Los Angeles Turns Tables on Raiders, Abandons Them

The Raiders have lost Los Angeles.

That’s not an easy thing to do, Los Angeles being a big town that pretty much stays in place, except during earthquakes.

But the Raiders have done it, they’ve lost their city. Maybe it will turn up before the end of the season, maybe Los Angeles will show up back at the Coliseum some Sunday morning, scratching at the back door, begging to be let back in.

Then again, maybe it’s gone for good, run off with another dream.

This is an embarrassing irony for a team in a habit of leaving cities, to have the tables turned like this.

But check it out. The Raiders can’t draw fans, in the seats or in front of the televisions.

Sunday there were 40,000 fans at the Coliseum enjoying as peaceful and tranquil an afternoon as you’ll see at a National Football League game. Your in-laws will make more noise in your living room on Thanksgiving Day.

On several occasions, the roar of the Coliseum crowd was drowned out by the din of aphids munching petals in the Exposition Park rose garden.

If the Raiders could have harnessed the electricity generated by the fans, Coach Mike Shanahan might have been able to blow-dry his hair after the game. Instead he merely pulled it out.

The intensity of the crowd picked up near the end of the game, a 12-6 loss to the Atlanta Falcons. There was some very sincere booing, and the cretins who traditionally hang over the Coliseum tunnel and drool down on the players as they run off the field of valor were quite vocal and unsympathetic to the local lads.

But make no mistake: Somewhere along the line, the Raiders have lost the hearts and minds and wallets of the city of Angels.

Even the L.A. Clippers are generating more excitement these days, with their palace revolt against the tyrannical Gene Shue.

It’s a shame. The Raiders are tied for first place in their division, yet the fans seem to demand more. Like maybe a touchdown every month or so.

The Raiders have tried to copy the Dodgers’ formula, winning public sympathy with a light-hitting offense, but it hasn’t worked.

The team has lost its grasp on the city.

“We just couldn’t get the fire,” said Raider defensive end Greg Townsend. “It’s like the fire was out today. We’re supposed to beat a team like Atlanta. We knew in the second quarter both teams (division co-leaders Denver and Seattle) lost. If that didn’t fire us up, I don’t know what could.”

Townsend painted a poetic word picture of an ugly ballgame.

“Those (Atlanta) guys are just big slugs, we just wallowed with ‘em. We shoulda played our game. We let ‘em push us around, we shoulda been shuckin’ ‘em, getting to the ballcarrier.”

Normally, an NFL defensive squad that gives up 12 points is in line for a bonus and a party. But when your offense has gone on vacation, only a shutout will do.

If any group earned the right Sunday to refer to itself as wallowing slugs, it was the Raiders’ offense.

Early in the second quarter the Raiders had a second-and-1 at the Falcon 30. The next two plays were runs by Marcus Allen and Bo Jackson. Each play gained zero yards.

That is astounding.

Bo explained the sluggish Raider offense about as eloquently as anybody.

“I ain’t got nothing to say,” Jackson said as he cut around this reporter and out the locker-room door, breaking to daylight.

Despite gaining just 25 yards in 9 carries, Bo did get out of his uniform after the game without pulling a groin muscle, as he did the previous week. So all the Raider news this dreary Sunday wasn’t bad.

But despite the sunshine, it was a strange and depressing day for the silver and black. The few fans who did show up at the Coliseum waited and waited, almost reverently, as if anticipating some kind of harmonic convergence.

The Raiders continue to battle for a playoff berth, but nobody is sure why they bother.

The team that once threatened to take the city away from the Rams, to win the affection and loyalty of the struggling masses from Bel-Air to Willowbrook, has lost its city.

Maybe it’s the planned departure of the Raiders to Irwindale or Algiers that has cooled the local fans. Maybe the recent glorious successes of the Lakers, Dodgers and Trojans have made it harder to impress Mr. and Ms. Los Angeles Fan.

It’s a tough city. Mediocre and dull don’t cut it, even if your mediocrity and dullness put you at the top of your division.

All hope is not lost. Maybe the Raiders will all learn their playbook and suddenly start lining up in the correct formation most of the time, which they didn’t do Sunday.

Maybe they’ll catch fire, or at least register a pulse.

But if they do, will they ever find the city they’ve lost?

What can Al Davis do? Have a LAPD sketch artist draw a composite of 1 million missing fans?

Long after Sunday’s game, Davis slipped into the back seat of his silver-and-black stretch limo. It cruised slowly away from the Coliseum, out into the night, in search of a lost city.

It’s out there somewhere, Al.