Raiders Open New Claim on L.A. Market

A Los Angeles federal judge has thrown out of court a contentious and long-playing lawsuit pitting the Oakland Raiders against the National Football League, significantly complicating Raider owner Al Davis’ chances of returning to Los Angeles.

In a ruling filed Tuesday and made public Wednesday, U.S. District Judge George H. King dismissed the suit, which included antitrust claims--and the threat of huge damages--linked to the team’s move back to Oakland before the 1995 season. “[King] showed them the back of his hand,” said Frank Rothman, the league’s chief attorney.

The Raiders, however, responded Wednesday by refiling the lawsuit in Los Angeles Superior Court, dropping the antitrust claims but reasserting Davis’ primary allegation--that the Raiders “own” the Los Angeles market.

The slam-bang legal developments mark the latest twists in a convoluted history of enmity-laced litigation between the team and the league. It also leaves unsettled Davis’ assertion that he owns the L.A. market--a critical issue because the league is scheduled in two weeks to consider awarding an expansion team, and Los Angeles is believed to be the leading candidate.

The Coliseum, backed by real estate heavyweights Ed Roski Jr. and Eli Broad, is seeking to attract the team; so is a bid from the South Bay city of Carson, led by former super-agent Michael Ovitz. Both are vying against Houston. NFL Commissioner Paul Tagliabue is expected Friday to tour the Carson site.

The league has indicated in recent weeks that it may award a team to Los Angeles but not immediately select owners or a particular site. Instead, it will try to form a committee of prominent area business leaders and politicians and form a financial plan for a new stadium.

If the Raiders had not charged ahead with the suit filed Wednesday, the path would have been clear for owners to award the league’s 32nd team to a Los Angeles-area candidate without the worry of having to settle up with Davis for millions of dollars.

With the dismissal of the federal suit, Davis--who in recent weeks has made it plain that he is unhappy in Oakland--has lost a measure of leverage it afforded him in dealing with the NFL over the Los Angeles market.

And it remains unclear whether the new lawsuit will fare any better than the one King dismissed.

In essence, the picture is just as muddied as ever. Which is why both sides claimed victory Wednesday.

“If Judge King gave the back of his hand to anybody, he gave it to the NFL. It’s the NFL that wanted [this case] in federal court. Not us,” Raiders’ attorney Laurence Hutt said.

The Raiders and the league have been at each other in court for years--first in a series of legendary battles (won by the Raiders) over the team’s move to Los Angeles, now over its move back north.

The Raiders moved to Los Angeles before the 1982 season. The team stayed for a dozen years, playing at the venerable Coliseum.

They went back north before the 1995 season after a deal unraveled that would have seen them move to a new stadium at Hollywood Park in Inglewood.

The Raiders say they own the Los Angeles market because they paid for it. To move, a team must pay an “offset”--a complicated formula involving the value of an expansion team in the new city minus the value of such a team in the old city. The Raiders made such a payment, in installments in 1980, 1990 and 1991. They say that gave them territorial rights.

The lawsuit before King was filed in August 1995 by the NFL. Among other things, the league alleged that the Raiders had breached the league’s revenue-sharing agreement.

In February 1997, the team filed an extensive countersuit. Among the claims was one that alleged that the league had violated antitrust laws by refusing to schedule the Raiders’ home games in Oakland in the 1994 season.

The significance of including an antitrust claim in a lawsuit is clear. Under federal law, damages in a successful antitrust suit--which not infrequently run into the millions of dollars--are multiplied by a factor of three.

The Jan. 17, 1994, Northridge earthquake caused extensive damage to the Coliseum. Nonetheless, the Raiders were able to play there that year.

It was partly because of the damage to the Coliseum, however, that Davis looked longingly at opportunities in Hollywood Park.

By the time of a hearing in November before King, the suit filled more than 30 volumes in the Los Angeles courthouse and included Davis’ claim that he owned the market here as well as an allegation that the league interfered with his Hollywood Park deal.

In the ruling he issued Tuesday, King said there was no merit to the Raiders’ antitrust claims. To prove that there was damage from the 1994 schedule, the Raiders would have had to shown that their “relevant market” was the Bay Area. This, he said, they could not do because, in 1994, they were still the Los Angeles Raiders.

King dismissed the other claims as well, but not on the merits--as the league erroneously claimed in a news release it issued late Wednesday.

Instead, King dismissed the other claims because they were not grounded in federal law and, as a federal judge, he had no obligation to hear them--leaving the Raiders free to run to state court.

Which they did, giving them the opportunity to lob yet another broadside. In a statement faxed Wednesday night to other NFL owners, the Raiders declared: “The NFL has for years attempted to delay and dodge this matter. They can no longer do that. They can run, but they can’t hide.”