The Raiders appear focused on a return to Oakland for the 2019 season.
A week after owner Mark Davis relayed his hope in remaining in the Bay Area, Executive Director of the Coliseum Authority Scott McKibben told Michael Gehlken of the Las Vegas Review-Journal that the sides have had "meaningful and productive" talks about the Raiders playing in Oakland in 2019.
"I will confirm that we, late last week, started sitting down and talking with the Raiders about the potential of a 2019 season deal," McKibben told Gehlken. "In my view, the discussions have been meaningful and productive."
NFL Network Insider Ian Rapoport added that the Raiders must exhaust every attempt to make a deal in Oakland before any other options come into play. After the 49ers all but squashed an opportunity for the Raiders to play in San Francisco, those options appear to be limited.
The Raiders' lease with the Oakland-Alameda County Coliseum expired on Wednesday and McKibben told Rapoport the team informed him they'd like to keep talking.
"In light of the fact that we're having some real, constructive dialogue, we're going to continue to talk the next few days, see if we can get something done," McKibben said. "Hopefully this will reach a conclusion in the next 10 days or so."
With Davis' team currently without a place to play games in 2019 before the move to Las Vegas in 2020, a resolution on the matter should be coming soon. At the moment it appears Oakland is the frontrunner.
"We're all feeling better about that possibility than we did two weeks ago," McKibben said. "So, we're going to keep talking."
