Sometimes it can be hard to judge preseason performances because it’s usually first teamers vs first teamers, second teamers vs second teamers. But the 49ers did the Raiders a solid in the final preseaon game. They played their starters, even while the Raiders sat all their starters.
Now, the Raiders were unable to keep the 49ers from scoring. In fact, on all but the first drive, they ran through the Raiders’ backups like a hot knife through butter. But that’s to be expected. What the Raiders are looking for are small victories. Individual performances.
With these individual performances, you are actually seeing how these guys would hold up against the caliber of player they would face in games that count. And for that, the Raiders coaches should be thanking the 49ers for giving them a good look at their roster hopefuls and depth players.
Those depth players bent but didn’t break on the first drive of the day; making the stop to force the 49ers to settle for a 49-yard field goal.
That stop was brought to you by Janarius Robinson who blew past the tackle to make a tackle for a five-yard loss that the 49ers couldn’t recover from.
Though they looked out of their depth on the next drive, the third drive, they took the ball away. Making that the final play for Brock Purdy and the 49ers first team offense.
That takeaway was again led by Janarius Robinson whose pressure helped lead to a pass breakup by Sam Webb that was intercepted by Christopher Smith off the deflection.
As for the Raiders offense versus the 49ers first team defense, that was just plain bad from start to finish. Nathan Peterman led the Raiders offense to just 36 yards of offense with one first down in the first three drives. Dylan Laube looked for a moment on the second drive like he might make something happen — picking up the only first down in the first three drives — but then he fumbled the ball away.
It wasn’t until an 81-yard punt return by Tyreik McAllister that that Raiders got on the board in the first half.