INVADERS TRIVIA
--
The Invaders name was almost certainly chosen in an effort to capitalize on another pro football team that had recently left the area - the NFL's Oakland Raiders.
--
The Raiders, who were part of another league that challenged the NFL, attempted to move to Los Angeles as early as 1979.
--
The Raiders were rebuffed however by NFL owners, who under their constitute had to ratify such a move.  They didn't, and Raiders managing general partner Al Davis filed an anti-trust suit in response.
--
Like the USFL would in 1986, Davis would win his anti-trust case, ultimately moving his Raiders to L.A. in 1982.
--
The ruling in the case would essentially end any control pro sports leagues had over franchise relocation, and the NFL subsequently suffered a number of team relocations over the next twenty years.

In an effort to try to lure Major League Baseball to the opposite side of San Francisco Bay, and in the realization that the AFL and its Oakland Raiders weren't going to wither away and die, the city of Oakland built Oakland-Alameda County Coliseum in 1966 on a 120 acre site, adding a basketball arena shortly thereafter.

"The Coliseum" is unique in that its partially built underground - fans entering the facility walk into the building above the lower-level seats.  The Raiders were joined by the former Kansas City Athletics in 1968 as maverick team owner Charles O. Finley relocated his club.  In 1982 the Raiders packed their bags and moved to Los Angeles, leaving the door wide open for Tad Taube and the USFL's Oakland Invaders to make it their home. 

In their inaugural USFL season the Invaders drew in excess of 30,000 fans a game, cheering them on to the league's first Pacific Division title.  From there it would be downhill.  The Invaders were seen as no substitute for the NFL Raiders, and attendance dropped to below 25,000 in 1984, and then to below 20,000 in 1985 despite a merger with the Michigan Panthers that propelled the Invaders into the USFL Championship Game.

The demise of the Invaders would not prove to be the end for pro football in Oakland, for in an unprecedented move, the Raiders would relocate back to Oakland after a dozen years in Los Angeles.  The Raiders remain in place today, but the A's will soon be on the move, having reached a deal to build their own stadium in Fremont, California.

OAKLAND-ALAMEDA
COUNTY COLISEUM

Oakland, California
.

USFL.INFO - Copyright © 2007 - The McIntire Corporation.  All Rights Reserved.
The names, nicknames, logos, uniform designs, slogans, photographs, audio and video recordings, and any other intellectual properties
utilized in USFL.INFO are used on a "Fair Use" basis, without intent of profit.  Such intellectual properties are retained by their respective holders.