Raiders preview: Expectations are high

Sit down, please. The following announcement may cause dizziness, heart palpitations, blurred vision, disorientation and, depending on the colors of your replica NFL jersey, euphoria or angst.

The Raiders could make the playoffs this season.

Granted, that's a lot different than saying the Raiders will make the playoffs this season. This is, after all, the NFL, and a lot can change for a team between July and December. But the Raiders might have improved more than any other team during the offseason, and are suddenly cast into the unfamiliar role of media darlings.

Forbes selected Oakland quarterback Derek Carr as one of four NFL players on the cusp of a breakout season. The NFL Network's Elliott Harrison predicted that Jack Del Rio will be NFL coach of the year, and that the Raiders will win the AFC West. Quick reminder: The guys who won the Super Bowl less than six months ago, the Denver Broncos, are in the AFC West.

Recently, four ESPN “insiders” were asked which NFL team they'd like to coach right now. Respected reporter John Clayton said the Raiders. “This is a team on the rise with a great young quarterback in Derek Carr, young stars in Khalil Mack and Amari Cooper, plus a great offensive line,” Clayton wrote.

This is a surreal twist for a team that hasn't gone to the playoffs, or even posted a winning record, since 2002. How did this happen? Or we are we simply deluding ourselves?

Here are five things you need to know about the 2016 Raiders and their elevated expectations.

GM Reggie McKenzie got stuff done

For the third consecutive year, the Raiders were among the NFL leaders in available cap space when the offseason rolled around. This time, they seem to have nailed it.

Time will tell, of course, but it's possible that no team improved its roster through free agency more than the Raiders did in 2016. On March 10, the first day that free agents could officially be signed, the Raiders announced deals with offensive lineman Kelechi Osemele (who is expected to start at left guard for the time being), edge rusher Bruce Irvin and cornerback Sean Smith. That's three position groups upgraded with three hefty checks.

These are not the expensive, big-name graybeards of the Al Davis era, either. Osemele is 27 years old, Irvin is 28 and Smith 29. All of them are in their primes. Each could make an immediate impact on the Raiders' fortunes, and could stick around for a while.

General manager Reggie McKenzie was at it again on April 7 when he signed safety Reggie Nelson. He's a little older at 32, but Nelson is coming off a bounce-back year with the Bengals.

The 2016 haul follows a pretty good crop of 2015 free agents that included center Rodney Hudson, defensive tackle Dan Williams, wide receiver Michael Crabtree and linebacker Malcolm Smith. Two years ago, McKenzie was fighting for his job. Now he's regarded as one of the NFL's up-and-coming GMs.

Pass rush should be team's strong suit

The Raiders had 38 sacks last season, right around the league average of 37.1. But one of the main pieces in that pass rush was anything but average. In just his second season, end/linebacker Kahlil Mack had 15 sacks, second only to Houston's J.J. Watt, who was the AP defensive player of the year. Mack's five-sack game against the Broncos in Week 14 was transcendent.

In projecting the top AFC defenders for 2016, the analytics group Pro Football Focus ranked Mack second - behind Watt and one spot ahead of Denver's Von Miller, the reigning Super Bowl MVP.

Mack should get better this year, and not just because he's only 25. Opponents will be less able to rotate blockers to his side now that Irvin is in Oakland. Irvin is a bona fide pass rusher in his own right, with 22 sacks over four seasons in Seattle.

Flash-forward to the stretch run of the regular season, and it boggles the mind. Aldon Smith was among the most feared quarterback-chasers in the league during his first three seasons with the 49ers. Eventually he sidetracked his career with a parade of legal transgressions. Now a Raider, he is suspended by the NFL for the accumulation of those offenses, but is scheduled to return in November.

If Smith can return to form, or anything close to it, in 2016 - well, you might feel sorry for Alex Smith and Philip Rivers in December.

Secondary got an upgrade

In signing Sean Smith and Reggie Nelson, McKenzie may have helped turn the Raiders' biggest liability into one of their top assets.

Even as so many things were going right in Oakland last year, the defensive backfield was a mess. Yes, Charles Woodson was heady and opportunistic in his final NFL season, and newcomer David Amerson was a revelation at one of the cornerback spots. But the Raiders had trouble filling the other secondary positions, and at times were picked apart by enemy quarterbacks.

McKenzie re-signed Amerson to a four-year extension last week; he'll pair with Smith to create a suddenly formidable starting corner tandem. And it's possible Oakland's first-round draft choice, Karl Joseph of West Virginia, will pair with Nelson as the starting safeties.

The new bodies will have another hidden benefit for the Raiders. The team won't feel pressured to rely on D.J. Hayden, a 2013 first-round draft choice who has never panned out at cornerback.

Don't get Carr-ied away

Some Raiders fans got a little ahead of the cart last year, expecting Carr, Mack and Cooper to turn losers into winners in one season. Certainly, there was improvement under Del Rio in 2015. Just as obviously, there is a lot of work to be done.

Here are some of Oakland's potential pitfalls this season:

Carr is generally hailed as one of the game's bright young quarterbacks. He also had a tendency to throw ill-advised passes late in close games. If he doesn't clean that up in 2016, the rest of this stuff might not matter a lot.

Going into last season, running back Latavius Murray was seen as part of a Big Three with Carr and Cooper. He got the starting job and rushed for 1,066 yards, most by a Raider since 2010. He also fumbled four times, several of them at particularly inopportune moments, and failed to earn Del Rio's trust.

Who'll stop the run? That's the question, even as we all swoon over Oakland's pass-rush potential. The Raiders were okay against the run last year, giving up an average of 104.9 yards per game. But they didn't have a true gap-stuffing linebacker in the mold of, say, Patrick Willis. And they still don't.

Raiders' future in Oakland murky at best

The Raiders' on-field fortunes will gain some clarity soon enough. The team's off-field saga may be in limbo for years.

Owner Mark Davis, who inherited the decision-making when his father, Al Davis, died in October of 2011, wants a new stadium to replace the Oakland Coliseum, which has crumbling facilities and a dirt infield for September baseball games, thanks to sharing space with the Oakland A's.

Someday, perhaps not too far down the road, Mark Davis will get his venue. But where will it be?

He wanted to move the Raiders to Los Angeles, but the plan approved by NFL owners calls for the Rams to move into a proposed stadium in the Inglewood neighborhood, and for the Chargers to join them. The Chargers have one year to accept the deal, or two if they're able to get a stadium initiative on the November ballot in San Diego. Only if the Chargers opt out can the Raiders move south (again).

The late entry into the real-estate game is Las Vegas, which is aggressively courting the Raiders and may be able to garner NFL approval after years of hearing that the league was too creeped out by gambling influences to site a team in Vegas.

As casino mogul Sheldon Adelson and others sort out the geography and economics of putting a team in the desert, some possible heroes have appeared in Oakland. Hall of Fame defensive back Ronnie Lott, who played three seasons with the Los Angeles Raiders but is better associated with the 49ers, is fronting a group of investors that has entered into talks with Alameda County (and soon, maybe, with the city of Oakland) to build a new stadium at the site of the current Coliseum.

Count on months, if not years, of tangled, hostile, ever-evolving negotiations. And enjoy what may be a breakthrough season, Raiders fans. Your team seems ready to return to the “greatness” of which Al Davis so frequently spoke. It just isn't clear where that greatness will occur.

You can reach staff writer Phil Barber at 707-521-5263 or phil.barber@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter: @Skinny_Post.