Oakland Raiders Demise: Understanding What the NFL is Missing

July 20, 2010   ·   noel ramos   ·   Jump to comments

"The NFL is a better league when the Raiders are good." - John Madden, former Raiders head coach .
 
It is not just the personal bias of a man who guided the renegade Raider teams of the 1970s but a sentiment shared by most affiliated with the NFL.
Like any film, it's only as good as the main antagonist. The Raiders are the NFL's bad boys, the renegades and misfits, the villains of football, and for nearly four decades the NFL's most successful franchise. Only in recent years have the Raiders fallen from their usual status as one of the NFL's elite. In that time the NFL, its fans, and more importantly its players have forgotten what the Oakland Raiders are.
Led by one of the game's greatest pioneers and one of professional sports' most revered and simultaneously hated figures, Al Davis, the Raiders were once the epitome of excellence. Since the Raiders' self-destruction in Super Bowl XXXVII, he has been chastised endlessly by the sports media and vilified by...

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