The Oakland Raiders may be questioning Matt Flynn and aren’t ready to start a rookie like Tyler Wilson, but it’s quite clear that Terrelle Pryor, through all of this preseason, has shown he isn’t ready to become the team’s starting quarterback.
Pryor finished the game with 3-of-8 for 31 yards, throwing an interception as the Oakland Raiders, with huge problems all across the football field, lost 22-6 to the Seattle Seahawks. Flynn might not have much of an upside or potential like Pryor, but he’s less likely to mess up big time when the season begins.
There’s also the case of a terrible offensive line the Raiders have to protect their guys. They have a player or two injured that might help them pretty soon, but for now, it seems like it doesn’t really matter who starts behind center – there’s not too much talent protecting him.
The embarrassing thing about the result wasn’t just the loss or Pryor playing badly (did do well when going on runs with 3 carries for 48 yards). The worst thing about the loss was that the Raiders opened the game with a lineup of first-teamers, while the Seahawks were using their second-string players. The Raiders were still clearly the inferior team for most of that time-span.
The defense might have looked a bit better than before as they limited Seattle to only 53 yards on 32 carries, and the Seahawks scored only one touchdown throughout the game. Still, the Raiders looked inferior in almost every matchup across the field, showing that 2013 is going to be once again another year with double-digit losing, and the word rebuild and patience drawn all across this team for the who knows how many times.
Why should Pryor start the regular season? He shouldn’t. Potential isn’t good enough of a reason, and Flynn should finally get the job, even if he is just a place-filler as the Raiders wait for someone better to come along. ESPN’s Bill Williamson keeps writing about how Pryor should start simply for the reason that the Raiders need to find out what they have in the third year quarterback, and for them to know if they’re going to move on to someone else next season or still keep him around with the hope that he finally gets it.
But going out on a limb here, Flynn is the safer choice for someone who might still be able to finish with a better win total this season than Pryor. It doesn’t even have to be an all-season kind of job. If after six games things really do seem disastrous in Oakland and Flynn isn’t cutting it, then it might be time to start plugging the lineup with Pryor before the Raiders go and choose another quarterback in the draft.
Pryor, from the little we’ve seen from him, simply isn’t good enough to cut it in the NFL. Flynn might not have that potential of a franchise quarterback, but he’s good enough to start on the Raiders, and hasn’t messed up badly enough on more than one occasion to deserve losing the starting job for a second straight season.