In recent years, the Oakland Raiders have unfortunately not been commended for their defense. While the offense will obviously improve with the addition of Antonio Brown, the defense will need some work.
Second-year defensive tackle Maurice Hurst hopes to put in the work. Hurst is coming off a good rookie campaign and understands the expectation is not for him to maintain, but to improve.
As far as his own expectations for Year 2, Hurst believes the Raiders defense will be greatly improved, via Eddie Paskal of Raiders.com:
“Every single game that we play in they’re going to mention our pass rush, and we control the narrative for that,” he explained. “Obviously last year wasn’t good enough, and we get all the criticism for it, so there’s a lot of eyes on us to develop and be specialists here, and just change that narrative, change what they’re saying about us, and change our attitude on how we’re approaching things.”
Hurst led the mediocre Raiders defense in sacks with four on a team that only put up 13 total. He will have some help this season though with the addition of No. 4 overall pick Clelin Ferrell and others.
Ferrell led the Clemson Tigers will 11.5 sacks during his junior and final season with the team. The defensive tenacity of Hurst and Ferrell should at least make other teams start to think more about the Raiders defense.
According to Hurst, he believes that the Raiders toughness and new talent, like Ferrell, will be the key to a strong defense:
“I think we’ll be really good,” he explained. “I think we have some toughness to us. I think we have some talent that we didn’t have last year. I think it’s a really exciting time to be a Raider, and exciting time to continue to develop with these guys…”
Hurst understands that improvements on the defensive end need to start with him. Defensive coordinator Paul Guenther believes that Hurst is stronger and moving quicker than he had last year. Improvements such as those are a good sign that Year 2 will be a good one for the 2018 fifth-round pick.
