Raiders get familiar with fan-filled Allegiant Stadium, imagine home edge

By Case Keefer (contact)

Monday, Aug. 9, 2021 | 2 a.m.

Raider free-agent pickups Willie Snead and Kenyan Drake carved out time before Sunday afternoon’s practice at Allegiant Stadium to walk the field of their new home stadium.

The veteran skill-players traversed all the way from the tunnel where they’ll walk out on gamedays to the Wynn Field Club behind the opposite end zones. Along the way, they also got to enjoy their first taste of Raiders’ fans as personal seat license holders were invited to the lone preseason practice at the stadium.

“I told some fans, ‘Man, ya’ll in line with the New Orleans Saints,’ because those fans in the Superdome are just as crazy and just walking around the field, the energy, the vibe, the intensity, it’s just like, we miss football,” Snead said.

Getting familiar with the $2 billion, second-year venue was exactly how coach Jon Gruden hoped his players would treat Sunday’s start of the third week of training camp. It would be easy to write off the event as nothing more than the team filling a promotional obligation, but Gruden said it was more meaningful than that.

He wants the Raiders to feel comfortable on their home field ahead of Saturday night’s preseason opener against the Seattle Seahawks and eventually the Sept. 13 regular-season kickoff against the Baltimore Ravens on Monday Night Football. Defending Allegiant Stadium will be an integral part of the Raiders’ success, and Gruden expects his players to start visualizing as much.   

“We have a lot of new faces from other teams, we have young players who are inexperienced,” Gruden said. “We’re trying to get as much experience as possible. That’s why we came out here today — try to at least let them experience their own stadium, their own locker room, learning where their parking passes take them, their wives — where are they going to meet them after the game? There’s a lot of experience that these guys need to get.”

It was at this practice when Raiders owner Mark Davis coined the building “the Death Star,” a name that has stuck colloquially, and said he envisioned it as a place, “where our opponents’ dreams come to die.” The inverse was true in the Raiders’ first season at Allegiant Stadium, though.

The Raiders went just 2-6 in Las Vegas, tied for the second-worst home record in the NFL. Their final three losses at Allegiant Stadium all came in the final seconds. If they could have flipped a couple or all of those games, the Raiders could have reached their goal of getting to the postseason instead of finishing 8-8.

“We proved we could compete on the road,” Gruden said earlier in training camp. “I’m hoping I can somehow find a way to help our team compete better in our Allegiant Stadium here because it’s a spectacular place.”

Gruden was in his element throughout the two-hour practice, grinning ear-to-ear and turning to the crowd to make noise at the start of drills like one where the offense was backed up to the 1-yard line. He said having fun in moments like that are the reason he returned to coaching.

The players were energized by both Gruden and the crowd.

“When you see things going well and can just envision the great turnout we plan on having, you definitely feed off of that,” linebacker Cory Littleton said.

Littleton mentioned that home games last year just felt like glorified practices without fans allowed to attend. That should change this season with plans still in place for full-capacity crowds.

The stadium was only about a quarter full on Sunday and already offered a glimpse of what to expect, even without the extra piped-in crowd noise to make things harder on the offense. Practices aren’t the most riveting thing to watch from a fan perspective, but many in the stands were hooked throughout nonetheless. Even after nearly an hour of stretching and individual position drills to start, “Rai-der” chants rang out when the offense and defense first lined up against each other.  

“The stadium is a very beautiful venue and I can only imagine what it’s going to look like full,” Snead said. “But the fans were awesome today and just going around at the end, shaking everybody’s hand, I was like, ‘Dude, these guys are crazy man.’ And it’s awesome to see that. I can only imagine what it’s going to look like this season. It’s an exciting venue to be in.”

Unlike many of the other rookies and newcomers, Snead didn’t get a chance to check out Allegiant Stadium when he signed during the offseason so Sunday’s practice was his true first impression. He’s counting on many more chances to play there in front of fans over the next few years.

And, just like Gruden hoped, he couldn’t help but picture what success will look like for the Raiders at home.

“Monday Night Football is going to be crazy,” Snead said. “I can only imagine.”

Case Keefer can be reached at 702-948-2790 or [email protected]. Follow Case on Twitter at twitter.com/casekeefer.