There has been a lot that the Las Vegas Raiders have struggled with this season, the first under head coach Josh McDaniels. One of the areas that they have struggled in is closing out games.

The Raiders have had no issues building leads this season, it is holding onto them that has been a struggle. Their season would look drastically different if they held onto any of the three 17-point leads that they built and ended up losing.

Close games have been their kryptonite. After going 7-2 in one-score games last season, the script has been flipped this season. Las Vegas is 1-6 in one-score games thus far this season, with their first victory coming last week against the Denver Broncos.

Those struggles are certainly disappointing as the Raiders have some talent on both sides of the ball, but things haven’t come together this season. What is even more surprising about the losses in close games is that the Raiders have one of the most clutch quarterbacks in the NFL, Derek Carr.

While Carr is having a down season compared to the career year he had in 2021, he usually thrives in crunch time. The victory against the Broncos was the eighth in his career in overtime, which gives him the best record in NFL history for a player with at least 10 overtime games at 8-2.

One of those losses came earlier this season as the Raiders lost to the Arizona Cardinals in overtime in Week 2. That was one of the games that Las Vegas blew a 17-point lead in this season, but they were close to salvaging the game before Hunter Renfrow fumbled after a hit that concussed him.

Carr likely wouldn’t be the first quarterback that comes to mind when people would guess who has the best overtime record, but he shows up when the Raiders need him most. The rest of this season will be important for him as he could be auditioning for a job elsewhere as rumors have floated around that the Raiders could move on from him this upcoming offseason