The Hall of Famer died at his home in Oakland, the team said. The cause of death was not immediately disclosed.
Davis was one of the most important figures in NFL history - a rebel with a subpoena. That was most evident during the 1980s when he went to court - and won - for the right to move his team from Oakland to Los Angeles. Even after he moved the Raiders back to the Bay Area in 1995, he sued for $1.2 billion to establish that he still owned the rights to the L.A. market.
Before that, though, he was a pivotal figure in hastening the merger between the AFL - where he served as commissioner - and the more established NFL. Davis was not initially in favor of a merger, but his aggressive pursuit of NFL players for his fledgling league and team helped bring about the eventual 1970 combination of the two leagues into what is now the most popular sport in the country.
"Al Davis's passion for football and his influence on the game were extraordinary," Commissioner Roger Goodell said. "He defined the Raiders and contributed to pro football at every level. The respect he commanded was evident in the way that people listened carefully every time he spoke. He is a true legend of the game whose impact and legacy will forever be part of the NFL."
But Davis was hardly an NFL company man.
Not in the way he dressed - usually satin running suits, one white, one black, and the occasional black suit, black shirt and silver tie. Not in the way he wore his hair - slicked back with a '50s duck-tail. Not in the way he talked - Brooklynese with Southern inflection. Not in the way he did business - on his own terms, always on his own terms.
Elected in 1992 to the Pro Football Hall of Fame, Davis was a trailblazer. He hired the first black head coach of the modern era - Art Shell in 1988. He hired the first Latino coach, Tom Flores; and the first woman CEO, Amy Trask. And he was infallibly loyal to his players and officials: to be a Raider was to be a Raider for life.
Coach ( COH - news - people ) Hue Jackson told the team of Davis' death at a meeting in Houston on Saturday morning. Fans dressed in Raiders jerseys, meanwhile, quickly made their way to team headquarters in Alameda, where a black flag with the team logo flew at half-staff and a makeshift memorial formed at the base of the flag pole.
Mr. Davis opposed the N.F.L.-A.F.L. merger. But becoming part of the N.F.L. did not stop him from trying to change it. Mr. Davis became the symbol of a franchise that garnered a reputation for outlaw personalities and a kind of counterculture sensibility. The Raiders were the first franchise in the modern era to have a Latino head coach (Tom Flores), a black head coach (Art Shell) and a female chief executive (Amy Trask). He feuded for decades with the former commissioner Pete Rozelle, and he sued the N.F.L. in the early 1980s so that he could move the Raiders from Oakland to Los Angeles. Then, 13 years later, he moved them back.
“He is a true legend of the game whose impact and legacy will forever be part of the N.F.L.,” Roger Goodell, the league’s current commissioner, said in a statement Saturday.
Mr. Davis generally inspired deep loyalty from his players, though he had an ugly battle with one of his stars, running back Marcus Allen, and when he got along with his head coaches (not a given) — most notably John Madden, who led the Raiders from 1969 to 1978, perhaps their most successful decade — they spoke warmly of him. Wherever the team called home, Oakland or Los Angeles, Mr. Davis was a fan favorite — until he wasn’t.
In league circles, he was not always viewed fondly. Known for, or at least suspected of, underhanded ploys like bugging the visiting team’s clubhouse, he infuriated other owners with his relentless self-interest; Dan Rooney of the Pittsburgh Steelers once called him a “lying creep.”
For his part, Mr. Davis once said of his fellow owners: “Not all of them are the brightest of human beings.”
Don Shula, the Hall of Fame coach, once said of Mr. Davis, reporting on a conversation they’d had: “Al thought it was a compliment to be considered devious.”
But he knew football. A shrewd judge of talent, especially early in his career, he became known for providing a home for gifted, wayward athletes, signing or trading for some players who were undervalued or given up on by other teams, like quarterbacks Daryle Lamonica, George Blanda and Jim Plunkett, and running back Billy Cannon and tight end Hewritt Dixon.
He rehabilitated others, like receiver Warren Wells, defensive linemen Lyle Alzado and John Matuszak, and quarterback Ken Stabler, whose reputations were sullied (either before or after they became Raiders) by allegations of criminal behavior, drug use, gambling or other transgressions.
The Raiders’ colors, silver and black, were chosen by Mr. Davis to intimidate. So was their insignia, a shield emblazoned with the image of a pirate in a football helmet in front of crossed sabers. The Raiders’ unofficial team motto — “Just win, baby!” — was reflected by the forceful style of play he encouraged, featuring brutal physicality on defense and speed and long passing on offense.
In April 1966, Mr. Davis left the Raiders to become the commissioner of the A.F.L., vowing to wage war against the N.F.L. for top players, a move that many observers at the time believed helped push the N.F.L. owners to agree, only two months later, to a merger of the two leagues.
When the owners agreed that Mr. Rozelle, the N.F.L. commissioner, would hold the same title in the merged league, Mr. Davis was further miffed, giving rise to their long mutual enmity. Out of a job as A.F.L. commissioner, he returned to the Raiders as a part owner and with the self-styled title managing general partner.
Mr. Davis, who became the team’s principal owner in 2005, sued the N.F.L. several times, once attacking the league as an unlawful cartel for forbidding him to move the Raiders from Oakland to Los Angeles to take advantage of a larger market and accusing Mr. Rozelle of standing in the way because he wanted to start a Los Angeles franchise himself. Mr. Davis won that one, and the Raiders began play in the Los Angeles Coliseum in 1982.
When he contended that the Coliseum was no longer an adequate stadium in an era of luxury boxes, the league allowed him to move the team back to Oakland. (By then, Paul Tagliabue was commissioner. Mr. Rozelle, who died in 1996, had stepped down in 1989.) In a subsequent suit, Mr. Davis accused the league of hampering the Raiders’ effort to build a new stadium in Los Angeles; the league eventually won that suit in 2007.
In Mr. Davis’s last 25 years with the Raiders, there were more feuds, not only with the league but with his head coaches. Nine men have coached the Raiders since 1995, and the team has made the postseason three times.
One piece of Raiders lore has it that the team’s fortunes declined after Mr. Davis began feuding with Allen, whose playing time was seriously curtailed in 1986, the season after he won the N.F.L. rushing title. The reasons for their dispute were never made public, but Allen said in a 1992 television interview that Mr. Davis had a vendetta against him, an accusation Mr. Davis denied. Signing with the Kansas City Chiefs as a free agent, Allen led the league in touchdowns and was named the comeback player of the year in 1993. On the final Sunday of the 1994 season, he gained 132 yards in 33 carries as the Chiefs beat the Raiders, 19-9, eliminating the Raiders from the playoffs and earning a postseason spot for themselves.
Mr. Davis’s survivors include his wife, the former Carol Segal, and a son, Mark.
The New York Times columnist Dave Anderson, a frequently harsh critic, wrote in 1976: “Al Davis can’t be all bad; it just seems that way.” But when Mr. Davis complained to Mr. Anderson about the criticism, Anderson could not help reporting that the conversation was fraught with charm:
“Why do you always use that word when you write about me?” Mr. Davis asked Mr. Anderson.
“What word?” replied Mr. Anderson, who then wrote:
“ ‘Sinister,’ said Al Davis. ‘You always call me sinister.’
“ ‘I thought you’d consider that word to be a compliment.’
“ ‘Well, yeah,’ he said, ‘but my mother reads The Times.’ ”
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