The Raiders, Alameda County and the city of Oakland filed
suit against the NFL in federal court Thursday for $200M in
damages for what they said were "antitrust and contract
offenses," according to the OAKLAND TRIBUNE. Robert Salladay
writes the lawsuit "appears" to be in retaliation for an NFL
lawsuit filed against the Raiders, Alameda County and Oakland for
not sharing certain revenues with the league (OAKLAND TRIBUNE,
10/6).
FROM THE HORSE'S MOUTH: A statement from Raiders attorney
Joseph Alioto states the suit against the NFL and "16 of its
members" charges "antitrust and contractual offenses." It claims
the NFL blocked the relocation of the Raiders back to Oakland
after '94, and that the NFL is "attempting to exact" millions of
dollars from Oakland and the Raiders as a result of the
relocation. The suit goes on the charge NFL executives with
"negligent mismanagement" of NFL Properties which resulted in
"enormous embezzlements" by its employees and "negligent
mismanagement" of the World Football League which was
"discontinued" after huge losses to NFL owners. Oakland Mayor
Elihu Harris quoted in the statement: "The NFL blocked the
Raiders from moving to Oakland to the community's considerable
damage." Alioto on this suit as compared to Davis' last court
battle with the NFL: "We'll beat them again, as badly as we beat
them then" (Law Offices of Joseph L. Alioto).
TROUBLE AT HOME: As the Raiders face the prospect of a non-
sellout this Sunday, Barry Witt reports in this morning's SAN
JOSE MERCURY NEWS that "real dollar totals show that the Oakland
Football Marketing Association has hit only 52% of possible
revenue numbers for seats sold." The city and Alameda County
must sell 80% of season ticket packages in each section to avoid
a taxpayer loss. Through Wednesday, only 35,763 of 65,000 total
seats in the Coliseum had been sold. An anonymous county
official told the MERCURY NEWS: "Is it the marketing that's so
bad, or is it that the product is so overpriced you can't sell
them?" In addition to the possibility not enough tickets will be
sold to cover public obligations, revenue guarantees for
preseason games could cost the county an additional $2.2M.
Thousands of tickets were given away to help fill the stands for
the two preseason games, cutting revenues from the $3.8M
guarantee to just $1.6M (SAN JOSE MERCURY NEWS, 10/6).
