ROAD TRIP, RAIDER NATION?
Bay Area Raiders fans spent last season watching their departed team play in an empty stadium in Las Vegas because of the pandemic. Now that fans can travel again, will they flock to the desert for the opportunity to cheer on the ‘Silver and Black’ in person again?
Raiders fans in the Bay Area couldn’t do anything but watch from afar after their beloved “Silver and Black” packed its bags and moved to Las Vegas a year ago. No one could fully experience the impact of the Raiders’ move from Oakland to Las Vegas last season because of COVID-19. When the pandemic hit, Raiders owner Mark Davis opted to keep fans out of Allegiant Stadium for the entire season rather than play before much smaller, socially distanced crowds. Davis said he didn’t want to choose some fans over others in the stadium’s first year of existence. The Raiders’ first season away from the Bay Area essentially became a broadcast-only event.
Now the “Death Star” — the nickname for the Raiders’ new stadium — is fully operational. With no travel restrictions either, the question is: Will the Bay Area contingent of “Raider Nation” pack their bags and join the team in Sin City? At least, on game days?
The Raiders won’t announce specifics other than to say the stadium is completely sold out this season. A team spokesman said that 12 percent of fans who had season tickets in Oakland in 2019 purchased Personal Seat Licenses (ranging from $500 to $70,000).
The loyalty of Raider Nation obviously has been tested again, but the roots run deep. This is a fan base that welcomed the team back with open arms after the late Al Davis moved them to Los Angeles from 1982-94. The Raiders still averaged around 63,000 fans in their final season in Oakland.
“Family is family, and that’s what this is like to me,” said Phyllis Wright, better known as “Blitz Chick” around Coliseum tailgates as well as on social media. “For some of us, I think it’s imprinted in our DNA. You may try and turn your back on it, but something reaches out and brings you back.”
Marcellus Thomas, who grew up in Oakland and hosted “The Pillaging Podcast” from the Coliseum parking lot, expects fans to rally to watch their team in person, especially after not having had that opportunity a year ago.
“Are you really so bitter you’re not going to watch the games?” Thomas said. “I know people who said last year they wouldn’t watch. But if you called them in the fourth quarter, they could tell you what just happened.”
Many displaced fans are either saving up for a game or two in Las
Vegas or watching on television. And since not all Raiders games will be televised locally, they’ll be buying NFL Sunday Ticket or watching in sports bars.
“I’d love for them to still be here, I’d love for us to still be able to get up every Sunday and tailgate (at the Coliseum),” said Sam Diaz, a longtime Raiders fan from Morgan Hill. “It is what it is. It’s still the Raiders. We might only be able to see them once now, but I’m excited to go.”
Getting to Las Vegas from the Bay Area is a short and relatively inexpensive flight. But for some, the in-person experience that was so much a part of their life is challenging because of the cost of game tickets. The average Raiders ticket price, according to The Action Network, jumped 75 percent from $87.78 when the team played in Oakland — a bargain by NFL standards — to the most expensive ticket in the league at $153.47 in Las Vegas.
Lucas Osegeura and his father drove from Windsor each week to see the Raiders play at home. He’s still a loyal supporter, but he’ll now have to watch from afar.
“Seeing the Raiders play anywhere but Oakland hurts my soul, but I am sticking with them,” Oseguera said in an email. “I’m priced out of going to a game this year, which is terrible since I’ve been to every game since 1998.”
Wright said she is torn between seeing her team get the home she says it deserved and the financial reality that making eight home games in Las Vegas isn’t her most prudent use of funds.
“I’m 59 years old,” Wright said. “I can’t sit there and justify spending a quarter of my retirement for a PSL. I can’t justify that.”
Mark Carter, who grew up in East Oakland and attended Raiders games at the Coliseum from 1996 through 2019, purchased a Las Vegas PSL and called the new home “the reality of the unfamiliar.”
In an email, Carter said, “Transitioning to the stadium will be like dating again after breaking up from a long-term relationship. There will be a learning curve for sure; the seats, stadium, section, fans and corporate feel.”
One thing is certain: The move has been a bonanza for the Raiders. The franchise has never been worth more, going from an NFL weakling in terms of finances to the 26th most valuable franchise
“I’d love for them to still be here, I’d love for us to still be able to get up every Sunday and tailgate (at the Coliseum). It is what it is. It’s still the Raiders.”
in all of sports, according to Forbes Magazine.
“The first thing that comes to mind is it’s a business. It’s a business whether you’re a player, coach or fan. But I feel bad for the fans who scheduled their lives during the fall and winter around games,” said former Raiders tackle Langston Walker, who grew up in Oakland and went to Bishop O’Dowd High.
Las Vegas will be a popular destination for fans of other teams, and some are wondering how many season-ticket holders will sell their seats at a profit and dilute the impact of the home crowd that was so much a part of the Raiders experience in Oakland. Don’t even get Raiders diehards started about how their otherworldly tailgating and the legendary Black Hole in the south side of the Coliseum stands can never be replicated.
“It’s an attractive destination,” former Raiders CEO Amy Trask said of Las Vegas. “There will be a lot of fans there for the Raiders, no doubt, but a more significant percentage of visiting fans, so it’s no longer going to be entirely silver and black in that stadium.”
Thomas is curious enough to make the trip to Las Vegas on a game weekend even if he doesn’t have tickets. He’ll always pull for the Raiders, but can’t help feeling sentimental about the Oakland experience.
“The demographics were different than anywhere else,” Thomas said. “No matter your political differences, your racial differences, we all came together on Sunday. You’re a Raider fan, you’re family. It’s something I’ll hold near and dear to my heart until the day I die.”
— Sam Diaz