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If you are an Oakland Raiders fan, you know who Darren Waller is and has been this season. He’s the team’s leading receiver and has been arguably their most important offensive player.

However, the national media hasn’t quite caught on to just how dominant of a player Waller really is. Through 10 games, Waller has caught 56 passes for 666 yards and three touchdowns. He’s one of the best tight ends in the league after the catch, and he’s just starting to scratch the surface of his potential.

In a recent piece by Pro Football Focus, the site named the most underrated player on every roster. Not surprisingly, Waller was the selection for the Raiders. Take a look at what they had to say about the team’s new star tight end:

Darren Waller missed significant time in each of his first three seasons due to injuries and off-field issues, but he has since overcome those and is breaking out with Oakland in 2019. Generating the third-highest grade (86.1) for a tight end so far, Waller has been Derek Carr’s go-to guy, with 28 more targets than any other receiver in the offense. Most of these targets have been quick passes of 2.5 seconds or less — on those passes specifically, Waller is third in PFF grade (89.2), third in explosive plays generated (11) and third in yards per reception (11.8).

Waller is a big reason why the Raiders’ offense has succeeded this season and ready to make a run at the playoffs. Look for the former Georiga Tech receiver to get a ton of work over the team’s final six games.

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[jwplayer CyWAa1YN-ThvAeFxT]

Usually, it takes rookies some time to acclimate to the pro game. The deeper into the draft, the more likely it is that you’re drafting a project. Either because you’re getting someone who didn’t have a lot of college production or had strong production against lesser competition.

For that reason, once you hit day three, you don’t have high early expectations. The first pick of day three for the Raiders at 106 overall was Maxx Crosby out of Eastern Michigan.

Crosby would fall into the category of strong production against lesser competition. He put up 35.5 sacks over the past two seasons playing in the Mid-American Conference. He had to put up monster numbers just to get noticed. He did get noticed and was on the NFL radar, but they were falling over themselves to take in on the first two days of the draft. But four picks into day three, the Raiders pulled the trigger. And they’re glad they did.

Crosby is coming off being named the AFC Defensive Player of the Week after putting up a franchise rookie record 4.0 sacks against the Bengals. But it didn’t merely take Crosby ten weeks to get things going. He was already leading the team with 25 pressures and was tied for the team lead with 7 QB hits.

I asked Crosby after his big game last Sunday if something clicked for him, and he said it was nothing like that. He said it was just his time to have that moment. That outside of some progress on the mental side of things, everything else has been there. His defensive coordinator can attest to that.

“We saw him early at Eastern Michigan,” said Paul Guenther. “[Assistant Defensive line coach] Travis Smith went up to Ypsilanti, saw him and he said ‘hey, he’s a good looking kid.’ You could see it on his college tape, and from the minute he got here on our practice field, it was evident we had a gem. He works his butt off, he’s always going 100 miles an hour, and you can’t ask for anything more than that.”

I can also attest to Crosby’s hustle. He never stops moving. In practice, when he was in one place, he was dancing or something, during drills he was at game speed, and even in running wind sprints, he was always the first one to cross the line. He simply knows one speed. And he clearly enjoys it. That’s rare.

“Some guys, you have to push for it, and some guys you don’t have to push to get that,” Guenther continued. “So, he’s one of those guys that you don’t have to push to get that which is always better.”

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[jwplayer CyWAa1YN-ThvAeFxT]

The night of October 27, the Raiders plane touched down in Oakland, fresh off their fifth game in a row away from their home stadium. That return from seven weeks without a game in Oakland was the start of a three-game homestand.

Friday, they will have their final practice in preparation for the Jets, and they will warm up the jet to fly across the country for the first time in nearly a month.

The Raiders were enjoying their home cooking over the past few weeks. After a 2-3 stretch away from Oakland, including losing the last two in Green Bay and Houston, they have now won three-straight over the Lions, Chargers, and Bengals.

Their two wins away from Oakland came in Indianapolis and London over the Bears.

In London, they had the Raiders had the advantage in terms of bodily clocks as they headed to London a week early to acclimate to the time change while the Bears came two days prior.

In that regard, it was just their win over the Colts in which they overcame a disadvantage in time difference. Though, to be fair, the crowd in London was very much Bears fan dominated, so the atmosphere felt very much like a road game.

There is something that can be taken from having spent so long away from home, not to mention still managing to pull out a couple of wins many thought improbable. Most notably, the team bonding that happened as a result.

“These little road trips are nothing new,” said Derek Carr. “We’re flying all the way across to New York, and we’re like that’s half the flight from what we are used to, and it’ll be good for us. Actually, it’s so funny, talking to our guys, we have a good routine of little games we play together, little team bonding things that we do and some of the guys are like, ‘Man! We get to go on the road this week!’ because they are excited to bond some more and play some of our little games that we play. And that’s the makings of a group that gets along and loves being around each other, so you always want to play at home, but when you got to go on the road I think that we’ve had a lot of practice at it.”

Of course, this can’t just be a one-off road trip either. The Raiders will be on the road again next week in Kansas City.

Obviously, that first road trip was huge. And coming out of it sitting at 3-4 was considered a win. The fear when the schedule was released was that road stint could put the Raiders in a hole early on that was difficult to dig out of. Instead, they were a game away from .500 and have carried that over to reach 6-4.

This road trip would be just as crucial because they are currently sitting just outside the playoffs. A win in New York could put them into the mix for the playoffs. That’s to say nothing of how big a victory in Kansas City would be. But right now the focus should be on the first leg of the trip where they’ll have to take the field for a 10am Pacific start time in a hostile environment, against a suddenly resurgent Jets team.

The experiences of that 7-week, 5-game stint away from Oakland along with the 10-day trip to Indianapolis and London can only help prepare them for this trip.

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