Black And Silver Blues

The king is dead. Long live the king. In this permutation, the king in question is Al Davis, owner of the Oakland Raiders. He was the craggy old face of that franchise from its inception, first as general manager, then owner. His football credentials were solid, having coached in both the college and pro ranks before moving into the front office to stay. Or at least that was what we all might have expected. Al Davis never really gave up coaching. Unlike so many other owners of sports teams, he was unwilling to simply sit idly by in his luxury box, grinning or wincing in response to the action on the field. For better or worse, Al took an active interest in his team. Sometimes that meant threatening to move from one city to another. Sometimes it meant inserting himself in contract negotiations with players. Sometimes it meant drawing up plays that he wanted to see. Sometimes all this "help" got in the way of the coaching staff that he had hired to carry off his simple edict: "Just win, baby."
It was easy for me to hate Al. He was the enemy. As a Denver Broncos fan, born and raised, there were few sights that would get my hackles up faster than the mere sight of Al's slicked back hair atop his silver and black track suit. He seemed to revel in the reputation his teams generated: rebellious and tough, sometimes to a fault. He took chances on players that no one else seemed to want. He helped himself to the last few years of character issues like Lyle Alzado and Bill Romanowski. Bad boys just seemed to find a place on the Raiders' roster.
All of that was fine through the later part of the last century. Al won three Super Bowls, and he seemed close to getting another one when Tom Brady helped define a rule that had may not have existed before that night in Foxboro. Somehow, it was almost fitting that a team that had made a practice out of breaking rules were undone by one that had been hanging around waiting for someone to run into it.
After that, the fortunes of the silver and black went precipitously south. The "commitment to excellence" Al trumpeted all those years became a sad reminder of a once proud franchise. It got bad enough that there were plenty of die-hard Raider fans who wished that the head Raider would just go away so that the team could find its winning ways. It got bad enough that when the Broncos beat the Raiders, I actually felt a little bad.
A little. Now I feel more than a little sad. Al is gone and so is the anchor for all that antagonism over the years. Hating the Raiders will be a little bit harder from now on. And that will be a little less fun. Aloha, Al. Thanks for the memories.