Raider memories: Heidi Game, Sea of Hands, Steel Curtain collapse and Hall of Famers
The Raiders have played some of football’s most memorable games with some of the sport’s greatest players and coaches in the East Bay — in the Coliseum.
You can hear John Facenda’s voiceover on NFL Films classics, “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.”
On Sunday against Jacksonville, Oakland the city and Oakland the fan base will bid an informal farewell. It will be the final game for the silver and black in a venue that has aged to the point that it is deemed the worst facility in the NFL.
The Raiders will head to Las Vegas for the 2020 season to compete in a $1.9 billion dollar venue. The memories will also go, but they’re rooted in Oakland.
Scores of old Raiders will be on hand Sunday, including original Raiders Tom Flores and Jim Otto. Two Raiders greats who will be missed will be Cliff Branch and Willie Brown, both of whom died unexpectedly in recent months.
“Cliff was such a surprise,” Flores said in a recent phone interview. “Shocked. Cliff was like a son to me. I coached him. I had to spank him, feed him, and I’d tell my wife Barb, ‘I have to adopt him!’
“It won’t be the same without Cliff and Willie.”
Hall of Fame Raiders who competed in Oakland include these familiar jersey numbers:
00 - Jim Otto: An original Raider and a Hall of Famer who dedicated every ounce of his body to the franchise.
12 - Ken Stabler: “Snake” cooly led the Raiders in their 1970s glory.
16 - George Blanda: Defied age to become the NFL’s all-time leading scorer.
21 - Cliff Branch: A jet at the end of a lot of Stabler touchdown strikes.
24 - Willie Brown: The consummate cover man, “Old Man Willie” landed in Hall of Fame.
25 - Fred Biletnikofff: Smooth routes, soft hands, Stickum and the Hall of Fame.
41 - Phil Villapiano: A padded-up linebacker who walked the walk and then talked about it.
63 - Gene Upshaw: A pulling guard who powered Oakland to two Super Bowl wins.
78 - Art Shell: As fine of a left tackle as the game has known, and twice a Raiders head coach.
83 - Ted Hendricks: Blocked kicks, made sacks and backed up his nickname of “Kick ‘em in the head, Ted.”
It happened in Oakland
A peek at memorable home games for the Raiders:
1967: Behind quarterback Daryle Lamonica and four George Blanda field goals, Oakland wins the AFL championship with a 40-7 beating of the Houston Oilers to move to 14-1 and into Super Bowl II against GreenBay.
1968: The Raiders win the infanous “Heidi Game,” though you had to be there to believe it, or even see it. It was a last-minute regular-season contest against the New York Jets in which outraged fans flooded the call center of NBC in New York, demanding to know why they didn’t see the final, frantic moments. The network switched to its regularly scheduled showing of the children’s classic, “Heidi.” The Jets won the rematch in the playoffs and then Super Bowl III.
1974: Oakland took down a dynasty in an AFC Division playoff, beating the two-time defending Super Bowl champion Miami Dolphins 28-26. Ken Stabler, while going down in the closing minutes, floated the winning touchdown pass to Clarence Davis, not known for his hands. The running back snatched the ball amid a sea of enemy hands.
1976: The Raiders won three signature games this season en route to their best year.
The first was a season-opening 31-28 victory over the two-time defending Super Bowl champion Pittsburgh Steelers, Oakland’s nemesis that decade. In a playoff game against the only team to beat the Raiders that fall, Oakland overcame a 21-10 fourth-quarter deficit to defeat the New England Patriots 24-21 on a late Stabler touchdown dive.
In the AFC Championship game, Oakland throttled Pittsburgh 24-7, leading to players tossing — or something like that — their 300-pound coach John Madden into the showers. Oakland then rolled Minnesota 32-14 in Super Bowl XI.
1980: In his second year as head coach, Tom Flores led the Raiders’ improbable march to Super Bowl XV as a wild-card entry, which included a playoff win over the Oilers, led by Stabler after an offseason trade. Houston native Lester Hayes punctuated the 27-7 victory with an interception return for a touchdown.
2002: Behind league MVP Rich Gannon at quarterback with the backdrop of the Black Hole, the Raiders beat Tennessee 41-24 in the AFC Championship, the last playoff victory for the franchise. This victory came a year after the brutal “Tuck Rule” game in New England that kickstarted the Patriots dynasty.