Episode 225 - Raiders Move to Vegas Official

Before we get to the meat of today's podcast (recorded on an iPad while driving - Kids, we're professionals.  Don't try this at home.), we announce that Mike and Tim both have pending batsu games - Mike has 2 (League Cup Final and NCAA brackets), while Tim has 1 (Arsenal winning Champions League).  Mike's will come as soon as a new host can be found (we're still looking), while Tim's will be issued once he is able to return to the podcast.

On to the serious news: the Raiders have officially been approved to move from Oakland to Las Vegas.  The vote was 31-1 and, unlike last year's blatantly corrupt LA vote, not a secret ballot - Miami was the lone no vote with the most hypocritical explanation you can possibly imagine.

If you think this move was unavoidable, you haven't been paying attention.  Here are the facts:

• Oakland did - and continued to do - nothing but provide lip service to the NFL.
• The Oakland Coliseum, opened in 1966, is not in need of massive repairs AND has sewage issues.
• The political will to get publicly financed stadium projects done DOES NOT EXIST in California, as evidenced here and in San Diego, where the Chargers had been playing in the equally obsolete Jack Murphy Stadium (opened in 1967).
• The Chargers had a number of stadium plans over the past 16 years go down in flames, including one that was on the ballot in San Diego in November; the Raiders have been trying to get relief for about as long.
• Contrast that with St. Louis: the Dome at America's Center (as it's now officially called) opened in 1995(!!!) AND the city was able to come up with a viable plan in Peacock-Blitz in about 1 YEAR - yet the team refused to negotiate and later lied their way out of town, no thanks to a poorly written "top tier" clause in their lease on the Dome.
• With all of these considerations, the NFL's own LA committee voted 5-1 in favor of the Carson plan, which would have provided much needed relief to the Chargers and Raiders while taking into account the viable Peacock-Blitz plan in St. Louis.
• Instead, Jerry F. Jones and the NFL's front office - in collusion with Senor Stan and his butt monkey Demoff - rigged the process and went with the secret ballot.  To this day, we don't know who the two brave owners who said "no" to the final plan were.  The owners ignored their own committee in the most corrupt and dishonest way possible.  
• All of this happened without adequately addressing the issues the two California teams were still left to face, making the Chargers' decision to exercise their LA option in January and today's vote inevitable.
• As for Miami: owner Stephen Ross has to explain his rank hypocrisy for allowing St. Louis to lose its team yet pulling the "established communities" card to justify his no vote today.

As a result, THREE cities - St. Louis, San Diego, and Oakland - are now former NFL cities, while LA is unjustly given a second chance and Vegas - which, until the very recent announcement of the NHL expansion Vegas Golden Knights, had never been a major-league city - is finally welcomed to the party.  All because of California stadium politics intersecting with Wal-Mart greed.

Fair use: "Senor Stan" returns, and we'd like to share a message from Bernie Miklasz (one that Mike identifies with in spades) to the idiots, especially the pro-LA idiots: "Don't vote, don't drive, don't procreate - because you are impossibly stupid."



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