Oakland Exodus

By way of a 31-1 vote, the Oakland Raiders will be headed to Sin City to become the Las Vegas Raiders. This isn’t an article about relocation and the hypocrisy surrounding it. Lets talk about the sports scene in the city of Oakland. Fans in Oakland are known for their passion and fierce loyalty. They’re blue collar fans that work in a blue collar type of town.They’ve supported the Raiders through the highest of highs and some pitiful lows. When San Francisco and the rest of the Bay Area didn’t want to claim the Golden State Warriors, Oakland embraced them as their own. Now both teams are on their way out. How can this be? That’s just the way business is done. Money matters more than the fans.
By the year 2020, the city of Oakland will have lost two sports franchises and the other (the Athletics) attempted to leave once before. As we’re reminded time and time again, sports is a business. It’s only about family and community if the sports leagues are making enough money to stick around. Teams have moved before, but this latest relocation just feels dirty. There’s no team that historically matched their cities identity better than the Raiders. You couldn’t say Oakland without immediately thinking of the Raiders and vice versa. The fans in the Black Hole were a perfect visual for the Raiders connection with their fans. What happens to that once the Raiders are out of state? On the surface Las Vegas looks like a slam dunk of an NFL proposal, but did it have to be the Raiders? My heart broke for fans in St.Louis and San Diego, but this just seems more egregious. After all the Rams moved back to their historic home while the Chargers basically burned their fans into indifference. The Raiders were the heart and soul of the East Bay and the most popular team in California. This is just wrong, but the money makes it right in the eyes of the NFL.
The Warriors situation is a bit different as they’ll still market themselves as the team of the Bay Area. But even that is disrespectful to the fans in Oakland. When the Warriors stunk, the rest of the Bay Area wanted nothing to do with them until they were competitive again. During that time, Oakland provided one of the best home court advantages in the NBA. But of course, the grass is always greener on the other side. The Warriors will be moving to the other side of the Bay in a few years. The same side of the Bay that didn’t really care about them when the team was a bad as the old Clippers.
The only thing left for Oakland fans now are the A’s; a team that would be in San Jose if not for the the San Francisco Giants. However, lately it seems like the they’ve committed to Oakland for the long term. Now that the city is down two teams, maybe they can get the new stadium they need to stick around. I hope they do find a solution because Oakland fans deserve at least some loyalty for their years of fandom.
Here’s some other articles regarding NFL Relocation:
The NFL’s Stadium Hustle May Be Ending
Hopefully we won’t see anymore business decisions stripping teams from their fans.