Bye Area

It Was the Pro Sports Capital of America. Now It’s Been Wiped Off the Map.
Oakland was titletown in the 1970s, as the A’s, Raiders and Warriors delivered championships in five straight years. Now, in the same span of time, all three have abandoned the city they once called home.

OAKLAND, Calif.—It was another NFL Sunday at what was once the most famous sports bar in the country, and upon first glance it was like nothing had changed.



A souped-up Escalade adorned with Raiders decals and flags was parked outside. By the entrance, a man wearing a faded Raiders apron was tossing racks of ribs onto a ripping-hot grill. Patrons clad in silver and black packed the tables inside, just as they had for decades.



Here, within these walls, the Raiders still belonged to Oakland.



“They say, ‘I’m not a Raiders fan anymore,’” said Ramonn Smith, the new owner of Rickey’s, an East Bay institution since 1946. “But they’ll still come watch the game.”



A generation ago, Oakland was the center of the American sports universe, a community of just over 400,000 people where champions were made and superstars were born.



A franchise from “The Town”—locals will tell you that San Francisco is the city—won a title in five straight years in the 1970s: baseball’s Athletics in ‘72, ‘73 and ‘74, the NBA’s Warriors in ‘75 and the Raiders in ‘76. All three teams played steps apart at two venues surrounded by parking lots and a BART station on 120 acres just off of Interstate 880.
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