Rams versus Raiders a game the NFL should embrace and sell yearly

The Los Angeles Rams and Oakland Raiders will meet in a regular season game in 2018. LA visits the “Black Hole” for a regular season matchup that should be an annual meeting, especially when the Raiders are in Las Vegas.

Go easy sports fans, I know the NFL schedule is what it is. But don’t think for a moment that under the most perfect of conditions, the Los Angeles Rams against the Raiders, especially in Las Vegas, doesn’t work on every level.

The potential windfall defies logic.

Next season, LA will play at the aging Coliseum, giving quarterback Jared Goff, Todd Gurley and company a regular season visit to the “Black Hole,” against a Raiders team under latest retread Jon Gruden.

Should be a real good matchup.

It could be a real good, maybe even a great matchup for years to come.

The National Football League, as great as it is and has been, is a victim of numerous self-inflicted wounds. Given the backlash that has accompanied so much with franchise relocation, including the Rams and the Chargers, and the soon to be Raiders, the NFL would be smart to see the geographical and NEEDED rivalry that could be Rams / Raiders, Los Angeles / Las Vegas.

Hey, it’s a 1 hour and 15 minute flight from LAX to McCarran International Airport, and if flying isn’t your bag, it’s a four hour drive from the deserts of LA to the deserts of Las Vegas.

Imagine the possibilities?

Maybe an opening weekend game?

Or a Thanksgiving matchup that gets the rank and file fan away from the garden variety that is both Detroit or Dallas.

Plus you have a built in rivalry, and some things just make sense.

Yes, Rams/Niners is a big one, as is Rams/Seahawks.

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And I get that Raiders / Chiefs, Chargers, Broncos are the NFL Films reels of legend.

But if the league is going to try and sell me on the gaudy Thursday Night “Color Rush” game that is only bad for the retinas, I’d ask they’d consider a geographical/fan based rivalry that is LA-Vegas, Rams-Raiders, McVay-Gruden.

Hey, why not?

Some stories just right themselves.