Antonio Pierce shares harsh critique of players after Raiders' upset loss

NFL head coaches typically don't give honest answers about their teams' performances until after they have had time to review the games.

Las Vegas Raiders head coach Antonio Pierce did not need to watch tape to confirm what he saw from the sidelines during Sunday's shockingly awful 36-22 loss to the previously winless Carolina Panthers in the Silver and Black's home opener at Allegiant Stadium.

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In fact, Pierce witnessed enough of his players failing to play hard that he decided to mention the lack of effort during his postgame press conference. He made the damning observation after agreeing with a reporter's observation about the Raiders being no-shows against a desperate Panthers squad.

"As the game went on ... I think there were definitely some individuals that made business decisions," Pierce said. "And we'll make business decisions going forward as well."

The scathing quote hung in the air well after the disappointing defeat. Raider Nation speculated on social media about who Pierce was talking about, but the team played so poorly that there weren't any consensus candidates.

Las Vegas, a 5 1/2-point favorite, was riding high after last week's 26-23 comeback road win against the Baltimore Ravens, but the Raiders fell flat on their faces against Carolina. The defense allowed 36-year-old journeyman quarterback Andy Dalton to throw for 319 yards and three touchdowns, and the offense managed only 55 rushing yards despite a concerted effort to establish the ground game early.

"It was a bad day for the Raiders," Pierce said.

Pierce intends to address the situation the only way he knows how — with a week of tough love and old-school practices.

"We got our ass whooped. We got to put pads on — I don't know — get back on the sled," Pierce said. "It's the same group that's, for the most part, all come back (with the) same technique and same cultures. Not a different scheme.

"Obviously we're going to have to coach them better, get some hard asses on the guys, and guys got to take some rough coaching because we didn't see that coming on either side of the ball. We had opportunity to run the ball. We didn't. We didn't do that at all. We tried and tried and tried and tried. ... I would've booed us, too."

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