John Madden, who made his mark on NFL football as coach of the Oakland Raiders well before becoming a household TV analyst and video game maven, is unhappy with the team’s planned move to Las Vegas.
In a story published Wednesday on the East Bay Times website, Madden said moving the Raiders – again – “really bothers me.” The story was based on comments Madden made on the SerusXM program “Hall of Fame Radio.”
The move, OK’d by the NFL and set to happen upon completion of a new stadium in Las Vegas, is suppose to me made for the 2020 season. The team will play in Oakland in 2018 and is negotiating for a home field for 2019, possibly Levi’s Stadium in Santa Clara, home of the San Francisco 49ers.
Madden’s main beef is what he called “the finality of it.” Once the team is gone and the Coliseum, which has been the team’s home for decades – except when the Raiders played in Los Angeles at the old Coliseum there for most of the 1980s and early ’90s – is demolished, that’s it for NFL history in the East Bay.
“We don’t have a Hall of Fame, we don’t have a museum — there’s nothing to leave there,” Madden said in the SerusXM interview. “And maybe this is just me being oversensitive, but doggone it, if you’re going to go, that’s really tough, but leave us something. Leave us something here in Oakland, please.”
Want to re-live some of the pain? Here are related stories and images about the Raiders’ great skedaddle:
▪ Editorial: Raiders jilt Oakland, hit Las Vegas jackpot
▪ Ailene Voisin: Mark Davis makes his move, and Raiders fans should send him packing
▪ Fans mourn, rejoice as NFL backs moving Raiders to Las Vegas
▪ Raiders owner Mark Davis calls Vegas move 'bittersweet'
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