Oakland Raiders Win, Join Jacksonville Jaguars

The Oakland Raiders put together a nice win over the Kansas City Chiefs on Thursday, snagging their first win of the season. With that victory they have now joined the Jacksonville Jaguars as the only one-win teams in the NFL, at the bottom of the standings.

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While the rest of week 12 has yet to be played out, right now both the Jaguars and the Raiders stand a game behind the Tennessee Titans, New York Jets, and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. Despite having one more win than the Jags and Raiders, we can all agree that those teams are also a wash right now. All five of them are fighting for that top draft pick and while there isn’t a “Suck for Luck” type atmosphere, most of those teams have little to play for.

This is not the place that the Jaguars or Raiders hoped to be at this point in the season. The Raiders wanted to avoid being considered as the next 0-16 team (and, thankfully, they won’t be) and the Jaguars hoped they would not appear to have regressed following a 4-12 campaign last season. Both teams hoped to make strides this year, one behind a rookie quarterback with a more veteran roster and the other behind a veteran quarterback with a very young roster.

Neither plans have panned out thus far.

Both franchises are looking forward. Right now it looks like the Raiders will have to rebuild in a number of places (32nd ranked offense in particular stands out) and the Jaguars will have to find some veteran players to plug into gaps that their young players have failed to grow into (32nd scoring offense, second worst defense in points allowed). Both teams are reassessing where they are.

The victory for the Raiders likely won’t spark a turnaround for the Jaguars this season, but it does provide some inspiration for a team that has seemed to underperform and shoot itself in the foot with mistakes. The two teams should use each other as barometers for measuring progress from this point of the season and into next year. While improving over their own past performances is key and there’s nothing like racking up more wins, the NFL is all relative (just look at the division-leading 4-6 Atlanta Falcons).

Hopefully both franchises won’t find themselves tied for last in the future.