Aug. 22, 2011
49ERS PAGE49ERS VIDEO
RAIDERS PAGERAIDERS VIDEO
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PROGRAMMING NOTE: Chronicle Live is at Raiders training camp in Napa, where the topics will include Saturday night's violence at Candlestick Park, the drafting of Terrelle Pryor, Jason Campbell's condition and more. Tune in at 5, 9 and 11 p.m. on Comcast SportsNet Bay Area and 6 p.m. and midnight on Comcast SportsNet California.
Ray Ratto
CSNBayArea.com
Of all the things to be said about Saturday's violence-besotted Raiders-49ers game, the one thing that is absolutely true is that this doesn't have anything to do with the NFL not having an 18-game schedule.Yet there was 49ers president Jed York on the radio, saying it anyway, an absurd notion that may have actually made the possibility of an 18-game schedule even more remote. If that's a case you think needs to be made, your case is too weak to be saved.We dont need to go through the reasons why Saturday's events happened, or why it might be impossible to prevent large numbers of angry and liquored-up people from becoming violent on what is essentially neutral territory. And whether the Mercury-News report about the series ending is correct, premature or off-base, we do know this.If there was only one practice game every year in the Bay Area, this would have been it. And the brawls and shootings took place because people in a mood to fight gathered together to do so. Even if, as the Mercury News claims, the game is no more, a smaller schedule wouldn't have changed anything. Jed York knows this, or should, or shouldn't speak on the subject until he does. The last thing this is about is game inventory, and he should be at least moderately ashamed to suggest that it was.
PFT: York suggests 18-game schedule could impact fan violence
Frankly, he never should have even tried to bring it up, and credit to Raiders CEO Amy Trask for not suggesting it, maybe because it probably never occurred to her to try. The 18-game schedule was already killed for the life of the current CBA by mutual negotiations, and the issue of fan violence at practice games was never raised, I would bet real money.The only issue with practice games is that a lot of people dont attend or watch them, a fact which was correct Saturday night on Candlestick Point as well. The 69,000-some-odd announced were actually about 40,000, and it wasnt like another 30,000 was going to change the mood or mellow the crowd.Some folks came to drink and get ugly. Some folks came to drink and found ugly. Some folks just wanted ugly. And this was the perfect opportunity for all those options to be in play.KILLION: Candlestick Park violence, tragic, but not surprising
If the two teams feel that never meeting again is a good idea, then fine. If there arent enough police and security to make the game a safe place for spectators, then it deserves to die. But the notion that things would have been different if this were a for-real game is downright hilarious. If anything, it might have been worse.And well see what Jed has to say the next time that scheduling quirk comes around. Maybe, This wouldnt happen if there was an optional bye.I mean, that sounds idiotic, but it wouldnt be as risible as this explanation was.Ray Ratto is a columnist at CSNBayArea.com.