Thursday Night

This week is the start of the first set of Thursday night games since the first week of this season.  The matchup is between the Oakland Raiders verse the home team the San Diego Chargers tomorrow night.  These two teams have a very similar background coming into this game.  For starters they absolutely despise each other being that they come from the same area of California.  They also have both suffered difficult losses prior to this upcoming loss and are hungry to break their losing streaks.  Both teams’ losses could be because of critical injuries to both teams.  The Oakland Raiders had the biggest loss when their star running back Darren McFadden was injured due to a foot injury and is questionable for this Thursday game.  The Chargers on the other hand have been struggling keeping their running backs healthy as well.  It started with an injury to Tolbert and just two weeks ago Ryan Mathews suffered an injury as well.  Although it hasn’t kept him sidelined, his performance has definitely suffered from it.  I believe the winner of this matchup will be the team that prevents the least amount of turnovers.  Both quarterbacks will greatly influence this statistic.  Phillip Rivers has been struggling all season with turnovers causing most of the Chargers losses.  On the other hand, Carson Palmer not being experienced with his new offense could also be susceptible to turnovers.   The team that is able to overcome their disadvantages and limit their mistakes will be the obvious winner in this early week matchup.