Klint Kubiak didn’t soften the blow after the Las Vegas Raiders’ latest setback. Following a 33-30 loss to the Buffalo Bills on Sunday, the Raiders coach said he was “very disappointed” and made it clear he wasn’t interested in treating the defeat like a moral victory.
When asked what his team needs to fix, Kubiak answered with three clipped words: “Close. Games. Out,”
That’s the part of the Raiders’ season that keeps coming back to haunt them. Sunday’s loss was their third straight, and once again they were close enough to make the game feel alive, but not close enough to finish it. After last week’s flat showing in New England, Las Vegas pushed one of the league’s most productive offenses to the final moments, only to come up short by a field goal.
The recurring issue is about more than one bad day. It’s the little edges that decide games late - third-down defense, late-game play calling, and the kind of depth that gets tested in the fourth quarter.
Buffalo’s offense is built to punish even a small lapse, and the Raiders’ secondary has been living under a microscope after two straight weeks of getting beaten deep. That group includes two rookies and three league-average veterans, which has left plenty of room for opponents to attack.
There’s also a bigger roster conversation hovering over all of it. The Raiders have put resources into veterans like Kirk Cousins and Maxx Crosby, and those are the players who need to show up when a game is there to be won.
A close loss can feel like a step forward for a team still trying to define itself under Kubiak and general manager John Spytek. But stack enough of them together, and “close” starts to look a lot like the team’s identity.
For now, Kubiak sounds determined to keep the emphasis on accountability. The week ahead should be spent on two-minute drills, red-zone execution and late-down defense.
If the Raiders drop another one-score game, the discussion won’t be about effort anymore. It’ll be about whether the roster has enough to finish the job.
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Kubiak has framed the response in familiar terms, leaning on accountability and leadership as the standard for a group still trying to define itself. The bigger question now is whether that message can turn into something more concrete as the Raiders head into Week 7, where the margin for error is starting to shrink and every result seems to matter a little more than the last. [Read more 🡒]