This Raiders’ bye week should be considerably more fun than, say, the one two years ago.
Oakland was 0-4 then, coming off an embarrassing blowout loss on the world stage in London, and the most important decision was whether to let fired coach Dennis Allen fly home with the team. The Raiders went on to go 0-10 before finishing 3-13.
This year, the Raiders are 7-2 — already matching last season’s win total — and are in first place in the AFC West. Players hustled to the airports Thursday afternoon to start their five days off, but all were excited about getting back and finishing what they’ve started.