How Raiders Are Preparing for Daunting Cross-Country Trip

The Las Vegas Raiders must travel across the country once again to take on a tough opponent in the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. How do they approach that challenge?

Nov 17, 2024; Miami Gardens, Florida, USA; Las Vegas Raiders tight end Brock Bowers (89) celebrates a touchdown in the third quarter with teammates running back Ameer Abdullah (8) and wide receiver Tre Tucker (11) at Hard Rock Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Jim Rassol-Imagn Images / Jim Rassol-Imagn Images

The Las Vegas Raiders will travel to the other side of the country to face the Tampa Bay Buccaneers on Sunday. Many teams have struggled when traveling into a different time zone, as players' body clocks can sometimes be off when playing in a different time zone.

 "I mean, it's real," It's different when you play on the East because the two teams I played for was on the east coast, so didn't really feel it as much. But I did feel it we went to London, for example, or one year we played in Osaka. That hurt. Those were different, and it took a while for your body to get to it, to get adjusted. It was really uncomfortable. The sleep, my sleep mechanics was off. My routine was off. 

“So, that's why I asked the question you asked earlier: I really went into depth with our team. What's worked best for us? Like they like to come in after practice today on Friday, get their massages, get all their therapy, ice tub, and all that stuff, sleep in their bed, get up in the morning, and let's roll. That's fine. So, they sleep on the plane. We get up; we have our meetings, they go to bed. Hell, at seven o'clock on Sundays, our guys are up and rolling eating breakfast. So, a lot goes into it. I think every team is different, but for our team, that works best."

Pierce noted he and the players have figured out a travel routine that works best for them.

 "That's between me and the players, I'll be honest," Pierce said. "And to be honest, I know not all those games have gone our way, but I think we've got off to pretty fast starts and been very competitive on these East Coast games. Even going back to Baltimore early on when we did get a win. But in Miami, I felt we came out strong, and really, our guys like their routine. Monday through Friday, we speed up the week and the day, like today, we started at 6:30am. And we'll get in here tomorrow at seven, and we'll be on the first thing smoking and get out of here and we'll be at in Tampa by three o'clock. So, they like that schedule. That's something we talked about at length last year and continued this year.” 

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