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The Everlasting Mystique of the Las Vegas Raiders

Even in the midst of turmoil, there is still something special about the silver & black

There is something fascinating and interesting about the logo of the Las Vegas Raiders. It has been mostly unchanged since 1964, depicting a plunderer wearing an eyepatch with two crossed swords behind him. It is timeless and in a certain way depicts everything that the franchise is: hostile, unpredictable, and mysterious.

Today, the franchise has hit rough times, making the playoffs only twice since making the Super Bowl in 2002. Since then, the team relocated from Oakland to Las Vegas and their forward-thinking owner Al Davis passed away. Today, they are a team searching for their sixth head coach in a decade and have the sixth worst win-loss record in that time.

Despite all this turmoil, upheaval, and losing, the team still has a nationwide fan base and there is a mystique about them that other teams simply do not possess. The Raiders in many ways are a franchise that mirrors their name. They are looked down upon by others, in a realm that in a certain sense rejects them. They have rough edges that make them appealing. They are a dormant entity that has been toiling away in the shadows like all plunderers eventually do. And yet there is still a mystique, something inherently fascinating about this team that makes them iconic.

A History of Trailblazing

You can argue that the two most prominent figures in the history of the Raiders franchise have never worn the jersey or played a snap on the field. Al Davis and John Madden are institutions of football history, two men that are central to its growth even after their deaths.

Al Davis was a part of the Raiders organization when they were in the AFL and instituted a plan to compete with the NFL by poaching rival quarterbacks to join the league. This worked so well that eventually the two leagues merged and formed the Super Bowl era of football. While Davis had his issues with the merger (such as the Raiders having to pay an indemnity for establishing a team in the territory that was occupied by the San Francisco 49ers), he was nonetheless a huge part of it and is one of the architects of the modern NFL.

Once in the NFL, Davis proved to be one of the most hands-on owners in NFL history, as he also took on general manager duties of the franchise. Davis displayed an eye for talent and found tremendous success during the 1970s and 80s, where the team won Super Bowls and were a perennial power. He came to be known for his catchphrases and slogans like “commitment to excellence” and “just win baby.” He looked flashy when the cameras were on with his sunglasses and white tracksuits. This was a man who did not fall into the norm of what a football owner should look like.

More than the winning, the outfits, and the catchphrases, Davis should be remembered for being the first person to open doors for others in the NFL. Davis and the Raiders made history in coaching hires as the first team to hire a Latino and Black man as head coach of the franchise with Tom Flores in 1979 and Art Shell in 1989. He refused to play exhibition games in the sixties when it became clear that his Black players would be treated worse than white players, a moment of racial unity that was sadly too uncommon in those days. Davis would go on to draft Eldridge Dickey, the first Black quarterback to be drafted in the NFL (Dickey would eventually switch positions as a pro). Even in his later years he was an innovator, with the Raiders becoming the first team to hire a chief executive that was a woman (Amy Trask) in 1997.

With all the lawsuits and turmoil that surround the memory of Al Davis, his opening of doors for others should not be ignored. It was that unconventional thinking that led him to hire John Madden as the team’s head coach in 1969. Madden was 32 years old, and at the time was the youngest head coach ever hired in league history. Davis did what others would not: identify potential for greatness while not concerning himself with optics or what he was expected to do. It is a methodology that is seen today, with the Rams hiring of Sean McVay following a similar thought process.

Madden himself would go on to be one of the most iconic and impactful figures in NFL history. As the Raiders head coach for ten seasons, Madden won 76% of his games, which is still second highest all-time. He won a Super Bowl and never had a losing season, winning the AFC West in seven of his ten years there. And yet despite all that success, most will not remember Madden for his decade patrolling the sidelines as the head coach of the Raiders.

Madden, instead, is remembered for being a promoter, a great announcer who made liberal use of drawing on the screen to teach football, the face of football on Thanksgiving, and the name that any kid with a video game console associates with football. In the context of coaching, broadcasting, and being the face of a video game franchise, Madden has been an integral part of the football experience for five decades. And it all started as a Raider.

The Raiders have a long history of giving young coaches a chance, having hired two of the youngest coaches in NFL history (Madden, Kiffin)

Both Davis and Madden were trailblazers in their own way. Conversely, both men did not exactly fit the mold of their positions. Davis was loud and direct, in a time where team owners often faded to the background. The aura of someone like Jerry Jones today does not exist without the precedent of Al Davis before him. Madden coached in an era where men like Tom Landry, Don Shula, and Chuck Noll patrolled the sidelines. Both men were successful and unique, which has come to define the ethos of being a Raider. But much like the plundering namesake of the team, there is a restlessness that comes with conquest.

The Instability of the Raiders

“The Autumn Wind” is a poem and battle cry for the Raiders and their fans. It is a piece of media that is familiar to any football fan of a certain age and often delivers chills in its magnitude. The last stanza is especially captivating:

The Autumn Wind is a Raider,

Pillaging just for fun.

He'll knock you 'round and upside down,

And laugh when he's conquered and won.

In these four lines we see what the aura of the Raiders was at its peak. Hard-nosed, menacing, and victorious. The second line, “pillaging just for fun,” however, indicates that the Raider has no true home, that he is always searching for the next location to plunder. And in a strange way, that is what has become of the modern Raiders, a team that sometimes feels like it is without a true home.

Since the AFL merger, the Raiders have moved three times. From Oakland to Los Angeles in 1982, then back to Oakland in 1995, and most recently to Las Vegas in 2020. In that time span, they have moved more than any other franchise.

Of the three cities that the Raiders have called home, Oakland feels like the one that fits their identity the best. The Raiders in their great years were often defined by players that defy the conventional mold of the NFL. They never had a Johnny Unitas or Joe Montana figure. The legends of the Raiders are players like Jack Tatum, Gene Upshaw, and Howie Long. Even the more clean-cut players like Marcus Allen and Tim Brown seemed to have an edge to them that was not found on other teams.

That edge is an underdog energy that is pure Oakland. Los Angeles has some of that edge, so the move to the bigger city always made sense from that lens. But the shift to Vegas, which to many is a city of all glitz with little substance feels a bit awkward. This fit and the movement over the decades has colored the dysfunction of the team.

Since 2010, the team has hired and fired seven different coaches (not including interim coaches). They are the most unstable franchise in that time along with the New York Jets. The decade before that was defined by the declining ability of Al Davis to run his organization as he once did. The last quarter century, in retrospect, has been defined by the awkward end of a prolific figure and the difficult reality that his replacement will never be able to fill the seat that was vacated.

The man with the unenviable task of replacing Davis is his son, Mark. And try as he might, the younger Davis does not have the same sort of gravitas and pull that his father had. The team, in an effort to find its winning ways again, has brought in NFL legend Tom Brady as a part of its ownership group to restore the greatness of the silver and black.

The irony of course is that Brady as a player is linked to the Raiders thanks to controversy. The matchup between Oakland and New England in the 2001 Divisional matchup, better known as the Tuck Rule Game, was a moment that lives in infamy in Raider lore but also helped to springboard the Patriots dynasty that ruled the NFL for the next two decades.  It is expected that Brady will be a big part of the operation moving forward, a move that Davis is hoping will help him leave his imprint on the franchise.

The Raiders are a team in the last two decades that have been lost at sea and trying to find their way. They moved to Las Vegas into an arena that looks like the Death Star but still seems to be lacking in identity and knowledge of self. They have tried a variety of coaches from someone with a history of winning in the NFL (Jon Gruden) to a former player trying to instill toughness (Antonio Pierce). Despite all the turmoil, the Raiders still have one of the strongest fan bases in football, and that more than anything is the secret sauce of their mystique.

The Aura of Raider Nation

Color schemes in the NFL are often overlooked in an era of alternate uniforms and artistic interpretation of jersey design. But there are a few teams that have stayed true to their palette and subsequently what it symbolizes. The black and gold of the Steelers and the dark green and athletic gold of the Packers come to mind. But it is the Raiders that have the most iconic color combination of silver and black.

The colors are timeless, futuristic, and reflect intimidation. Even when the team is performing poorly, it is a uniform for their fans to wear proudly on game days. The Black Hole, the rowdy fan section at Raiders home games, has transferred to their new home in Las Vegas and despite the team’s struggles are still one of the rowdiest groups of fans that the NFL has to offer.

The Black Hole was designed as an intimidation factor, with the idea of all fans wearing black and giving the opposing teams a sense that they were in a literal black hole. In the stands on game days, Raiders fans are loud, decked out in face paint and menacing costumes. They are of course not the only fan base that does this, but it does feel different in the Black Hole versus other stadiums.

Formed in the mid-nineties, the Black Hole prides itself on being a welcoming community for Raider fans across the country, with local chapters in seventeen different states from California to New York. They pride themselves on being a collective of fans that span generations, genders, races, and ethnicities. It is an ethos that is reflective of the allure of the Raiders.

Raiders fans are sometimes viewed as the outcasts of the football world, and their history often reflects that. The fan base, as a result, has often embraced people that are trying to enjoy a football team to help guide them through the perils of life. At the teams’ home games you will see immigrants, people that have dealt with emotional hardship, and people that seek community. The welcoming nature is incredibly powerful and leads to the belief that this is more than simply just a football team.

That is the allure of the Raiders, and the core of their mystique. There is something about the jerseys, the stadium filled with fans wearing black. It is an aura that many other teams cannot replicate. The fact that Raider Nation and the Black Hole are still dedicated despite years of losing football is a testament to the community that the franchise has built in multiple cities.

Fan bases like the Raiders make the leagues they play in better when they are winning. There is simply an appeal to a team steeped in history and tradition doing well. The Raiders specifically feel different than other franchises in sports simply because they have the feeling of a movement, a counterculture vibe that transcends the hash marks. The allure is still there, and they have a diverse fan base that should be envied across sports. In these uncertain times, they are a story of togetherness through adversity that is inspiring to say the least.