Bay Area Beatdown Cements Jon Gruden's Raiders as NFL's Worst Team

Two years ago, the Oakland Raiders were a 12-4 playoff team. That happened.

After a 6-10 backslide last season led to head coach Jack Del Rio's dismissal, the Raiders signed Jon Gruden to guide them back to glory on the richest coaching contract in NFL history: a 10-year, $100 million deal.

Halfway into the first season of his second stint with the team, Gruden looks like he sports the worst coaching contract in NFL history. The only place he's led the team is into the AFC West basement.

After getting humiliated 34-3 at Levi's Stadium by the one-win San Francisco 49ers, who were led by undrafted third-string quarterback Nick Mullens, the Oakland Raiders look like the worst team in the National Football League.

"Commitment to Excellence" has become "Commitment to Excrement"—because there isn't a single facet of this Raiders team that wasn't crap Thursday night.

In the NFL, it all starts with the quarterback. Thursday's meltdown may well have marked the last time we'll see Derek Carr start in Oakland. The countdown to a divorce between player and team might have started ticking in Santa Clara, California—if it hadn't already.

There had been rumblings regarding Carr's relationship with Gruden and his status with the team. Earlier in the season, Gruden criticized Carr for eschewing downfield throws in favor of checkdowns:

To be fair, it wasn't the first time that had been said about Carr. In fact, Del Rio said the same thing about the 27-year-old last year:

However, as Scott Bair reported for NBC Sports Bay Area, just this past week Gruden defended Carr.

"I've said that I think he's going to be a great player," Gruden said. "… I'll again say that he's the strength of this team, and I'm excited about it."

Just before Thursday's game, Ian Rapoport of NFL.com reported Oakland's preferred plan was to build around the quarterback it signed to a five-year, $125 million extension in June 2017.

Whether that's still the case after the game is another story.

At first glance, Carr's 16-of-21 passing and 171 yards against the 49ers aren't that awful. His passer rating was 99.5.

John Hefti/Associated Press

But that just conveys how misleading passer rating can be. In the face of a relentless San Francisco pass rush, Carr once again reverted to Captain Checkdown. His 8.1 yards per attempt was 3.8 yards lower than Mullens', who had never played in an NFL game before Thursday night.

By the fourth quarter, Gruden had seen enough. Carr spent the final minutes watching AJ McCarron play quarterback.

Yes, Oakland's offensive line was a hot mess, as it allowed eight sacks against the Niners two games after it gave up six to the Seattle Seahawks. No, after Gruden shipped No. 1 wideout Amari Cooper to the Dallas Cowboys on Oct. 22, the Oakland receiving corps doesn't have much talent.

And to be fair, McCarron didn't have much more success than Carr.

But Carr looks as though all those sacks he's taken of late have clouded his thinking. He looks rattled. Too many plays are falling apart with alarming speed. He looks a lot like his older brother, David, did while he was getting pummeled for the expansion Houston Texans.

This isn't to say Oakland's putrid offensive showing (242 yards) is all Carr's fault. Hardly. The alleged offensive guru who's running the mess deserves his share of the blame. After all, Gruden calls the plays. Gruden decided the Raiders didn't need Cooper.

While 49ers head coach Kyle Shanahan had Nick "The GOAT" Mullens marching up and down the field with impunity, the Raiders scored on their opening drive—and that was it. Oakland entered Week 9 28th in the NFL in scoring—and that number didn't rise after this turkey.

The Niners spent most of the game playing as if they knew what the Raiders would do before they did it. The play-calling was predictable. Boring. Dated.

Thearon W. Henderson/Getty Images

It would be nice to say there was a silver (and black) lining on the other side of the ball. That the defense offered some glimmer of hope. It didn't. As bad as the Oakland offense was, the defense was worse.

The Raiders defense allowed 405 yards. To a team that averaged below 350 before the game. 

The Raiders made Mullens look like Joe Montana. He missed on just six of 22 attempts, threw three touchdown passes and had a 151.9 passer rating. Of course, quite a few of Mullens' 262 passing yards came because the Raiders were out of position and tackled like a Pop Warner team, or both—like on Mullens' first touchdown throw.

Paging Reggie Nelson.

It got worse. Check out the herculean effort and relentless pursuit on Raheem Mostert's 52-yard, third-quarter touchdown run:

That's just sad.

If defensive coordinator Paul Guenther survives this debacle, it will be just another gaffe in a seemingly never-ending stream of them. The Raiders entered Week 9 fresh off allowing 42 points to the Colts at home and with the NFL's 26th-ranked overall defense and 28th-ranked scoring defense. After? Per the NFL Network's postgame coverage, the Raiders are surrendering the most yards per play through eight games in NFL history.

Would it be piling on to mention that having a Defensive Player of the Year front-runner (Khalil Mack) on the team might help offset some of this? Mack has five sacks for the Chicago Bears after Gruden traded him Sept. 1. The Raiders have seven—fewest in the league.

Now, this is the point where fans and Gruden apologists will mention all the draft picks that the coach has stockpiled, including three firsts in 2019. They'll talk about all the cap space the team will have—cap space that would grow exponentially were the Raiders to move on from Carr.

Gruden's playing the long game, they'll say. Taking a step back so that the team can build a dynasty once it gets to Las Vegas in 2020.

Stop it.

Justin Sullivan/Getty Images

What evidence is there that this regime can hit on all of those early picks? Most of them? Any of them? The last first-round pick the Raiders hit out of the park was Mack in 2014. The last one that can be called even a nominal success was Cooper the following year.

Neither is on the team.

Never mind that the next young quarterback Gruden develops will be the first one Gruden has developed. He succeeded before with veterans.

Hey! Maybe Eli Manning will be available in the offseason!

Gruden told Fox Sports earlier in the week he thinks free agents will line up to play for him next year (via Tom Schad of USA Today).

"I got a cellphone just like you and everybody else," Gruden said. "And I get a lot of phone calls from people that are dying to come and play here. I'm just telling you. They're dying to play for the Raiders."

Um. OK. Sure they are.

Are the Raiders a storied franchise? Yes. Is there a measure of prestige involved in wearing that iconic uniform? Yes. Playing in Vegas will be a selling point for some, too.

Know what else is a selling point? Not getting your head kicked in by an undrafted rookie third-string quarterback for a one-win team on national television.

Get ready for the tomato-can premium: to have to overpay free agents to compensate for the inevitable losing. To believe any differently is almost as ludicrous as Gruden's postgame statements regarding the team's direction:

"I'm just trying to get people excited about the Oakland Raiders. The Oakland Raiders are a great organization. I know it's not looking pretty right now. I've heard a lot of negativity over the last six or seven months—and rightfully so. But we're going to build a championship football team here, and I know a lot of people as players, as fans and in general who want to be a part of this."

That's funny, because Gruden's players didn't look much like they wanted to be a part of Thursday's game. These Raiders look nothing like a championship football team. The only thing Gruden has built so far is a raging dumpster fire.

And if this latest face-plant is any indication, things will get worse before they get better.