Raiders Opinion: Favorable Schedule Should Benefit Team

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The Las Vegas Raiders should enjoy a surprisingly successful 2023, buoyed by a favorable slate of games.

While their opponents may be a bit of a challenge, the Raiders’ 2023 schedule is just about as favorable as it could have been. The team’s longest road trip is two games. Meanwhile, they  stay home (or not play) four straight weeks at the back half of the season. As expected, their most difficult opponents come from their own division. Yet, the Raiders also drew the increasingly competitive AFC East. Vegas splits the division with two home (New England & New York) and two away (Buffalo & Miami) games.

Road Warriors Before Home Cooking

Opening the season at home is typically a guaranteed sellout and teeters towards more of a party than just a football game. However, the Raiders will have to wait until Week Threeto play a game in Las Vegas. That’s when  the team will host the Pittsburgh Steelers on Sunday Night Football. Even after opening the season on the road for two weeks, against the Denver Broncos and Buffalo Bills, the Raiders will head back out on the road. In Week Four, Vegas travels for a “neutral site” game against the Los Angeles Chargers. Las Vegas may have to travel to California for the game, but Raider Nation takes over L.A..

Second Home

The matchup against Los Angeles is also one of the team’s two standalone away games (a road game not followed by an additional road game), meaning that when the Raiders leave Las Vegas, the fans will typically have to wait multiple weeks for their next home game. After a somewhat threatening opening stretch, the Raiders will return home for a Monday night game against Green Bay (most likely given the primetime spot before Aaron Rodgers’ departure to the New York Jets) and a standard Sunday game against the New England Patriots.

Midwest Battles

Las Vegas will travel to Chicago following their two-game homestand and could spend the entire week in the Midwest, as a Week 8 Monday night matchup with the Detroit Lions awaits. This eight-game stretch is almost perfectly balanced with a mix of struggling, rising, and dominant teams, but does not feature a set of daunting back-to-back matchups. The stretch of matchups featuring fluctuating talents ends after the Raiders’ Week 9 battle with the New York Giants, as the New York Jets, Miami Dolphins, and Kansas City Chiefs wait on the horizon.

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Make Or Break

The three week stretch from Week 10 to Week 12 is certainly the Raiders most difficult pocket of games this season, but the team will be rewarded with a very late Week 13 bye. Three of the Raiders’ final five games following the bye will feature divisional opponents, with the Minnesota Vikings and Indianapolis Colts filing the remaining spots. To close the season, Las Vegas will stay home out of the bye to host the Vikings and Chargers, before travelling to Kansas City and Indianapolis, and will close out the season in Sin City against the Broncos.

Optimistic Overview

While the layout of the schedule is surprisingly fair, the Raiders will most likely experience only one “bad weather” game. On Christmas Day, they venture to Kansas City. Additionally,  as the team visits (notably cold and snowy cities) Buffalo and Chicago before November. Considering that Allegiant Stadium has now had multiple seasons to showcase its novelty, the Raiders landing five primetime games in 2023 cannot solely be attributed to their new home, and it could be hinting that something bigger with this team is on the horizon.