The Raiders’ thrilling 38-24 victory last Sunday at home over Buffalo drew a mere 54,759. (Oakland, designated as the home team, played Houston on 21 November at Mexico City, drawing 76,473.) In 2012, the last year with the open seats in the third tier of Mount Davis, the Raiders averaged 54,216, when they were 4-12. The Raiders are averaging 54,532 at the Coliseum – lower than last year’s average of 54,613, when the Raiders finished 7-9. The Golden State Warriors of the NBA announced Monday they have sold out 200 consecutive home games at the 19,596-seat Oracle Arena, which is literally next to the Coliseum.ĭespite having a winning team that is fun to watch, for a change, fans are hardly storming the gates. Stadium access via freeways and railways has long been regarded as superb.
The Raiders did not return several requests for comment from the Guardian about the short-term and long-term future of Mount Davis, tarped or untarped, and the Coliseum at large. Mark Davis, Al’s son and now the principal owner of the Raiders, would need to get 24 votes from the league’s 32 owners to move to Vegas – a sizable number. The NFL won’t hide that it would love to keep the Raiders in Oakland or the San Francisco Bay Area. Photograph: Thearon W Henderson/Getty Images Oakland’s Khalil Mack celebrates in the Black Hole after an interception return for a touchdown against Carolina last month. The Goth denizens of the Black Hole hold placards at home games that read “Las Vegas: if you build it, we won’t come.” You can’t really blame them: Las Vegas is 550 miles from the Coliseum, and the Raiders have been in Oakland for all but 13 of their 57 seasons. (Money would come from the Raiders, the casino magnate Sheldon Adelson and a hotel-room tax.) The Raiders have been looking elsewhere for a new stadium a $1.9bn domed, 65,000-seat stadium in Las Vegas has become the Raiders’ most viable option. The blackout rule was suspended last year, but the tarps have stayed on for Raiders’ games.
The Raiders tarped off the seats in 2013 to ensure that at least 85% of seats would be sold within 72 hours of kick-off, enabling their games to be telecast locally (after more than half of their home games between 19 were blacked out). The Coliseum, four sections of which is referred to as the Black Hole because creative fans wear dark-side black-and-silver costumes that often include face paint and plastic skulls, has as the result of the tarping the smallest seating capacity of an NFL stadium: 56,063. That expansion came to be known as Mount Davis, after the brash owner who died in 2011, because it loomed over the 50-year-old Oakland-Alameda County Coliseum like a enormous white elephant, undesirable to fans of the Raiders or the Oakland A’s, the baseball team.Įven though the Raiders have undergone a stunning turnaround this season, winning 10 of their first 12 games and closing in quickly on a play-off berth, the upper tier of Mount Davis will remain covered by black tarpaulins, by league rule, unless the Raiders host the AFC title game.