Last season, the NFL opened two new stadiums hosting three teams but due to the pandemic, fans were not allowed at either. So it has been a long wait to add these to the Club 124 list. I saw the Rams and Chargers two months prior when we held the annual Club meetup at SoFi, but I was unable to extend that trip to see Allegiant Stadium for the Raiders the following week. So I had to wait even longer to get to Las Vegas, deciding on the first week in December when the Washington Football Team would be visiting. I stayed at a hotel just 15 minutes away and fellow sports traveler Mark joined me for the walk over.
We strolled along Dean Martin Drive, passing several parking lots charging between $20 and $40, one of which had a food truck selling bacon-wrapped hot dogs. The rideshare drop-off point is here as well, and then you pass under Hacienda Drive (which is used by most pedestrians to get across the freeway) and the stadium appears in front of you. And yes, it does look like a giant Roomba. There are tailgaters here, but nowhere near as many as were in Oakland.
We arrived about 2.5 hours before kickoff and gates were already open. Vaccination is required for entry this year and if you don't have the Clear app, you will need to go to a tent nearby to confirm your credentials and receive a wristband, which includes the date and opponent and actually makes a nice souvenir.
Clearing security and scanning our tickets was extremely easy and we had time to make a lap around the exterior of the building.
Allegiant is a low-cost airline that offers only non-stop flights, including several routes from nearby McCarran International. I've flown them a couple of times and can't say that they are any worse than their cheap competitors like Spirit and Frontier.
Modelo is another major sponsor and there are games and other interactive kiosks available, so take your time to walk around before entering the stadium proper.
Returning to the main entrance, there is a large Raiders logo that makes for a good photo op. Just behind it is the team store.
Note the Legacy Bricks surrounding it; they honour fans who have paid dearly for the privilege. It is all worth it, though, when your brick ends up featured on the pages of the world's greatest sports travel blog. Nearby, you can find bricks for former players, who presumably did not have to pay.
The main entrance is up a set of stairs. Looking back from the top, you can see the Luxor among other Vegas properties, as well as the entrance plaza.
Upon entering, your first stop will be the team store down the escalators. There you will find the first of many Halls of Fame, with the 28 former Raiders who have been enshrined in Canton. Many of them (Jerry Rice, Warren Sapp, etc.) played the majority of their careers elsewhere but are still feted here.
Go back upstairs and you cannot miss the giant cauldron, which rises through a hole in the floor and is the most dominant feature of the stadium. It is officially the Al Davis Memorial Torch and is reportedly the largest structure in the world made from a 3-D printer.
At this point, the 100-level concourse was already crowded, as many fans wanted to get the full experience. And there is a lot to see here, so we began to tour.
First, though, we had a quick look at the field before most fans had taken their seats. You can see towels draped over every chair, which lessens the impact of the seat colours; the lower bowl and upper bowl are black while the middle bowl is grey.
Here is a view from the corner. These seats are not part of the club, which takes up most sections between the 10-yard lines on both sides of the field
Looking back, you can see the torch in front of a set of windows. Note that there are two scoreboards at this end and just one at the other.
Although the club is restricted to ticket holders, the concourse wraps around the back of the club and has several features worth seeing. The collection of Nevada high school football helmets is one of them.
Farther along is a series of photos and paintings celebrating the history of Las Vegas. Each of them has a small blurb attached and you can spend quite a bit of time reading all of them.
By this time, we had reached the other end of the field and I went down to the lower rows to snap a picture.
Looking up, you will see the suites and the 300 and 400 levels above that, with the press box at the very top.
The roof is a translucent dome that allows natural light onto the field. Even then, the natural grass field does roll outside when it is not in use so as to receive as much sunlight as possible.
There is another club on the west side of the stadium, but again, the concourse wraps around the back. There are photos of the stadium during construction and a variety of statistics that are worth reading here.
With the tour of the 100 level complete, we went up to the 200 level, where one of many famous quotes attributed to Davis is embossed on the torch.
Suites and a club take up the best seats at this level, and unlike the lower level, the concourse stops at the club. So if you want to see both ends of this level, you have to go up or down and walk around and then back down or up. Do take the time to do this, as you will see those Hall of Fame players further honoured.
The picture below is of the very swanky club seats along the east sideline. Very nice indeed and if any reader would want to gift me a ticket for an upcoming game, I will gladly accept.
Walking back past the torch, you see the window to the right. There are escalators here to take you to the top level; they were only going up before the game, but once things got started, there was one escalator going up and one going down at each bank.
From the 300-level concourse, and you can look down at the 200 level next to the torch. Acrophobics will want to avoid this spot as there is just a pane of glass separating you from a long fall.
There is nothing to see at this level, but I did go up to the top row to snap a picture of the entire field.
From here, you can look back to the torch with The Luxor in the background.
Our seats were in Section 229 and along this corridor are paintings of those 28 Hall of Famers.
This is the view from our seats, which I picked up for $125 including fees, a good deal for the 200 level. Right above us was a suite, which I suspect cost slightly more.
The view from here is different, with Excalibur visible through the windows behind the torch. Before the game, someone presses a button and the "flame" turns on, which you can see in the next photo.
There are dozens of concessions, with The Gridiron offering $3 hot dogs (which are quite good) and pretzels. There is also a designated driver program that gives you an empty cup, which you can fill up yourself at one of the refill stations. There aren't as many of these as there should be, and at halftime, they had run out of some of the options.
Overall, Allegiant Stadium is the best new venue in the Big 4 in some time. The location is unbeatable, it is architecturally stunning, it can be affordable for the most part (tickets will drop in price once the novelty wears off; this game was not even sold out) and it has a lot of history on display that is unique to both the city and the franchise. Nobody likes it when a team abandons a fan base like the Raiders did, but those fans lucky enough to be in Vegas are the big winners. Sadly their team cannot say the same.
The Game
The Raiders won the toss and deferred (kickoff below) and WFT made them pay with a 9-play, 75-yard drive that culminated with a sweet one-handed touchdown catch by Logan Thomas. The next six drives ended in punts before the Raiders managed a field goal after a 10-play march that essentially ended the half.
The second half saw two more punts to start things before Derek Carr drove the Raiders 71 yards over nine plays. Again the drive stalled and Vegas settled for a field goal to get within a point. Washington responded with a good drive of their own, taking another nine plays to move 75 yards, with Taylor Heinicke connecting with running back Antonio Gibson for a 4-yard score early in the fourth. Not to be outdone, the Raiders conducted a quick TD drive of their own, helped by three WFT penalties, that saw Josh Jacobs score from a yard out. They had to go for two and they failed, keeping Washington in the lead 14-12.
On their next possession, Heinicke was picked off by rookie Nate Hobbs. With 6:49 left and the ball on their own 39, the Raiders really needed a touchdown, but could only muster another field goal after taking 4:27 off the clock. This gave Washington more than enough time to drive into field goal range while time ran down, and rookie Brian Johnson delivered a 48-yard field goal. The Raiders did have 37 seconds left but only one timeout, and a Hail Mary failed at the gun as Washington won 17-15.
This was not a bad game, with only 17 meaningful possessions and a lot of extended drives. WFT was 7-13 in third down situations and that was the difference in the game as the Raiders were only 2-8. Interestingly, there were no fourth-down attempts. It took 3:01, giving us plenty of time to wander around looking for a meal before our red-eye flights home.
Notes
Before the game, I saw a fan with a season stub, something that is increasingly uncommon. Regular readers know about my obsession with hard tickets and I really hoped that I could find one after the game. Surprisingly, there was a pair left just two sections over, so Mark and I each got one.
Look at this ticket; it is truly a thing of beauty. It honours Ted Hendricks, one of those Hall of Famers (he was also on the cover of the program). There is simply no reason every team cannot do something like this to give their fans a souvenir of their experience.
I have seen the Raiders eight times and they have lost seven of those games. Their only win: over the Bills of course.
Next Up
The final trip of the year will see me heading to Washington and British Columbia to finish my Leafs on the Road quest as well as officially keep my Club 124 membership going with a visit to the Seattle Kraken. I also hope to see a WHL game and Gonzaga basketball on that trip, so check back around Christmas for a bunch of recaps.
Best,
Sean
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