San Francisco at Las Vegas

If there's such a thing as a preseason rivalry, this is a good one as the Battle of the Bay takes place in Oakland this year. Raiders fans have not left this one happy on too many occasions. Since this series has started, eight games have been played with Oakland coming away with the cover just twice. We don't think things are going to change much here. There seems to be more emphasis on this game by the Niners, as they won just one preseason game last season and that was in this game. Even though it was only the second exhibition game, Mike Nolan had Alex Smith and Trent Dilfer play almost the entire game, piling up 26 points for the win. One important note here is the addition of new offensive coordinator Mike Martz for the Niners. Martz, known as an offensive wiz, came over in the offseason from the Lions. If you look at Detroit's offense in the preseason under Martz, they put up 27 points in game one a year ago and 20 in the opener the year before. We also don't think the Raiders, with their historically terrible team and many new cogs, should be favored in their first game out. We look for the San Francisco offense to show the Martz influence here, and continue their exhibition dominace over the Raiders.