Mark Davis To Modernize Raiders – Just Blog Baby (blog)

Oakland, California, is a throwback city. Always has been. Always will be. A blue-collar city, appearing as if frozen in the 70’s during an era when the Oakland Raiders rose to prominence. This is not to say Oakland is stuck in the past. Just a city dotted with reminders of those days and times when life moved at a different pace than today.

Much of what has helped to identify Oakland is closely tied to the Raiders. Al Davis created a team cast in the image of the city and fans for which the Raiders played. It was that mentality that crafted the infamous Raider Mystique and made the East Bay a second home for so many that spent Sundays watching the Silver and Black.

No matter how hard we try, time cannot be stopped. That is one train that never stops at the same station twice. Time only moves in one direction – forward.

In many ways the Al Davis era took the anachronistic nature of the city of Oakland to a literal level with the Raiders. Whereas the architecture and feel of Oakland is fresh from 1971, the inhabitants aren’t spinning 45s at night after driving home bumping their 8-tracks. However the Raiders were still being run almost the same way in 2011 as they were in 1971.

That is all changing

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