas — the tank is on — but Carlson's job has never been in more jeopardy. This was an unacceptable performance, point blank.

What makes it worse is that Las Vegas' defense actually came up with a three-and-out stop against the Chiefs after Carlson's final miss. That led to Kansas City's game-losing fumble with 15 seconds left — a fumble that wouldn't have happened if Las Vegas was running out the clock with a 20-19 lead, rather than trying to set up Carlson for one last boot toward the goal posts.

This is the real source of blame, Raiders fans. If there's somebody who deserves all of your ire on this Black Friday, it's Carlson.

Dylan Parham and Jackson Powers-Johnson teamed up for the Raiders' final goof

With the Raiders in field goal range and 15 seconds left on the clock, right guard Dylan Parham tapped backup center Jackson Powers-Johnson on the shoulder — an apparent signal to snap the football.

The only problem? Aidan O'Connell was looking the other direction, focused on his wide receivers. He wasn't ready for the snap, and he certainly didn't call for it. The football hit the unsuspecting O'Connell on his shoulder and went bouncing to the turf, where the Kansas City defense converged to recover the fumble and secure the victory.

We can probably throw more blame around for this play alone — Antonio Pierce and Scott Turner for the offense's confusion, potentially O'Connell for a wonky snap count — but in the end, it falls on the two offensive linemen joined at the hip who clearly facilitated the early snap.

This Raiders' loss goes beyond even the Raiders — it smells strongly of Chiefs voodoo — but as long as we're relegating our blame to known facts and not speculative superstition, we might as well pin it on the folks at the center of Las Vegas' mind-numbing late-game blunders.