Raiders’ defense has to be better in rematch with Chiefs

Raiders linebacker K.J. Wright has spent more than a decade in the NFL. He knows how things look when his team is playing well and, just as importantly, when it’s not.

Wright didn’t like what he saw when he looked back at the Raiders’ defensive performance against the Chiefs last month at Allegiant Stadium.

“Watching the film again, that wasn’t up to our standard,” he said of the 41-14 loss. “We know what we’re capable of, and that shouldn’t happen again. We all saw the film. We saw what they did to us. We know we all have to play much better this go-round to have a chance to win.”

The Raiders will get that opportunity when they head to Kansas City for a rematch at 10 a.m. Sunday.

With the linebacker group depleted by injury, Wright is expected to take on a larger role than he did in the first meeting. Last week against Washington, he played his most snaps since the opener, and Wright should see even more with Denzel Perryman, Patrick Onwuasor, Cory Littleton and Marquel Lee all ailing, and Nick Kwiatkoski now on injured reserve.

While he will be needed on the field, he will remain in a key leadership role as well. Wright called his teammates together on the practice field Wednesday and delivered a speech.

“We know with this last stretch, we can make it happen. But it’s all about our energy and our mindset,” he said later. “Focus on the details and the execution. … The message we talked about is that … we’re not where we want to be, but we can get where we want to go.”

They will have to do a better job against the Chiefs than they did in the first meeting. In that game, Kansas City had its most points since Oct. 3 and second most of the season. Its 422 passing yards were a season high, as were its 516 total yards.

“They showed kind of what we thought,” defensive coordinator Gus Bradley said. “I thought there were times we executed well, but against this team you got to execute all the time.”

There’s also a schematic issue. A blueprint has emerged for teams to slow down Mahomes and the vaunted Chiefs offense by employing a two-deep safety shell and keeping everything in front of the defense. That takes away explosive plays and forces the Chiefs into longer drives with more opportunities for mistakes.

But Bradley’s system doesn’t often use two deep safeties. His system allowed the Chiefs to find their rhythm in the first meeting. Mahomes threw for five touchdowns and completed 70 percent of his passes, for 8.1 yards per attempt.

He has thrown for just two touchdowns in the other four games during the Chiefs’ current five-game winning streak and completed just 57.6 percent of his throws, at 5.9 yards per attempt.

Bradley didn’t give away much but appeared to indicate there would be more flexibility to his defense in the rematch.

“I think if you go back and watch, you would see there is some mixture of some things that we do,” he said. “We are trying to get to that point where we can mix things up without losing execution of what we really are. That’s the challenge with it.”

One of the issues with playing two high safeties is it takes Johnathan Abram out of his role in the box where he has grown comfortable and gives him more coverage responsibilities.

The Chiefs have exploited that part of his game.

Mahomes went 9-for-9 for 127 yards and two touchdowns when targeting Abram in the last game. Mahomes is now 14-for-15 for 198 yards and three touchdowns in those situations the three times they have matched up, according to Pro Football Focus.

“I think in our style of defense the strong safety is going to get attacked,” Bradley said. “He’s looking forward to it. … He’s a guy that is extremely competitive. He’ll step up to the challenge. We expect him to play pretty well this week.”

For the Raiders to have a chance, Bradley will have to be right.

Contact Adam Hill at ahill@reviewjournal.com. Follow @AdamHillLVRJ on Twitter.