The Making of a Rivalry : Pro football: Raiders vs. Rams would seem to be a natural, and someday it might be.

Mention Lakers vs. Celtics and the images flow: from Frank Selvy’s missed jump shot to Gerald Henderson’s clutch steal, from Magic Johnson’s baby hook to Larry Bird’s deadly three-pointers.

That is a rivalry.

So is Dodgers-Giants: from Bobby Thomson cracking that unforgettable home run to Juan Marichal cracking John Roseboro over the head with a bat, from Willie Mays’ basket catches to Sandy Koufax’s blazing fastballs.

UCLA-USC is one of college football’s great rivalries: from O.J. Simpson’s runs to Gary Beban’s clutch throws, from Red Sanders to John McKay.

Raiders-Rams?

It hardly stimulates the mind. Or the blood.

It’s not that they haven’t played. Tonight’s exhibition game is the 10th between the two, with the Rams holding a 5-4 edge.

The teams also have played seven regular-season games, the Raiders having won five.

But all of the exhibitions and three regular-season games were played while the Raiders still called Oakland home.

Since the Raiders’ move to Los Angeles, they have played the Rams in 1982, ‘85, ’88 and ‘91, with the Raiders winning three of the four meetings, including last year’s 20-17 victory.

The teams have never been in the same conference, never met in the postseason and have avoided each other in the preseason for more than a decade because they were bitterly facing each other in a different kind of rivalry--in a courtroom.

Raider quarterback Jay Schroeder, who played his high school and college ball in Los Angeles, doesn’t see this as a big intercity rivalry.

“No, it definitely isn’t,” he said. “We face them about once every four years. It’s nice because of the travel, but an exhibition game is an exhibition game.

“This is not like facing the Chargers, somebody we already don’t like because they’re in our division. Here, we can just go in and get our work done.”

Once upon a time, the Raiders did have an archrival outside their division--the San Francisco 49ers.

That was in the days when the Raiders were in the upstart American Football League, a league the established NFL snubbed its nose at.

All the elements of a rivalry were there: old NFL vs. young AFL, blue-collar Oakland vs. cosmopolitan San Francisco, wide-open, bombs-away football vs. the conservative, more defensive-minded brand.

When the Raiders and 49ers first met in a 1967 exhibition, they couldn’t decide where to play. So they were going to flip a coin.

But they couldn’t even decide where to flip the coin.

They compromised by meeting on the bridge that links the two cities for the coin toss.

When the Raiders came to Los Angeles in 1982, lawsuits came along. Because an issue was whether the Raiders had illegally invaded Ram territory, there was no way the clubs were going to meet on the field.

“They were suing us,” Ram executive vice president John Shaw said. “They were suing the league. They were suing Georgia (Frontiere, Ram owner) personally. That made it difficult.

“Since then, there’s been contact on both sides, but there have been a lot of difficulties in the scheduling. There have been baseball conflicts and all those things that go into it. It was just never really pursued aggressively, I guess.”

Tom Flores and John Robinson, coaches of the Raiders and Rams for much of the ‘80s, discussed playing each other, but nothing ever came of it.

Finally, Shaw ran the idea of an exhibition between the two teams past Frontiere. She agreed and told him to speak with Raider owner Al Davis.

“Let’s do it,” Davis said.

But will they do it every year?

“There’s a natural rivalry . . . I really think,” Shaw said. “It’s something the fans of this area would be interested in seeing often.

“There’s an understanding that, barring a serious conflict in scheduling involving baseball, the renovation of the Coliseum or whatever, we’ll try to get together next year up there (at the Coliseum). . . . I think both sides would like to play it, but I’m not giving any guarantees.”

Raider executive assistant Al LoCasale sees a good reason to keep the rivalry going.

“We don’t have anywhere to go beyond the 49ers that isn’t an extensive trip,” he said. “You start to look at the transportation costs, and you don’t want to play teams in the AFC West if you can avoid it. We already see them two times a year.”

Ram quarterback Jim Everett would like to go even further with the Raiders.

“I’d like to see us go so far as to do the realignment thing and have them in our conference,” he said. “I think that’s the way it should be with two teams in the same area. It could be a hell of a rivalry.”

But, Everett acknowledges, that’s not the way it is right now.

“This is just another team in our way,” he said of tonight’s game, “that happens to be wearing black and lives across the street.”

Raider defensive lineman Bob Golic sees it much the same way.

“It’s the L.A. Raiders against the Anaheim Rams,” he said. “The distance does make a difference. Where we are in the South Bay, you don’t run into a lot of Ram fans. You don’t really run into them until Long Beach. So this is not for the city championship. No, nothing like that.

“But what we are going to do is dress in our uniforms and then ride down there on buses to get the feeling of an intercity rivalry.”

Times staff writer Tim Kawakami contributed to this story.