Raider Irregulars Dealt Regular Rout in Denver, 30-14

Into this land that time forgot, at least during the football season, came the Raiders’ strike team, undefeated and untied until Monday night when they arrived here and got unMasqued.

Waiting was a crowd of 61,230, Replacementmania having succeeded Broncomania with a loss of only 16,000 purists. Waiting also were the lowly surrogate Denver Broncos, 10-point underdogs and beaten by 30 the week before, who turned around and embarrassed the Raiders, or Masqueraiders, 30-14.

How bad was it?

Raider quarterback Vince Evans, latest messiah-designate, threw an interception on his first pass that was run back 50 yards, and two more before the game was over.

He called it a “nightmare.”

The Broncos’ Joe Dudek, who has yet to make an active roster in peacetime, ran for 128 yards and a 5.6 average.

Denver rushed for a total of 204 against a Raider front seven that included stars Howie Long and Bill Pickel, another member of the 45-man roster, Jamie Kimmel, and four other players with National Football League experience.

“We just basically got our (rear ends) handed to us,” Long said.

The crowd was the biggest to watch one of these games by about 20,000 over the next largest. It was played in a din that suggested that maybe the locals haven’t even figured out there is a strike. You couldn’t be sure, until you checked out the banners, which combined a strike motif with the ABC-TV letters, in an effort to get on TV.

There were entries like:

“Howie Long vs. Broncos--A Brutal Comparison.”

And:

“Breaking Off Strike Talks--A Bad Call.”

And suggested in the press box:

“Any Body Can Play.”

There were others in the stands like “Elway, K-Mart Is Hiring,” and “We STILL Hate the Raiders,” so you knew these people did, indeed, have a clue about what they were gathered for.

What they got was an evening they’ll remember long after the strike is small print. Their undermanned warriors took a 14-0 lead. The Raiders caught up. The Broncos took a 17-14 lead just before halftime, kicking a field goal on fifth down. Really.

“We yelled and screamed,” Raider Coach Tom Flores said. “They (the officials) lined them up anyway. We approached them later. They said they reviewed it.”

Working the game was not a replacement crew but Fred Silva’s. Lots of regulars had a rough Monday.

In the second half, the Broncos just blew the Raiders away. The first two Raider possessions ended with an Evans interception and a fumble at the Denver 26 by tight end Ron Wheeler.

After that, the Broncos just crunched the Raiders underfoot. There was a 74-yard touchdown drive in 9 plays, 6 of them rushes, and an 87-yarder in 13 plays, with Dean May and Monte McGuire alternating at quarterback, 11 of them runs. After that, this Raider team was just part of the Broncos’ favorite lore.

If this was to be a hard night for the Raiders, they started finding it out early--say, when they boarded their charter flight. United Airlines, their carrier, apparently worried about security and its own union problems, didn’t board the squad at the terminal, but at an area across LAX near the United hangar.

Four security men with walkie-talkies traveled with the team.

“It was funny watching these guys on the plane,” said a man who flew with the Raiders. “They actually watch the safety film.

Waiting was the next-best thing to Broncomania. About 55,000 seats were sold and the Broncos also took the precaution of giving away 6,000 tickets to area high schools, previously unheard of in the National Football League. If attendance is a factor in determining which side is winning in this strike, a certain advantage goes to management that not only gets to announce the house but can paper it, too.

“Hey,” Bronco General Manager John Beake told the Denver Post, “we’re not insensitive to kids.”

The Raiders were bused into Mile High Stadium Monday afternoon at 3:30 to avoid any confrontations with pickets. Perhaps they were stale, but after forcing the Broncos into a third and 14 on the first Denver series, cornerback Rod Hill let Steve Watson beat him on a fly pattern to catch a 49-yard bomb from Ken Karcher. Perhaps Hill was just showing the form that got him waived in Dallas, Buffalo and Detroit.

That put the ball at the Raider 33. Four plays later, the Broncos scored when Dudek swept right end for eight yards and the touchdown.

Not long thereafter, the Broncos tipped a punt by Raider Vince Gamache and the kick knuckled to earth 15 yards downfield at the Raider 38. Four plays after that, Dudek swept left end for three yards and another score to make it 14-0.

Late in the period, Evans drove the Raiders 75 yards with a little help--OK, a lot of help--from the Bronco defense, which committed penalties for three of the first four Raider first downs on the drive. Thus launched, Evans ended it with a scrambling three-yard toss to tight end Mario Perry in the end zone.

The Broncos held the ball three plays and punted. Ricky Calhoun, a ninth-round pick by Detroit out of Cal State Fullerton whom the Lions cut in camp, busted this one 55 yards into the end zone and that game was about to be tied, 14-14.

Raider Notes

A fan fell 15 feet to the ground out of the south end zone seats after Nathan Poole’s touchdown in the fourth quarter. The fans was carried off on a stretcher and taken to a hospital. . . . Bronco veteran Steve Watson suffered six broken ribs after a hit by Raidersafety Eddie Anderson. . . . Bronco quarterback Ken Karcher suffered a dislocated finger on his right hand.