In the Las Vegas Raiders’ past two games, running back Josh Jacobs has produced the two most productive games of his NFL career.

Raiders quarterback Derek Carr has seen that kind of running from a teammate before.

“It’s something I saw in Marshawn (Lynch),” Carr said. “He was a very violent runner. And Josh has that same mentality, and when he does it like that and runs it like that, it’s up there with some of the best.”

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In Las Vegas’ 32-23 victory over the Denver Broncos on Oct. 2, Jacobs ran for 144 yards and two touchdowns on 28 carries and caught five passes for 31 yards. That eclipsed Jacobs’ previous career high of 132 rushing yards achieved in the final game of the 2021 season against the Los Angeles Chargers.

In the Raiders’ 30-29 loss to the Kansas City Chiefs on Oct. 10, Jacobs ran for 154 yards and one touchdown on 21 carries and caught five passes for 39 yards.

“He’s running extremely violent,” Carr said. “And not just the physicality, but his cuts are violent, his mentality is violent. You can see when he gets in the open field, we all know he can make people miss and stuff like that, but you’ve seen a couple of times in the last couple of weeks him eye the safety up and say, ‘OK, here I come.’ And he’s going to do it play after play after play, and more power to him. I’m glad he’s doing that and not me. I don’t know how he does it. It’s really impressive what he’s been able to do, but he’d be the first one to tell you how good of a job those guys up front are doing.”

Even though the Raiders had their open date last week, Jacobs enters Week 7 of the NFL season ranked third in the league in rushing. Jacobs has 490 yards and three touchdowns on 91 rushing attempts, behind the Cleveland Browns’ Nick Chubb and New York Giants’ Saquon Barkley, who have played in six games apiece.

Before his outburst in the past two games, Jacobs had 192 yards on 42 rushing attempts and seven receptions for 59 yards in Las Vegas’ first three games of the season.

“JJ’s just done a tremendous job with his opportunities,” Raiders coach Josh McDaniels said. “I think we had a few games there early in the season where we kind of were playing backwards. We lost control of the lead, and then once you lose control of the score, sometimes you lose control of being able to stay balanced as long as you would like, and certainly no team wants to do that, so there’ll be a tug of war on Sunday to try to get control of the score, and they’re going to be trying to do the same thing we’re doing so that we can hand him the ball and let him do his thing.

“He’s been tough to tackle, very durable. Obviously, he makes people miss in space, he finishes runs the right way and, so far, he’s taking care of the ball, so just a really good, complete back.”

The Raiders return from their break against the Houston Texans at 3:05 p.m. CDT Sunday at Allegiant Stadium in Las Vegas.

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Each team is coming off its bye and has won one game this season. For the Texans, the victory came their last time out on the field – a 13-6 triumph over the Jacksonville Jaguars on Oct. 9.

Jacobs joined the Raiders from Alabama as a first-round choice in the 2019 NFL Draft. A 1,000-yard rusher as a rookie, he repeated that feat in 2020, when he earned selection for the Pro Bowl. Last season, Jacobs’ output dropped to 872 yards on 217 rushing attempts, although he still ran for nine touchdowns and caught a career-high 54 passes.

In April, the Raiders declined to pick up their option for a fifth season on Jacobs’ contract. The option would have guaranteed Jacobs $8.034 million for the 2023 season. Now, he’s headed toward free agency at the end of the season.

Las Vegas general manager Dave Ziegler, who made the contract decision, praised Jacobs in a Friday interview.

“Josh has just been tremendous,” Ziegler said. “Josh is a football player in every sense of the word. He loves the process, he loves to practice, he loves to work out, he takes care of his body, he’s done an excellent job with ball security and he’s obviously running hard and playing physical, so it’s been a joy to watch him, watch his development and just see what type of football player he is, I would say, Monday through Saturday. And that’s oftentimes where the games are won is Monday through Saturday and the preparation that needs to go into it.”

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Mark Inabinett is a sports reporter for Alabama Media Group. Follow him on Twitter at @AMarkG1.