by David Zizmor

ALAMEDA–Week two of the preseason in Minnesota veteran and players alike are telling the Oakland Raiders rookie Amari Cooper that the offense looks good. Right now everybody really need to temper their enthusiasm the Raiders have played only one game of pre season last week on Aug 14 at the Coliseum against the Rams.

There’s nothing to get excited about in terms of what you saw on the field against the Rams. The simple fact of the matter is in the first pre season game and frankly in every pre season game you do not see lot of complex defenses out there it just doesn’t happen and teams just don’t want to reveal anything for their opponents in the regular season.

It’s more important to see the second and third stringers in the base defense just to see the starters playing in the more complicated depth that they throw out during the regular season. The Raiders might have looked decent against a base defense against some of the second and third stringers and a little bit for the first stringers.

Their not facing the same level of competition as you are in the regular season. Even when you see the first stringers a lot of key guys won’t be in there who are veterans and who are really proven players and who only play in the pre season seldomly or not at all. They have earned the right to take those games off and in the best interest of the team to avoid any kind of injuries to those key guys.

Comparing the Raiders in 2015 to the Raiders exactly a year ago in 2014 Raiders fans have a reason to be optimistic but you can’t look at them and say their going to make the playoffs. You could look at the team and feel better about them and that they’ve improved year after year. On offense quarterback Derek Carr isn’t a rookie anymore and we kind of know about his skillset and what Carr is able to do.

Carr is still a work in progress because he’s still in his second year but you could look at him and say he looks like he could be a decent quarterback. You look around the rest of the skill positions and you say Latavius Murray looks like he could be a really skilled running back. Cooper their first round pick looks really, really good. Michael Crabtree didn’t have a great year with the 49ers but at least in camp so far he’s been strong and certainly an improvement than some of the guys the Raiders ran out their at wide receiver last year.

David Zizmor covers the NFL for http://www.sportsradioservice.com listen to the podcast below