Week two of the NFL season continues on Sunday with fourteen more games of action. Among those, not many are more interesting than the AFC West matchup between the Kansas City Chiefs and the Oakland Raiders. By now, everyone knows the story with the Chiefs. The Raiders on the other hand, were a complete disaster this offseason and that has been well-documented. Even so, they came out last week guns a-blazing and took down the Denver Broncos 24-16. The Chiefs do lead the all-time series 65-53 over the Raiders, including a sweep of the two games last season. In the first meeting last December, the Raiders did cover the 14 point spread. The line this time around is a little more manageable, at only seven points.
Chiefs Offense Can’t Be Stopped
Surprise, surprise— were one week into the season and Kansas City already dropped a 40-burger. Combined with the Jaguars, they smashed the over/under of 52.5. Even with the injury to Tyreek Hill, the offense didn’t miss a beat. It took all of three quarters in the first week for Patrick Mahomes to pass for over 360 yards. He finished with 378 and 3 scores, picking up right where he left off in his MVP 2018.
Newly acquired Lesean McCoy, reunited with his old coach Andy Reid, looked rejuvenated. On 10 carries he accumulated 81 yards and added a 12 yard reception on to that. One of the biggest surprises of week one however was Sammy Watkins. The former Clemson product has never really lived up to his top-5 selection, but that started to change last Sunday. He absolutely balled out with 9 catches for 198 yards and 3 touchdowns. It seems to not even matter who Mahomes is throwing to, the Chiefs are just that good.
Raiders Headed In The Right Direction?
Last season did not play out how the Raiders would have expected. They signed Jon Gruden to a lucrative contract to return and come out of retirement, and he was supposed to get Derek Carr back on the MVP trajectory he was once on. Instead, they fell completely flat and ended the season with only 4 wins. So, they retooled the entire offense. They bolstered an offensive line that let Carr get sacked the third most times in the league by adding Trent Brown via free agency and drafted Kolten Miller.
They signed Tyrell Williams from LA to give Carr a weapon in the passing game, and drafted Josh Jacobs to help him in the running game. Granted it was only one week, it seems like the offense is getting back to where it should be. Williams and Jacobs went off for the offense, Carr finished the game with a passer rating of 121, and the offensive line didn’t allow a single sack against Von Miller and Bradley Chubb.
Game Outlook
In terms of Vegas, this actually doesn’t look terrible for Oakland. The game opened with a 10 point spread and has since moved down to only 7. And as we noted earlier, last time the Raiders hosted the Chiefs, they covered a massive spread and were in the game pretty much the entire time. Confidence for an offense is scary, and the Raiders are working with that after week 1. While I don’t think they’re going to win, they can cover the spread even in a shootout. I expect much of the same from last years 40-33 game.
The Pick: Raiders +7, Over 53.5
