PFF ranks Raiders LB Marquel Lee NFL’s top preseason linebacker From the beginning of the season Womens Kelechi Osemele Jersey , one of the most scrutinized areas of the Raiders team has been their linebacking corps. The Raiders sunk plenty of money into that group this offseason signing the likes of Emmanuel Lamur, Tahir Whitehead and Derrick Johnson. To say that linebacker, particularly middle linebacker, was a weakness last year would be a massive understatement.But surprisingly, the player who has shined most brightly in the linebacker unit isn’t one of the new arrivals, it’s a guy who was already here- former fifth round pick Marquel Lee. The good folks at Pro Football Focus threw darts or tossed chicken entrails onto the ground or whatever it is they do to come up with their arcane formula that ranks each and every player in the NFL on each and every play, and the results show that Marquel Lee is officially the bee’s knees.Well that’s great Womens Justin Ellis Jersey , but it was Detroit. What about going against an actually good team, the Rams?Lee would keep up his torrid pace on Thursday against the Packers as well.So not only is Marquel Lee rated as the Raiders’ best player by PFF, he is in fact rated as the best linebacker in the NFL right now. Of course, we should all take this with a grain of salt because the more a player is on the field the highest his rating is able to go, so guys who are first-string locks and don’t get much preseason time won’t rack up the ratings the way Lee has. But even Derrick Johnson, who was signed to be the Raiders’ middle linebacker, has been raving about Lee this preseason.“He’s very athletic http://www.oaklandraidersteamonline.com/frostee-rucker-jersey ,” Johnson said. “We have plenty of talks about what he sees on the field.He’s a guy who is very smart and he’s got a bright future ahead of him. I’m excited to watch him every time we are out there.”In a preseason full of standouts on the defensive end for the Raiders, Lee might be the case study for how good coaching affects a player. Lee was excellent at Wake Forest, a veritable tackling machine. But he only had 25 tackles last season under the previous regime. Under Paul Guenther, he’s playing at an elite level and seems like a candidate to lead the Raiders in tackles. After winning just four games and trading away a few valuable pieces, the Oakland Raiders were not anywhere close to a playoff team in 2018. On defense, the Raiders ranked dead last in the league giving up 29.2 points per game. On the other side of the ball it wasn’t much better for Oakland as it ranked just 28th in the league scoring 18.1 points per game. With some quick math, the Raiders had an average point differential of 11.1 points per game. Absolutely abysmal. Despite a poor season for the second straight year Authentic Rashaan Melvin Jersey , Derek Carr is still optimistic about the team’s future. “We need some guys who can come in and help us now,” Carr said in an interview with 940-AM in Fresno via NBC Sports. “We have some good building pieces. We have some foundational pieces. Obviously, we have a quarterback, so we don’t need one of those. That’s the good thing.“We just need some players who can help us win now. We’re building this thing. We’ve been building this thing. We’ve built this thing a couple of times. It’s time to get people who can just come in and help us now. There are a lot of veterans on this team who signed contracts or signed extensions or free-agent deals to come play here because we want to win and we believe in this system and what we’re doing.”The optimism is valid since Oakland does have the cap space and a plethora of draft picks to turn around the organization rather quickly. But that involves hitting on a high percentage of those draft picks and free agent signings to fill the many holes that exist on the roster. If the Raiders do hit on a large percentage of their offseason decisions, they will be a lot closer to the playoffs than people think. However, that will be much easier said than done considering Jon Gruden’s track record selecting players in Tampa Bay.