Raiders Welcome a Respite : Pro football: Even though they are on a roll, there are wounds to heal before playing the Chiefs.

In seven weeks, the Raiders have taken a two-game lead in the AFC West, shown that two tailbacks can be better than one, restored luster to a sagging image, retooled an erratic quarterback and made him the king of efficiency and shown the kind of consistency it takes to have scored 24 points in each of four consecutive games.

So, the Raiders are hot as an Al Davis rumor. They used to lead the league in penalties and fistfights. In Sunday’s victory over San Diego, they were penalized twice for nine yards. One of those was a white-collar mistake by Coach Art Shell, who blanked on a certain passage in the NFL rule book about the requirements of declaring tackles eligible.

The Raiders aren’t even dirty anymore.

“Our team is playing very hard and very clean,” Shell said.

The Raiders are firing on all cylinders and can’t wait until Sunday when they can take all this momentum and sink their teeth into . . . no one?

The Raiders have a week off, forcing the team to sit on its hands for two weeks until a showdown Nov. 4 with the Chiefs in Kansas City.

They way they’re playing, you’d think the Raiders would suit up tomorrow if they could, but Shell said the break is coming at the right time.

“On the one hand, you want to continue to play, because we’re doing all right,” he said. “But we’ve got some people hurting, and we need to get healthy. So it’s coming at a pretty good time. We can use it.”

Shell lost four more players to injuries Sunday. Left tackle Rory Graves strained his left foot, tight end Andy Parker pulled a hamstring, snapper Dan Turk suffered a knee strain and tackle Tim Rother injured a foot. Nothing earth-shaking, but serious enough stuff to welcome an extra week off.

The Raiders gambled and won when they activated defensive end Howie Long for the Charger game, instead of using the open date to allow Long another two weeks of rehabilitation. When Long broke his right foot against Seattle in Week 2, doctors estimated that he wouldn’t return before the Chief game Nov. 4.

“Howie played pretty good for the first time back,” Shell said. “He didn’t show any signs of the injury being a problem. He came out all right. That’s a big positive for us.”

Long, though, welcomes the respite.

“My foot’s not that well, and I’m not in shape,” he said after Sunday’s game. “The week off couldn’t come at a better time, as far as I’m concerned.”

The Raiders also have three injured players ready to come back: cornerback Garry Lewis, collarbone; tackle Bruce Wilkerson, knee; and tight end Mike Dyal, hamstring. All are eligible for removal from the injured-reserve list, and all can use an extra week to work out the kinks to play the Chiefs, who messed up what could have been a battle for first place by losing to Seattle on Sunday, 19-7.

Shell, new to the position of looking back over his shoulder at the competition, said he hasn’t paid much attention to the standings.

“The only thing I care about is what we’re doing,” he said. “Ultimately, we have to take care of ourselves. If you take care of your own, you don’t worry about what other people are doing. I’d be lying to you to say I don’t look to see what’s there. But if you get your hopes up for somebody else helping you, then you’re in trouble. You help yourself. The Raiders take care of themselves. Let the rest of them fall in line.”