Locked On Broncos - Daily Podcast On The Denver Broncos - HIGH STAKES: Denver Broncos Matchup vs. Raiders has HUGE Playoff Implications

Episode Date: December 4, 2025

The stakes just got a little higher for the Denver Broncos in their Week 14 matchup against their division rival Las Vegas Raiders. Cody Roark is a credentialed beat reporter for Mile High Sports and covers the Broncos daily in person. Sayre Bedinger is the site expert for Predominantly Orange. Both bring Broncos Country the most in-depth and objective coverage of the Denver Broncos. WANT MORE DAILY DENVER BRONCOS CONTENT?For all of the latest Denver Broncos news today -- Follow & Subscribe on all Podcast platforms…🎧 https://link.chtbl.com/LOBroncos?sid=YouTube Locked On NFL League-Wide: Every Team, Fantasy, Draft & More🎧 https://linktr.ee/LockedOnNFL Follow on Twitter: @CodyRoarkNFL and @SayreBedingerFollow the show on Twitter: @LockedOnBroncos Support Us By Supporting Our Sponsors!  Aura FramesFor a limited time, save on the perfect gift by visiting https://AuraFrames.com to get $35 off Aura’s best-selling Carver Mat frames - named #1 by Wirecutter - by using promo code LOCKEDON at checkout. FanDuelIf you want to be right in the middle of the action this season, visit FanDuel.com and place your NFL live bets all season long. PrizePicksDownload the PrizePicks app today and use code LOCKEDONNFL to get $50 in lineups after you play your first $5 lineup.Click Here: https://prizepicks.onelink.me/LME0/LOCKEDONNFL GametimeDownload the Gametime app, create an account, and use code LOCKEDONNFL for $20 off your first purchase. Terms apply. Download Gametime today. What time is it? Gametime. FANDUEL DISCLAIMER: 21+ in select states. First online real money wager only. Bonus issued as nonwithdrawable free bets that expires in 14 days. Restrictions apply. See terms at sportsbook.fanduel.com. Gambling Problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit FanDuel.com/RG (CO, IA, MD, MI, NJ, PA, IL, VA, WV), 1-800-NEXT-STEP or text NEXTSTEP to 53342 (AZ), 1-888-789-7777 or visit ccpg.org/chat (CT), 1-800-9-WITH-IT (IN), 1-800-522-4700 (WY, KS) or visit ksgamblinghelp.com (KS), 1-877-770-STOP (LA), 1-877-8-HOPENY or text HOPENY (467369) (NY), TN REDLINE 1-800-889-9789 (TN) Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

One team looking for the postseason, another team gearing up for the off season. The Broncos, the Raiders, week 14, crossover edition. Let's get it. You are locked on NFL crossover, part of the Locked on podcast network. Your team every day. And welcome in to another edition of the crossover edition here on the Locked on podcast network, locked on Broncos, Locked on Raiders. It is brought to you by prize picks, Sarah Beninger,

Locked on Broncos and Q Myers here. Locked on Raiders. And again, we're presented by prize picks. Download the Price Fix app today. Use promo code locked on NFL to get $50 in lineups after you play your first $5 lineup. And this is the tale of two teams going in totally different directions this 2025 season. The Denver Broncos look like they're going to take the AFC West title for the first time in a very long time from the Kansas Chiefs.

And the Raiders are trying to lip to the finish line and figure out what they're going to do in the 2020. 25, 26 off season. But we're here to break down week 14 action at Allegiant Stadium against Sarah Beninger from Locked on Broncos and I'm from Locked on Raiders. So we'll talk about the storylines in this matchup. We'll talk about the matchups that we're going to be

focused in on in this game. And we'll also talk about the paths to victory. So Sarah, it's got to be nice, man, to be talking about the postseason and potentially being the AFC West Division champions, taking that from the Kansas City Chiefs that's had that strangle hold on it. for so long. I'm sure that's one of your big

storylines, but go ahead and jump right into it, man. What's one of the biggest storylines in this matchup for the Denver Broncos? Well, it's always fun to get an opportunity to play AFC West matchups late in the season, right? Especially when they're high stakes. I know you said these two teams are going opposite directions, but we know

when it comes to Broncos and Raiders, right? I mean, you can almost throw that stuff out the window. For these two teams, they just, they have that bad blood, you know, with each other. And that comes across. And we saw it earlier. this season, right? That ugly 10 to 7 game in Denver earlier this season. I mean, these two teams, they're going to be in a dog fight no matter what. But the biggest storyline for the Broncos is there's actually really high stakes in this game because the Broncos right now are

kind of battling it out with the New England Patriots. Speaking of things that haven't happened in about 10 years, right? They're battling it out with the New England Patriots for that number one seed and a win against the Raiders this weekend would give the Broncos the ultimate edge at the end of the year in terms of common opponents. So this win against the Raiders is almost as good as a head-to-head win against the Patriots for the Broncos when it comes to overall playoff seating. That's big time right there. And, you know, that's, again, you got to give the Patriots a lot of credit for being in the position that they're in. Also give the Broncos a lot of credit for being in the position that they're in right now with the chance to be AFC West Division

champions if the rest of the season plays out the way that is gone. So far, how much confidence do you have in Bow Nix in quarters one, two, and three? I think everyone knows he does really well in quarter number four. A lot of come from behind victories, but is one of the big storylines Bo Nix throughout the course of the game. I think the frustration is for a lot of people that, at least like me, I do have the utmost confidence in Bow Nix in quarters one through three. And I think the frustration is that it's not always happening, right?

because we see, hey, 77 points in five quarters when you're playing the Giants and the, the Eagles, right? You have these just outbursts of scoring. That's like, what's going on? Excuse me, it was the Giants and the Cowboys where that happened. But like Bo Nix has put it together so many different times that you do kind of come in with this idea. He should be able to do this from quarters one through three. He should be.

And we're seeing it more and more, these last two games, the Chiefs game. He was outstanding. The commander's game. He was really good other than the interception to Bobby Wagner. So he has improved in that way. He's coming off a season high, 321 passing yards. So we're seeing that progression week to week. But that's the tension, right?

Is that frustrating, hey, you've shown up late in games. You've shown up when it's crunch time. Why is it not happening in quarters one through three consistently? I think that confidence in Bo is why that frustration exists. Yeah. And I mean, just even going back to the last time that the Raiders and the Broncos face each other, you know, just kind of watching that rock fight. And we all know that Denver has a really good defense.

And, you know, for them not to just take off offensively on the Raiders defense, even though, again, divisional matchup, you know they're going to always give everything that they got and hated rivals. So we know how that shakes out. But just, you know, it's just surprising to see Bo Nix not have more early success. And I know that that's something that a lot of folks have talked about. So that's obviously something to pay attention to in this game and moving forward for the Denver Broncos.

And obviously, that's gearing up for the postseason, right? I mean, these games matter in a major way. For the Raiders, these games matter because they're trying to figure out who they are and what they are and who they're going to be in 2026 and even who's going to lead the charge, right? So I'll start with Pete Carroll as a big storyline in this game. And really, he's got to be a storyline in every game until the regular season gets wrapped up. They've already fired Chip Kelly, the offensive coordinator. So, okay, now you can't blame him. Tom McMahon, who Denver Bronco fans are very familiar with as Special Teams coordinator.

He's been let go. You can't put the finger and point the finger at him anymore. All eyes are on Pete Carroll. And, you know, there's a lot of attention on Pete Carroll's son, Brennan, the offensive line coach, because as you know, the Raiders have been giving up a lot of sacks. So six sacks against Denver when they played on that Thursday night game. Since then, they've only given up 25 sacks. It's been four games. So they've given up 25 stack, Brennan Carroll's the offensive line coach.

So a lot of attention on the Carrolls, right? Are they going to be in line to be with the Raiders at 2026? You know, is Mark Davis going to have to do a one and done when it comes to the head coach? So I think that Pete Carroll's got to show now that Greg Olson is the play caller that, hey, this is now my team. It's not the Chip Kelly slash Pete Carroll team. It's the Pete Carroll led team. And what I want to do in my vision with this team, it can go in the right direction. This is how we're going to get there.

Obviously, you can't save the season. They've been eliminated from the playoffs. That's what happens when you only win two games. But they've got to show some kind of signs of life. If they don't show any signs of life, they don't show any signs of improvement, I think the Pete Carroll is going to be a one and done guy. And honestly, Sarah, I don't think that the Raiders want to fire him, but I think that they're going to make him prove that he deserves to be there beyond this season. And that would be one of the most shocking developments if it were to happen, right?

Because Pete Carroll, we looked at before the season, right? We're talking about this Mount Rushmore of head coaches in the AFC West. These are some of the winningest coaches in modern NFL history, all in one division. And this is my, it's always been my big question with him and how things kind of played out this season, the trade for Gino Smith, obviously giving Gino the contract that they gave him as well. Like, is Pete Carroll around for a long time or is he around for a good time, right? I mean, the Raiders, I think they wanted to capitalize as quickly as possible. Not that Pete Carroll can't keep coaching as he gets into his 70s here, but that's my big question is after the year,

if you reevaluate this roster and you look at where things are at with them, are you saying as Pete Carroll, hey, I'm signing up for, you know, Fernando Mendoza or, you know, quarterback X, Y, or Z from this draft, Dante Morata, Oregon. I don't know who it would be. And I know we're maybe putting the car before the horse here with five games left or whatever it is this season. But man, that's the thing that I wonder is, did he sign up for that when he was hired? And how much does that play into? Because you talked about it. I mean, when you point one finger at somebody else, there's three pointing right back at you. So ultimately, I think him at the end of this year, if the Raiders, did move on. That to me would be the most shocking development of, of this season.

I think we all expected the Raiders to take us a huge step forward with the culture that he brings. Absolutely. Everyone thought that it was going to be a much better team, a competitive team, right? The AMC West was going to be that much better because every team was going to be competitive. And I don't think any of us were foolish enough to think, oh, this is going to be a playoff team. They're going to go win the division. But, you know, I was looking at it. Well, hey, Pete Carroll doesn't, doesn't, you know, lose any more games than, you know, eight or nine. this is going to be at least an eight-win season. They won two games, right?

And I don't think what he signed up for is what he ultimately ended up, you know, being a part of. You know, the Chip Kelly and him seemed like an arranged marriage as opposed to him hiring them. And so that's been coming out lately. And that's a big problem. It just seems like a philosophy's ideas, they're not all on the same page. And as you know, as the Denver Broncos and Sean Payton turned things around, everybody had to be in lockstep with each other, from the top to the downstairs, right, to Sean Payton calling the shots and moving on from Russell Wilson and taking that big dead cap hit, but they all did it in lockstep.

The Raiders aren't all in lockstep, and that's a big problem. So, yeah, these next five games are going to be big time evaluation, not only for the players that are going to be around in 2026, but if the head coach is going to be around in 2026. So a big time storylines for both the Denver Broncos and the Raiders in week 14. So what's the matchups that we're going to be focusing on? It was a rock fight the last time these two teams took the field. What is it going to look like coming up on Sunday? We'll talk about the biggest matchups, the segment number two of today's Lockdown Broncos and Locked on Raiders crossover edition podcast show.

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play your first five-dollar lineup. Promo code is locked on NFL. You get $50 in lineups after you play your first five-on lineup. Prize picks. It's good to be right. And welcome back to another crossover edition here. It's Locked on Broncos, Locked on Raiders, going into week 14. Actually, we talked about the biggest storylines in segment number one.

Segment number two, we'll talk about the biggest matchups. Before we get into that, we want to thank you for making Locked on Broncos and Locked on Raiders, your first list of the day. And thank you for making it locked on the number one sports podcast. network alongside Sarah Berger, Beninger, I'm Q Myers. And Sarah, I don't know what it's going to be, man. I'm just going to mess up your name throughout the course of the show. But that's okay, man. That means that it's all love, I guess. That's what it is. That's right. And Broncos rivalry. But let's go ahead and get into the biggest matchup in this game

coming up. What are you looking at from a Broncos point of view when it comes to the matchups going up against the Raiders in week 14? Well, I think we've got to start with Brock Bowers and just how the Broncos match up against him because it's kind of been a weird year for the Broncos. The old tight ends, the, you know, geriatric millennials like myself, have been having a lot of success against this Broncos defense. In the last two games,

Zach Ertz at 10 catches and almost had an 11th for a, you know, potential game winning touchdown on that in that overtime drive. And then, you know, two weeks before that, the Broncos take on the chiefs, Travis Kelsey. He's out there looking like vintage Travis Kelsey. But when the Broncos are going up against, Brock Bowers, Tyler Warren, even to a degree, Jake Ferguson of the Dallas Cowboys, like they've held those guys in check. And it's very odd to me. I mean, I guess,

you know, shout out to the geriatric millennials out there, right? That's playing tight end. So that's the thing that I'm looking at in this game is what is the strategy against Brock Bowers? Are you going to keep it, you know, pretty open-ended? Like they've had Jaudey Barron covering tight ends. They've had Pat Sertan shadow Brock Bowers. in the past. What does that matchup look like? Because ultimately, we know that's the Raiders want the ball to go to Brock Bowers. He's their best offensive weapon. So how do you defend against that? How do you take him away? And then how do you adjust to if they do say, all right, we're, we'll let you take him away. We're going to go to Gentie or we're going to go to somebody else. How do you defend against

that secondary weapon as well? Yeah. And that's exactly what I thought when I saw Pat Sertan return to action last week. Right. I thought, well, here it goes. Right. It's going to be a match up with Pat Sartan and Brock Bowers because as you mentioned, the Broncos have had Sertan on Bowers before. And I still remember going back to last year when, you know, I feel like the Raiders season changed. Maybe the Broncos season changed. It looked like the Raiders were about to go into the end zone and take a, what, a 17-0 lead. And all of a sudden there was a pick six. And it just seemed like everything shifted on a dime immediately on that play.

So I think Raider fans, I know I still think about it at times, like have nightmares of that. So when Pat Sartan returned, I thought immediately that was. was going to be the key matchup to watch because you're right the raiders want to go through Brock Bowers obviously they want to run ashton gentie he hasn't had the success in his rookie year that a lot of us expected that he was going to have but brock bowers is a non-negotiable right so he's that guy that they've got to go through they only got them four targets last week he had two touchdowns on four targets you know he like that's that's not enough now part of that is the raiders didn't have enough offensive snaps there was only 40-something snaps they've got to do better than that

it's going to be very difficult against this broncos defense but that's that's got to be the biggest matchup. Normally I'm talking about the trenches, but that's got to be it right there. I feel like that that's going to be the premier one, the one that you'll hear talked about on the broadcast more times than not. Yeah, exactly. And I do think back to that play from Pat Certan a lot because it does represent a turning point moment in the season or, you know, when you're trying to get out of a whole like the Broncos had been in of a near decade not making the playoffs, you look back at plays like that and you think, man, without that play or without a couple of plays by Nick Benito throughout the course of last season.

You don't even get back to the playoffs. And that's going to be a similar story this season. When you look back at some of these one-play difference-making opportunities that you have to shift the course of the entire season to change the narrative on your franchise over the last handful of years, I think another matchup that I'm looking at too is obviously going to be, like you mentioned in the trenches, it does seem to be taking a bit of a backseat to the Brock Bowers story in this type of game because that's obviously must see TV. But man, the Broncos have struggled to run the ball the past couple of weeks without J.K. Dobbins.

That's their offensive story. Defensively, they struggled to stop the run against the Washington commanders, opened up the entire playbook for your old friend Marcus Mario Tah. And it was a tough, tough go for the Broncos defensively, surprisingly coming out of the by. They looked super rusty. That's an area that I'm watching for this week. Can they improve against the run and can they improve running the ball? Yeah, no, that's going to be huge.

The trenches are always huge. And, you know, with the Raiders, they want to be able to run the ball. So they're going to look at that and see, hey, Washington had success. Maybe we can as well. Again, Greg Olson now calling the plays. And he did have a more emphasis, a bigger emphasis on running the rock, or at least attempting to last week against the Chargers running Ashtagentie 19 times. You know, it's funny, his season high is only 23.

His career high as far as carries is only 23. And this is a guy that was drafted number six overall. So clearly the Raiders have not ran the ball as much ineffectively as, as they'd like to. So that's going to be a big deal. But the last time these two teams played, man, you know what it was. It was six sacks, right? And now this offensive line is even more compromised than it was in that week. So how is it going to look this week, right? Stone Foresight is still there at the left tackle spot. The left guard is still Dylan Parham. But, you know, last week,

Alex Kappa, he got to start at the center position. This is a guy that until the week before, hadn't played center in the national football league since his rookie year in the preseason. So all of a sudden, he slid into the center spot. You've got a guy like Caleb Rogers, who's a rookie, finally got some burn last week, got his first taste of the NFL action. But then they were splitting time at the right guard spot with Antonio Maffy. And then you've got DJ Glaze at the right tackle.

So the Raiders' offensive line is still in flux. And, man, I mean, you're going against a team like the Denver Broncos that, you know, get sacks like it's going out of style. Like, I mean, that's not a good recipe. So I'm paying attention to, you know, Blockbuster over here, where I'm looking at Sir Tan and Brock Bowers. But you got to also just pay attention to Dollar General, right? You got to look at what's going on in the trenches

because, man, that is going to be critical. And if the Raiders can't keep Gino Smith somewhat clean, they don't stand a chance in this game. And what we saw against the commanders was a deliberate attempt to nullify that pass rush by just getting rid of the ball quickly. You know, you take those go routes down the field when the Broncos are in man coverage. You take your shots when you got them.

You get rid of the ball quickly. You've got the pick routes, the rub routes. That's what the commanders were doing. Cliff Kingsbury, he called a pretty great game against Denver, especially with an officiating crew that was letting those pick plays go on both sides, to be fair. But, you know, in clutch moments, you notice them a little bit more, like the touchdown to Terry McClure and where Pat Sertan gets wiped out of a play.

That type of stuff, if it's going on, if it's not going called by the officiating crew, that's an area that you can take advantage because you can wipe that pass rush off the board if you're getting rid of the ball quickly. And I think the Broncos defensive line is going to take this past week personally because they did get gashed on the ground. And they didn't have their best past rushing game of the season. So I think they're going to take that personal, come out with a bit of a chip on their shoulder here against the Raiders. And Vance Joseph, he was not calling as aggressive of a game. It seemed like a sort of shift in in the norm where you see all these defensive backs blitzing, linebackers, blitzing. He wasn't doing a lot of that against the commander. So we'll

see if the Broncos get back to what has worked best for them in their first game coming back from the by where like I said, they were quite a bit rusty on the defensive side of the ball. Was he not calling such an aggressive game because it did, you know, kind of make me scratch my head as I'm watching the game as well. I'm thinking, man, this is not, doesn't look like that attacking defense that you normally see. Is that just because of Marcus's legs? I mean, he's not, you know, he's not fresh out of Oregon, Marcus. I mean, he's still older or Marcus, but he did, he did have some production on the ground on Sunday night. He did. And they lost contain off the edge, trying their four man rush and dropping guys

into coverage. You know, it was not as aggressive as a game of a game plan as we've gotten used to from Vance Joseph. And when you're losing contain off the edge, I mean, I believe going into the game, Matthew Berry made a note on the NBC broadcast pregame. He was saying that I think like the highest number of rushing yards that a quarterback had against the Broncos going into that commander's game was like 21 or something. It was very, very, very, low. It was a low number. And he was talking about, hey, they're facing some mobile quarterbacks like Jalen Hertz and all these guys. They're not giving up rushing yards, which I do think that played into the stylistic change from Vance Joseph and Mariotta being able to take advantage of that.

And so that is something that I'd be watching for is, okay, do you get back to your bread and butter this week against the Raiders? Well, tell you what, Gino Smith is not going to be running around the yard like Marcus was. I can tell you that. And look, it's funny because I thought when the Raider has acquired him. I said, well, at least he has that element that he can move around. He's not a guy. He's not even going to move around like Bo Nix does. But, you know, you could pick up third and three. You could pick up third and six if there's green grass. But he's so hesitant to take off. And he's, you know, he slides clunky. It's like he's never played baseball or something. He's, he looks uncomfortable doing that. It's just something about it. Maybe because he's been

hit so many times this year that he just, he's shell shocked to even, you know, start to run. I don't know. But I thought he was going to use his legs a little bit more than what we've seen. actually a lot bit more than what we've seen so far this season, and it just hasn't come to fruition. So I think the Denver Broncos could feel pretty safe and secure that they don't have to worry about any, you know, design runs or Gino Smith all of a sudden becoming fleet foot because it just hasn't happened at all this year. It's pretty wild.

But some big matchups to look at. And again, Brock Bowers versus Pat or Tan, that's must-see TV. Make sure you get your popcorn ready for that one. And Raider fans got to hold their breath and hope when it comes to that offensive line against the Denver Broncos and their defensive line because last time it did not work out. too well for the silver and black. But what will be the keys to victory, the path to victory, what does Denver have to do

to secure their win and what do the Raiders have to do to get back into the win column? We'll talk about that coming up on today's Lockedon Broncos, Locked on Raiders, crossover edition here on the Lockdown Podcast Network. And here we go. We're back. We're wrapping up today's crossover edition, Locked on Broncos, Locked on Raiders, Week 14.

Sarah, I remember when it was like week one, right? I remember when it was like, man, This has been such a long offseason. It's time for the regular season. And now we're talking about the postseason. We're talking about the postseason. We're talking about the offseason, talking about the draft. And in our point of view over here with the lockdown Raiders,

we're talking about the draft already. And that's unfortunate. But again, it's week 14. This is a good one, though. It is Raiders. It is Broncos. So throw the records out the window. It's always going to be, you know, one of those blood bass.

And both teams definitely want to win this one. And there's Alpha Dogs on both teams that want to make sure that their name is called early and often in this one. So the Broncos coming into Allegiance Stadium, what are they going to have to do to secure the victory on Sunday? I think they got a strike early. That's the number one key to victory, right? We saw against the commanders, the Broncos had two scoring drives to kind of start off a game. Unfortunately, it was two field goals. And so it was a six nothing lead that was quickly erased by a touchdown drive by the commander. So when you have a defense, that's so great situationally, third down, red zone defense, you've got to get them in early, early,

so that they can do what they do best, right? And this Denver Broncos offense has struggled in the red zone, the past four games. In the past four games, they've got five red zone conversions on 14 attempts. So it's not great. And that's, you know,

you've got Will Lutz, great kicker. You're still winning games. Awesome. The results are there. But I think everybody in Broncos country is wanting to see that sort of blowout win. And once again, you can't disrespect a rival by saying,

hey, you're going to come in and blow these guys out. But I do believe that if the Broncos could execute early on in the red zone and get out to an early lead, how that plays into their defensive strengths can't be overstated. So strike early and a couple of times even get out to a 14-0-0 lead. That is key in this game. And then you've got to run the ball offensively. Broncos running game has been stale.

It's been stagnant. It's struggled quite a bit since J.K. Dobbins went down, run the ball. And then defensively, get back to your identity. Get back to what you do best, right? We talked about that in the previous segment, or Vance Joseph seemingly went a bit more conservative against the commanders. You can't do that. You can't do that in the second half of the season,

in the stretch run of the season where the number one seat is at stake, get back to your identity defensively. What do you think is the reason or the biggest reason for the bog down when it gets to the red zone? I mean, five for 14, that's those are the Raider numbers. I mean, that's kind of the success rate or lack of success that the Raiders have had over the course of the year when it comes to the Red Zone or something. And we always, we have a guy that always tweets at me. Every time the Raiders have to settle for a field goal, always tweets minus four, minus four.

Sarah, I get so tired of seeing that minus four. Like I want to just, I just want to choke him, right? But he's right, right? Because it happens so many times. What's the biggest reason why the Broncos are bogging down? That's a great question because it, I mean, it could be a combination of things, depending on the game, right? I mean, against Houston, you're going up against an elite defense.

So it might just be, hey, their guys made a better play than your guys did. Against the commanders, though, it's, you know, you're not executing on the early downs. You're getting into third and medium or third and long situations within the red zone. And then all of a sudden, you know, you just can't, it's a 50, 50 play or less on like a third and eight or third and nine inside the 20. And you're trying to shot play or you're trying to, you know, just whatever it may be. And I think a lot of it has to do with the Broncos and just their lack of balance offensively. It's really frustrating. They had a huge punt return by Marvin Mims against Kansas.

chiefs that set them up inside the 10. They tried two running plays to start off that drive inside the 10. And the first one gained like one or two yards, the second one gained one or two yards, and then you throw it on third down, you don't get it. And that's the frustrating aspect is there's no, you don't have the ability right now to put the foot on the gas. And so they need to rediscover that. They need to start hitting some of these schemed plays that they have to get guys open.

And it just has to shift. They were one of the top 15 red zone teams before this, little four-game stretch. So I think that's the biggest thing is that lack of balance and lack of execution when they get there. Well, it sounds like that that it could give the Raiders a chance. And I do think that the Raiders defense is going to give them a chance, especially early on.

That's kind of been the M.O. The defense has come out. They've played well. They've getting off the field. They're giving the ball back to the offense. Problem is that the offense hasn't done anything with it. So I feel like one of the biggest keys for the Raiders in this one is when the Raiders defense does their job.

And again, I have no doubt that they'll do their job at least early. the Raiders offense has got to capitalize, right? And they've got to be able to sustain some drives and give the Raiders defense a little bit of time to actually get their, catch their breath and sit down and get a drink of Gatorade. And, you know, we just kind of just, it's got to be more balanced.

I mean, the Raiders were defense was on the field for 35 minutes last week. Right. I mean, that's just not going to work, right? Their offense was on the field for 24 minutes. It's just that can't happen. So when the defense gives you an opportunity, whether they're getting three and outs or they're getting off the field pretty quickly,

or I don't know, heaven forbid, they create a turnover because they've been able to do that as well, come away with the interception, cause a fumble and come up with it. And, you know, they're getting the ball back, but the offense is doing nothing with it. The Raiders' offense last week had two really good drives. They both resulted in Brock Bowers' touchdowns. And that was it, right? Those are the only two drives. They don't consistently do something with their offense. They've got to get the ground game going.

You mentioned that Denver hasn't done a good job of stopping the run as of late. This is a game that, you know, Ashton Gentie, I'm sure he's going to want to continue to try. to get things cooking his his rookie year. And Greg Olson, the new play caller, I believe, is going to try to feed him early and often. But the problem is when it doesn't work and all of a sudden they get down, then they have to go away from it.

So they have been, I will say this, they have been using him more in the passing game as well, catching even some screen passes out of the back field or just some dump balls, like some checkdowns. And in space, Ashton Gentie is a great back, right? He's a really good player in space. He makes things happen. He makes guys miss, picks up tough yards.

And it's funny, some of the plays that he makes and he gets in space at Boise State, that's a touchdown. Right? In the NFL, it's like an eight-yard game. So it's like it's a different ball game in the National Football League, but he's just got to get more touches. So, I mean, for the Raiders, you got to capitalize when the defense gives you opportunities. You can't turn the ball over, Gino.

He just can't do that. The offensive line is going to have to open up some run holes for Ashton to get going, and they're going to have to protect him as well. So it sounds like very basic football, but when you're a two-inteching, 10 team, it is very basic football that you got to get back to doing and see if this team and this head coach can really guide this team not only the rest of this year, but into the future. Yeah, and I continue to be interested to see how the Broncos evolve as a defense with

Dre Greenlaw out there. You mentioned the impact that Ashton Genty can make on a game. I mean, Dre Greenlaw on the opposite side of that, you expect him to be that enforcer in the middle. And he had a forced fumble in the last game against the Raiders. he had an interception against the commander. So we're feeling his impact very quickly, but I think there's just levels to the evolution that can come from that

as the season rolls along. So I'm interested to see, as you mentioned, Ashton Jente, getting him going on the Broncos side of things there. It's Drey Greenlaw and continuing to see, hey, how much more can we ask of him and how much more of an impact can he make as we get into this stretch run? Yeah, man. I mean, for the Raiders, again, it's Ashton Jentee and Brock Bowers, right?

And obviously Brock Bowers is a no-brainer. Ashton, Jentee's, he's trying to work his way into being that no-brainer. And so, again, we'll see how it all plays out. It's game number two for Greg Olson calling the plays with the silver and black. So I want to continue to see if that evolves. His offense continues to, you know, evolve a little bit and look different than what Chip Kelly was calling just some handful of weeks ago when the Raiders played the Denver Broncos the first time. But that's going to do it for today's crossover edition. Again, it's week 14 already.

The Denver Broncos on their way to Allegiance Stadium. take on the silver and black. And it's going to be a fun one, AMC West Division rival. Unfortunately, it's just two teams going in different directions for the Broncos. They're going to the postseason. The Raiders, they're gearing up for the off season. Of course, Sarah, fantastic job, locked on Broncos. Make sure you check out that show on Friday to close things out of the week. And they'll probably tell you even more keys to victory in the game and what to look forward to. And of course,

Locked on Raiders, we will do the same as well. So thanks again for making both Locked on Broncos and Locked on Raiders, your first listen of the day. the Lockdown Podcast Network, your number one sports podcast network. That's going to do it for today's edition here, Lockdown Broncos, Lockdown Raiders, Lockdown Podcast Network.