Las Vegas Raiders

In their nearly 65 years in professional football, the Raiders have played in three different cities: Oakland (two separate stints), Los Angeles, and Las Vegas. The team moved to Las Vegas in 2020 following years (or decades) of financial difficulties exacerbated by their inability to build a new stadium in Oakland beyond the aging Oakland Coliseum that they shared with the Oakland Athletics of MLB. Vegas was desperate to attract an NFL team to complement the NCAA college games it was already hosting at its sparkling new Allegiant Stadium and the offer proved just too good to turn down. It was a bitter pill to swallow for the many die-hard fans of the Oakland Raiders who had followed the team through thick and thin over the years, sporting the Raiders distinctive logo (a pirate with an eye-patch wearing a football helmet) and colors (Silver and Black). The new bosses in Las Vegas were savvy enough businessmen to hold onto a good thing when they saw it, and so the team’s name was maintained after the move along with its iconic pirate logo and colors. The Raiders had once been one of the strongest teams in the NFL during the two decades following the AFL-NFL merger of 1970. They were perennial playoff contenders, losing four AFC Championships in five years, first to the Baltimore Colts followed by their bitter rivals the Miami Dolphins and Pittsburgh Steelers (twice). The Raiders finally got their own back in 1976, not only downing the loathed Steelers but going on to defeat the Minnesota Vikings 32-14 to win Super Bowl XI. Oakland would repeat the feat in 1980 at Super Bowl XV over the Philadelphia Eagles in a 27-10 victory, but it was not enough to help them conquer their financial problems, and the team still moved to Los Angeles two years later. There, they added another Super Bowl to their trophy cabinet in 1983 when they demolished the Washington Redskins (now the Washington Commanders) 38-9. The Raiders gave it one more good go after they returned to Oakland in 1995, pushing through to Super Bowl XXXVII in 2002, where they lost to a talented Tampa Bay Buccaneers team. After that, the team only made the playoffs once in the years leading up to their relocation to Vegas in 2020. Only time will tell whether this roll of the dice will pay off for the Raiders on the field in the future.