Millions watch the NFL, but only 32 people matter
The Oakland Raiders are moving to Las Vegas after NFL owners voted 31–1 in favour of the relocation.
Monday afternoon the NFL owners approved the Oakland Raiders’ move to Las Vegas. The 31–1 vote in favor of allowing the relocation of one of the league’s most storied franchises is a figurative fork in the eye to all fans who believe it could never happen to them and their team.
The move has apparently been on the cards for months — years, if one considers Mark Davis’s unswerving conviction to relocate ever since taking the team over from his late father in 2011. Too late, the city of Oakland tabled an alternative bid last Friday which reportedly would have given Davis and the Raiders everything they wanted. NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell scoffed at the plan, saying it “does not present a proposal that is clear and specific, actionable in a reasonable time frame, and free of major contingencies.”
Instead, the Raiders’ half-cocked Las Vegas relocation scheme got nearly unanimous support from NFL owners, giving the Oakland version of the Raiders franchise an obscure, terminal illness; one with a death sentence but where the rest of the details are hazy. The Raiders will play out the 2017 and 2018 seasons in Oakland while they await a $1.7 billion stadium in Las Vegas for the 2020 season. The plan for 2019? The league’s line is something along the lines of “we’ll cross that bridge when we come to it.”
To Goodell, the Vegas plan is far more clear and specific than Oakland’s; the fact that the team lacks a venue for the 2019 season apparently doesn’t constitute a major contingency.
The whole ordeal smacks of the total disregard for anyone other than the owners and anything other than the league’s bottom line which, incidentally, has characterized Goodell’s entire tenure as NFL commissioner. Davis and the Raiders will get a new stadium (more than a third of which is being funded by the taxpayers of Nevada), a new fan base, and the unique position as the best show in town in a city built upon weekend excursions where people happily throw money away. In a profit-driven league, it’s a dream move.
This is the third NFL relocation announcement in just 14 months, following the St. Louis Rams’ and San Diego Chargers’ moves to Los Angeles prior to the 2016 and 2017 seasons respectively.
While Davis and the Raiders will get everything they want in their new desert home, Oakland and the Raiders’ colourful and dedicated fans are the real losers in the deal. It’s the unfortunate reality of rooting for a franchise where, no matter how much time, passion, and money you put into it, the owners and the league are the only ones with any power.
The fans know this. That’s why Monday’s fan reaction was so muted. All the op-eds, letters to Davis, and various public showings of support in the months leading up to Monday had little effect. Instead, news of the lopsided vote elicited little more public outrage than some social media posts. Popular, real-world reaction amongst Raiders fans, by all accounts, was for them to collectively throw up their hands, utter a few expletives, and have a drink. It’s a reaction born of frustration and resignation, a reaction indicative of a powerless people with hopeless hopes.
The lip service Davis, Goodell and others in the NFL front office are giving Raiders’ fans and Oakland this week is laughable. “It is painful all the way around,” Goodell claimed on Monday, apparently forgetting that 31 of the 32 owners he works for just voted for the move. Davis addressed fan concerns by stating he will “try to explain to them what went into making this difficult decision.”
Raiders’ fans, one surmises, might ask Davis to stop right there. No explanation necessary; they understand.
They know it’s not what went into the decision, but what Davis and the NFL are getting out of it. The answer is money. Lots of it. Everything else, like the Raiders’ 2019 venue, is just minor detail.
