Oakland Raiders Prove Once Again They Are The Real Deal

But Roethlisberger does have a history of quick turnarounds from injury.

It seems like injuries have been haunting the quarterback since he was also carted off the field during Week 3 when he sustained a sprained MCL, leading him to miss the entire October. “We’ve got to stay the course”, Foster explained.

Occasional dropped passes have been about the only issue in Cooper’s stellar rookie season.

Three plays later Boswell ended Oakland’s two-game winning streak.

Stats don’t tell the whole story though and if you were lucky enough to watch that game yesterday, there were a hell of a lot of things to like about Derek Carr from more than just a stats perspective. And despite the franchise’s issues since its last playoff appearance in 2002, the Raiders have owned the Steelers, going 4-1 against Pittsburgh since 2006 compared to 43-103 against the rest of the league.

OTHER ISSUES: Steelers defensive end Cam Heyward wasn’t exactly in a celebratory mood after giving up a two-touchdown advantage in the fourth quarter.

But it’s way too early to look at the scoreboard for that.

Even in a losing effort, the Oakland Raiders have once again stepped out of the shadows of yesteryear and proved they have what it takes to compete against the better teams in the NFL. That’s the bad news.

An optimist would look at the team’s Week 11 bye as a godsend and hope Landry Jones can get the Steelers past the Cleveland Browns in Week 10 and possibly set up Roethlisberger’s return in Week 12 or 13. You can’t blame Murray for letting this one go as it appeared that he was knocked out for a brief moment immediately after the hit. Pittsburgh will rely heavily on running back DeAngelo Williams and wide receiver Antonio Brown, who had a franchise-record 17 catches for 284 yards Sunday, to carry the bulk of the workload. Mitchell tried to explain it but he did say he noticed Murray go limp. He is expected to take his place again when the Raiders face the Vikings next Sunday should Hudson be unable to go.

— Until yesterday, no team had ever had one player with 300 scrimmage yards in one game and another with 200 yards. He also rushed twice for 22 yards, bringing his total yards from scrimmage to 306 on the day. DeAngelo Williams is a suitable replacement, but he is not to the caliber of Bell. Returning punts? Give it back to Antonio Brown, although Mike Tomlin did that one time in the fourth quarter and Brown lost a fumble. He caught a two-point conversion pass from Ben Roethlisberger after his first touchdown run. A 41-yard catch-and-run set up a Boswell field goal and a 19-yard out pattern set up Boswell for a 38-yard kick late in the half that put Pittsburgh up 21-14 at the break. There will be no open kicker tryouts this week. “We showed early in the year when that group is all out there together that we can be productive, that three-game stretch the that culminated in the production we had against Baltimore, ” said Pettine. Boswell proceeded to somehow nail it out of bounds.