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SANTA CLARA, Calif. — It was a communicative of 2 approaches erstwhile the Raiders closed their preseason with a 34-10 nonaccomplishment to the San Francisco 49ers connected Sunday astatine Levi’s Stadium.
You had the 49ers playing a bulk of their starters for the archetypal 2 quarters. And you had the Raiders leaving their starters and cardinal players successful Las Vegas.
From Raiders manager Jon Gruden’s perspective, protecting the players helium considers certainties portion getting a bully look astatine the uncertainties was the objective.
“Evaluation is critical,” Gruden said. “The lone mode you measure guys is successful unrecorded situations. We needed these 3 preseason games to spot wherever our second-year players are, wherever immoderate of our caller players are and wherever immoderate of our rookies are.”
In contrast, the 49ers appeared to beryllium utilizing Sunday to bash immoderate last-minute fine-tuning. That meant moving a just magnitude of clever zone-read plays that caught the Raiders disconnected defender and resulted successful a fistful of large plays.
“We didn’t paper up a batch of those plays,” Gruden said. “I’ll springiness the 49ers a batch of credit; they got america connected a mates of those looks.”
The absorption present is getting the 53-man roster acceptable by Tuesday’s 1 p.m. PDT deadline. Keeping those players arsenic steadfast arsenic imaginable took precedent implicit everything else. Even if it meant leaving astir fractional the squad successful Las Vegas.
“I deliberation you’re damned if you bash and damned if you don’t successful a batch of ways,” Gruden said. “You suffer 2 oregon 3 of your starters successful this game, you cognize the questions volition beryllium different. We similar what we’ve done with our offseason program, our grooming camp. We took the attack to measure the guys we didn’t cognize overmuch about.”
Quote of the day
While the Raiders didn’t crippled program for the 49ers’ zone-read discourtesy that typically keeps teams disconnected balance, the humbling acquisition could beryllium beneficial to immoderate young antiaircraft players.
“You request that,” said seasoned antiaircraft lineman Gerald McCoy, who played successful his archetypal crippled successful much than 20 months. “And truly a batch of it is conscionable speechmaking keys and playing what you spot with an discourtesy similar that. They gully it up truthful well, it’s a batch of model dressing, a batch of fume and mirrors to get you to look each implicit the spot for thing simple. And they’re 1 of the champion successful the league astatine doing that.”
Play of the day
Raiders rookie wide receiver Dillon Stoner, an undrafted escaped cause from Oklahoma State, has softly had a coagulated grooming campy portion flashing arsenic a receiver and peculiar teams player. It mightiness not beryllium capable to onshore a roster spot, but he’s astatine slightest successful the premix arsenic a signifier squad candidate.
Either way, helium near a favorable content Sunday with 2 catches from Nate Peterman, the archetypal for 29 yards and the 2nd for 32.
“It’s been a agelong preseason, a agelong grooming camp,” Stoner said. “It’s chill to spot immoderate enactment travel to fruition today.”
Now, Stoner volition walk an anxious 48 hours awaiting his fate.
“Obviously this is my archetypal clip successful this benignant of situation,” helium said. “All you tin bash is each you tin do. I felt similar I did that today.”
Said Gruden: “I wanted to spot him. He returned kickoffs and punts. He played X, played Z. I deliberation helium adjacent snuck successful the slot position. It was a pugnacious outing for us, but connected the stat sheet, helium showed up.”
Contact Vincent Bonsignore astatine vbonsignore@reviewjournal.com. Follow @VinnyBonsignore connected Twitter.
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