Once again the national media has decided to ridicule our Oakland Raiders. The Raiders have the worst roster in the NFL, Matt Flynn is terrible, a new stadium in Oakland will never happen, and Raider fans are a bunch of thugs. This is nothing new to Raiders fans as we have been the pariah of American football ever since Al Davis took over the team in the early 60’s. You have to have thick skin to be a member of the Raider Nation. We have spent the last decade in a Barret Robbins induced hangover. Every year we have pinned our hopes on a new savior: Kerry Collins, Aaron Brooks, Randy Moss, Robert Gallery, Deangelo Hall, JaMarcus Russell, Darren McFragile, and Carson Palmer. Despite all the losing we continue to be the loudest and proudest fans in the NFL and arguably the entire world. Yeah, soccer hooligans will try and claim they are the best fans but I doubt they would last one minute in the black hole. For the Raiders fans in the bay area, we have to deal with the San Francisco media bias and the sea of bandwagon fans called the niner nation, errrr the empire,…….no the “faithful”. For as long as I can remember, the Raiders have played second fiddle to the 49ers in the bay area. Yeah we lost some fans to the 49ers when Al Davis moved the team to Los Angeles, but the media still treats the Raiders as a second class team. As we all know, it was because of Al Davis that the DeBartlo’s bought the 49ers and Bill Walsh cited Al Davis as one of his mentors. Now that the 49ers have returned to legitimacy, the aforementioned “faithful” have come out in droves. Everywhere you look, 49ers fans are rocking their new Kaepernick t-shirt jersey that was purchased at the local gas station. We continue to hear the “whose got it better than us” chants (Jim’s brother?) and their “quest for six” mantra. Well, good job your team is winning now but where were you before? No matter if we are 4-12 or 12-4, the Raider nation will stand by their team. We will listen to Greg Papa on the radio, desperately waiting for “Touchdown Raiiiiiiiders” to blast through our radios. We will scour the internet to find any information on our new draft picks and free agent pickups. Hell, we will show up in the thousands to away games sporting the silver and black even if we know we will probably lose. Everyone knows that the Raiders play nine home games every year, eight in Oakland and one in San Diego. No matter what the statistics show, Raiders fans will be always be associated with being criminals and thugs. If you go to a Raiders game you will see black, brown, white, and yellow all joining together as a family during Raiders games. As a season ticket holder last season, I did not see one fight break out between any fans. We might have tattoos and get drunk, but we are far from being the most violent fans in the NFL. We have famous members of the Raider Nation from all spectrums of society: from Ice Cube to Tiger Woods and even World Cup hero Landon Donovan. A few weeks ago I interviewed Landon Donovan after the California Clasico. I asked Donovan what he expected from the Oakland Raiders this year, in a classic Raider Nation response he said “I expect the Raiders to make a Super Bowl run.” In our hearts we all feel the same way as Donovan, but in our heads we know that even though we might not win the Super Bowl this year, we will definitely be better than what pundits say. With C-Wood back in black, how can we not become a better team? So keep up the negativity, we are the Raider Nation we wouldn’t expect it any other way.
Posted on: Mon, 05 Aug 2013 04:20:30 +0000
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