Christian Wilkins Reflects on First Game as a Raider

Las Vegas Raiders defensive tackle Christian Wilkins got his first taste of playing for the Silver and Black on Sunday.

Las Vegas Raiders DT Christian Wilkins / Darrell Craig Harris, Sports Illustrated

Defensive tackle Christian Wilkins was perhaps the Las Vegas Raiders' most highly-anticipated newcomer going into Week 1, and he didn't disappoint.

The veteran defensive tackle helped lead what was, for the most part, a dominant defensive effort in Sunday's game against the Los Angeles Chargers, but unofrtiunately for the Raider faithful, it wasn't enough.

It was unfortunate for Wilkins as well, as the former Miami Dolphins defensive tackle obviously wanted his first game as a Raider to end with a victory. But as a veteran often does, Wilkins was able to find the silver lining.

“I mean, obviously, you work so hard throughout the offseason, and you work so hard in training camp and try to build the right stuff to produce wins," Wilkins said on Monday. "But something else we do talk about here, is the process over the result. Obviously, you want to win. You expect to win every game, or else, there's no point of going out there. But, yeah, once you look at the tape and once you take a step back from it all, you can start to process those things a little bit. Even sometimes when you win, you don't play great. You don't play perfect. Obviously, that’s what you want, win and loss columns, but there are things to find. There are positives or lessons to learn from when, win, loss, or draw.”

As far as the fan experience went, Wilkins was quite pleased with the energy Raider Nation presented on Sunday, as the majority of fans at SoFi Stadium were there for the Silver and Black.

"I thought that was awesome, definitely just a lot of great energy," Wilkins said. "And again, obviously disappointing coming in a losing fashion, but I just thought the energy was great. And just my first game as a Taider was a fun one, and I'm always going to remember it for the rest of my life. So far, everything has been a lot of what I expected and even more, a lot of what I've heard from guys before I came here. Even like talking to Jenk [John Jenkins] and Adam Butler, they're like, 'Hey, it's like that,' who are my former teammates, just talking to them and kind of things that everyone talked about. I mean, you see it a little bit, so it's nice. I definitely will remember this game just being my first in a Raiders uniform.”

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