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Sports

Let's Watch Just How Badly Amari Cooper Clowned the Buccaneers Defense

The Raiders did not start off targeting Amari Cooper against Tampa Bay, but the game changed as soon as they did.
Kim Klement-USA TODAY Sports

There was plenty of talk coming out of Week 8 about how the Oakland Raiders had taken the next leap. Derek Carr, the quarterback, got a lot of the attention. Up to and including MVP discussion. This is…not surprising. When a team takes a wins leap—no matter how poor the quality of the competition—the quarterback gets the credit.

But Oakland looked lost before the half against Tampa Bay on Sunday. They'd scored just three points against a pretty lackluster defense. Carr's pass to Seth Roberts won the game, but the reason the Raiders trailed in the first place was that they'd only targeted No. 1 receiver Amari Cooper twice. That changed in the second half—Cooper finished with 173 yards and a touchdown on 12 receptions—and so did the entire complexion of the game.

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On their third play out of the half, the Raiders ran Cooper on a post with another slot receiver running a go route down the middle. With only one deep safety, the Bucs respected the go route, leaving Cooper with plenty of space in the middle of the field.

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After a wide receiver screen, the Raiders set up a Donald Penn touchdown with this throw to Cooper that wound up being called pass interference. Note that Cooper sets up in the slot with a free release, and just blazes right past Chris Conte on the outside. In a year where defensive pass interference sometimes seems to get called a little too easily, Tampa had no way to legitimately contest this ball.

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To start the fourth quarter, Oakland brought Cooper into the backfield and ran some clearout routes to toss him the ball. Safety Bradley McDougald, singled up on Cooper, got juked out of his shorts. This was the second missed tackle Cooper caused in this game.

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And to set up the game-tying touchdown to Michael Rivera, the Raiders got into the red zone via this lovely ball from Carr. Cooper stacked and separated from rookie Vernon Hargreaves at the catch point. It was almost too easy.

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He didn't hang onto this one, but Cooper once again played Hargreaves on this ball that would've set up a game-winning field goal. It's an ugly finish, but such a perfect release off coverage that I couldn't help but show it.

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Oakland's pass offense is getting plenty of credit as the numbers soar to keep up with their bad defense. But it's not just about Carr. Cooper has only dropped three balls this year after dropping 10 in his rookie season. It's his breakout that has helped buoy this offense up even further, and it was on full display as he clowned the hapless Bucs.