‘We got our ass whooped’: What Antonio Pierce said after Carolina Panthers beat Raiders

Las Vegas Raiders head coach Antonio Pierce kept things simple in his postgame press conference on Sunday — after the previously winless Carolina Panthers streamed out of Allegiant Stadium with a 36-22 victory.

“We got our ass whooped,” he said.

The Panthers (1-2) outpaced the Raiders (1-2) in most statistical categories. Carolina had 437 yards of total offense — 306 through the air and 131 on the ground — and looked like a different team than the one in the first two weeks of the season. Andy Dalton, the veteran who stepped into the starting role after second-year quarterback Bryce Young was benched, had a remarkable day. He is the only quarterback in the NFL so far this season to throw for 300 yards and three touchdowns in a single game.

But the stats aren’t what Pierce focused on when articulating his frustrations postgame. He mostly talked about team effort and on how the Panthers controlled the line of scrimmage.

Here are the highlights of Pierce’s comments as they relate to the Panthers.

On how the Panthers controlled the line of scrimmage

“We got our ass whooped.”

On how that happened

“We got our ass whopped. We got to put pads on, I don’t know, got to get on the sled. Same group that’s, for the most part, all come back and same technique, same coaches. It’s not a different scheme, so obviously we have to coach better and be some hard asses on the guys, and guys have to take some rough coaching because just didn’t see that on either side of the ball. We had an opportunity to run the ball and we didn’t. Didn’t do that at all. We tried and tried and tried and I would have booed us, too, offensively, defensively we didn’t do a good enough job up front. Not good enough.”

Seems like the team didn’t show up

“No, they didn’t. I think as the game went on — I don’t think it was the team. I think there were definitely some individuals that made business decisions, and we’ll make business decisions going forward as well.”

On letting fans down

“Yeah, I think the one thing I’ve always said and spoken to you gentlemen and ladies about is being consistent. We’re here right now and that’s not what we’re fighting for and that’s not what we’re striving for and it showed up today, and if I could say I saw it coming I would have told you that, but I didn’t see that coming. And inconsistent plays is something we just got to constantly keep working on.”

On zone breakdowns in pass game

“Yeah, I mean, played a lot of men in this game and there’s some zone and want to be tighter coverage and obviously, listen, got to give credit to them, they came out here and put their best foot forward, and we didn’t.”

Any positives in the trenches on defense?

“No. I thought today was just bad by all of us. Bad day for the Raiders.”