With just a little more than two weeks before the start of the season, the Raiders are still looking for a wide receiver to emerge.
Tre Tucker and Jalen Nailor are the veterans in the Raiders’ wide receiver room, but neither have stood out consistently in practices and as Raider Nation Radio host Q Myers pointed out this week, it might not be a good sign that a sixth-round rookie has been outshining his peers in practices.
Malik Benson has been one of the pleasant surprises of OTAs and training camp, but he didn’t play well against the Texans and The Athletic’s Ted Nguyen said a bad route in the team’s joint practice with the Texans led to a Kirk Cousins pick six.
“It seems like there is a little bit of a disconnect with the receivers right now,” Nguyen said on the Just Win podcast on Wednesday.
“Kubiak kind of commented that a receiver needs to step up. I also found out that in the joint practice against the Texans; Malik Benson ran the wrong route on Kirk Cousins’ pick six and obviously he had a tough game in that game dropping two passes that should have been first down conversions on third downs. These receivers… are not just on the same page right now.”
The good news is that Benson has shown the ability to create space on routes, and it shouldn’t come as a surprise that he has been inconsistent this early in his career.
On the ESPN broadcast of Thursday’s game in Houston, Joe Buck said Klint Kubiak and Fernando Mendoza both believe Benson has the ability to be a no. 1 receiver in the NFL.
In the short term, though, the Raiders are trying to win games and need at least one wide receiver to step up. And to this point, it doesn’t seem like that has been happening.
x: @raidersbeat
Bech and Thornton better realize they haven’t done anything yet. They look like total busts. They won’t even be in the league anymore if they don’t improve drastically.
Thankfully our no.1 receiver is Bowers!