James Ramey, a retired Army Ranger, became hooked on the Silver and Black as a child growing up in central Ohio.
It was during a time when lucrative television deals weren’t quite in place for the NFL yet, so only a select few teams were broadcast nationally. As such, the Raiders, Pittsburgh Steelers and Dallas Cowboys were fixtures on his television set. And of course, many of his childhood friends were fans of their local team, the Cincinnati Bengals.
“Me being who I am, of course I go against the grain with Kenny Stabler,” Ramey told Raiders.com. “And back in the day Mark van Eeghen was my favorite player. He wasn’t that guy who was going to slash your knees but he was a grind it out, three or four yards, cloud of dust type of guy. Of course, they made the playoffs multiple times and I’ve just been a Raiders fan since.”
Ramey tagged along with one of his friends to his first Raiders game, when the Silver and Black traveled to face the Bengals on Monday Night Football in 1978. It was a good day for the young Ramey as the Raiders won 34-21. Stabler threw for three touchdowns and Ramey’s favorite player Van Eeghen rushed for 46 yards and a touchdown.
While serving in the military, Ramey tried to watch the Raiders play live as much as he could depending on where he was deployed. This included waking up in the wee hours of the morning with his comrades to stream games on a laptop while stationed oversees.
“It’s almost like a lot of soldiers gravitate to certain teams and the Raiders are one of those teams that the military gravitates to,” he said. “It’s just that persona that we’ve built over the years. Wherever I went, we usually had multiple people that were still Raiders fans. The camaraderie is like no other.”
After retiring from the military, he finally made it out to Oakland to watch the team play at the Coliseum. Ramey boasts having an undefeated record at games he’s attended there.
He’s also become a bit of a good luck charm for Raider Nation in part to his “Raiders Victory Plunges.”