Farewell, Oakland

I feel for Raiders fans in the bay area, it's a damn shame they are being ripped out of Oakland again, this time the state of California as a whole.

I know our two fan bases have certainly had, more we say "differences," over the years. There have been strong opinions of wether Franco caught that ball, or ice on the field during that particular AFC Championship game, but the rivalry has always been fun and exciting!

What these Raiders fans in California are being put through is terrible. For all Raiders fans reading this I quietly pulled for the Oakland Raiders this year to have one more good season of memories for the fans. Don't be offended for now moving towards hating the Las Vegas Raiders. Nothing against the Silver & Blacl for those choosing to stick with the team after the move, just a form of protest against taking the team away from Oakland, the Raiders true home.

 

The Raiders aren't alone, half the "legal" population would like to leave this horribly managed State, me included. At least I'm not living in one of the filthy urban areas and can easily get to State Line in 2 hours. The natural beauty of California is second to none; the welfare state mentality is ugly and crippling. I think the A's should follow the Raiders to LV.

 

I was in Vegas last month and drove right past the stadium. Looks like
it was on schedule. Something caught me off guard out there. SF
was the most popular NFL team in Vegas. Do any of you people that live out there
know if this is the case or was it just me?

 

Could

Two possible explanations: This is now home to a multitude of disgruntled NoCal transplants - OR - all other teams are more popular and their merchandise sold out leaving mainly SF stuff. Funny, though I was in Wallymart the other day getting some decoration stuff and there was a section of sports team ornaments and all they had were Niners and Warrior stuff - no Rams, Angels, Chargers, Dodgers, Lakers, Clippers, Kings, Ducks, USC or UCLA. Again not sure if all the LA based ornaments all sold out already or the merchandise ordering folks got their zip codes mixed up. I don't know many Niner or Warrior fans in SoCal.

 

Don't know about Vegas but the last few times I've visited the SF Bay Area the San Fran teams absolutely dominated in popularity, much more than the Oakland teams. All except the Warriors... who are moving to San Francisco!

 

Cali has trouble with it's teams. Chargers and now Raiders. I do feel for their fan base.

I was born and raised in Pittsburgh. I don't know how I'd feel if any of the 3 teams moved away. I just can't see myself rooting for the Las Vegas Steelers.

 

We came close there for a while with "Steelers West"!

 

No I wasn't talking about souvenir stuff, just fandom. I saw more SF fans than any other team, I was staying at the Mirage
and all the bars were full of football fans Sunday morning which is weird for me because I am
EST guy. I enjoyed the atmosphere of all these different fan bases. Of course I had my Steeler colors on and it was all good fun with people that love football like I do.

 

OK - 2 more possibilities: If this observation occurred this season, wonder how many Niner fans would have been strutting their gear if they were their normal 2-10 instead of 10-2 or whatever their record was when you were in LV? Other thing is by them relocating south 50 miles to Santa Clara, the heart of the Silicon Valley, they certainly now draw a very well heeled fan base (the type that likes to frequent Vegas and Monte Carlo), not that SF is shabby by any means economically speaking but the south peninsula is a filthy rich area. IDK. Maybe they're just scouting where their cross bay competition is heading.

 

I think maybe you nailed it there, Vegas was real busy the week I was there, a lot of disposable income was flowing. LOL