Raiders Defeat Error-Plagued Broncos, 37-12, Sunday, Improve To 6-3 With Third Straight Win
By Alan Snel of LVSportsBiz.com
It was not a game of beauty, but in the Raiders has an impressive win on the scoreboard.
Las Vegas Raiders 37 Denver Broncos 12
The Raiders stay in Las Vegas and will host the defending world champion Kansas City Chief for a prime time Sunday Night Football game next Sunday at 5:20 PM at Allegiant Stadium.
The Raiders’ Josh Jacobs had a big game, running for 112 yards and scoring two touchdowns. Here’s his first score. In fact, the Raiders ran 41 times for 203 yards, taking the pressure off quarterback Derek Carr.
Meanwhile, the Raiders defense recorded four interceptions against Broncos quarterback Drew Lock, including two picks by Raiders safety Jeff Heath.
Jeff Heath started it off. Jeff Heath made some big plays. He’s not playing 100 percent, but he’s getting close to it. I think he got the fire started. He got some good overall play by a lot of guys on defense. [Defensive Coordinator] Paul Gunther and his staff have tweaked the defense the last few weeks and we were opportunistic. [Carl] Nassib on his own blitz got an interception. I thought we did a great job stripping the ball. We need to create more turnover from fumbles and again we ran the football extremely well and that’s the recipe we’re looking for here. — Raiders coach Jon Gruden
It’s all about the stadium.
The Denver Broncos are visiting Las Vegas to play the Raiders at 1 p.m. Sunday, and this harmonic convergence of the Orange Crush Broncos and the Silver & Black in Vegas brings me back to the days in Denver when former owner Pat Bowlen in 1998 wanted a publicly-subsidized stadium to replace good ol’ Mile High Stadium.
My first newspaper stories on the topic of publicly-funded sports venues came in Denver, which had a six-county metro area use a sales tax increase to raise money in the 1990s to build the Colorado Rockies’ Coors Field in LoDo. Bowlen wanted a new football stadium to replace Mile High, the stadium off I-25 that had the steepest stands I’ve ever seen in a football stadium. He proposal to the Colorado Legislature: keep the Coors Field sales tax going to also pay for a new football stadium next-door to Mile High Stadium in the big parking lot.
While Broncos’ stadium off I-25 was built with public dollars, so was the Raiders’ palatial new stadium off I-15 across from the Strip in Las Vegas. Denver and five surrounding counties formed a tax district that imposed a sales tax and collected sale tax revenues across six counties. In Las Vegas, the public is on the hook for $750 million that will be paid for by a hotel room tax increase at hotels across Clark County.
When the Raiders wanted stadium public funding in Southern Nevada, opponents argued that the NFL is the richest sports league in the USA in no need of public subsidies for their member teams and the clubs’ revenue-generating new stadiums.
The argument against public funding of NFL stadium was the same back in the 1990s when the Broncos wanted the public to give them as much as $265 million toward a $320 million stadium. Check one of my old Denver Post stories on the topic.
The Raiders’ $2 billion stadium project includes $1.4 billion for the actual actual construction of the 65,000-seat, domed venue. The public contribution of $750 million is a record subsidy for an NFL stadium.
Old Mile High Stadium opened in 1948 as an all-purpose stadium. It served as the Broncos’ home from 1960-2000 before the stadium closed in 2001 and Empower Stadium at Mile High became the new home for the Broncos. Old Mile High Stadium was demolished in April 2002.
I did not see any Raiders players taking a knee during a videotape playing of the national anthem. I counted about eight Broncos players taking a knee.
Coca-Cola activation. Raiders showing a social media page on the big scoreboard with Raiders fans. It was called the Coca-Cola Social Board.
After one quarter, Raiders lead Broncos, 7-3.
No fans in the building. But Raiders stadium still showing billboard features that are sponsored by their corporate partners. Cox Communications sponsors the fantasy sports statistics on the jumbotron at Allegiant Stadium.
Raiders safety Jeff Heath snagged his second interception of the first half and the Raiders lead Denver, 10-6, at halftime.
After three quarters, Raiders lead Denver, 20-6.
During a penalty announcement, the ref referred to the Raiders as the Oakland Raiders before correcting himself and announcing Las Vegas Raiders. It won’t be the last time.
Some great stadium DJ work by Jake Wagner, who also handles the music assignment at T-Mobile Arena for Vegas Golden Knights hockey games. One of his highlight tunes was playing John Denver’s “Country Road” as a final serenade to the Broncos.
