[4] Prior to the 1980 season, Raiders owner Al Davis attempted unsuccessfully to have improvements made to the Oakland Coliseum, specifically the addition of luxury boxes.

The Raiders had another successful regular season in 1984, finishing 11–5, but a three-game losing streak in late October and early November forced them to enter the playoffs as the second wild card team.

The 1985 campaign saw 12 wins and another division title, but the first-seeded Raiders suffered a humiliating 27–20 defeat at the hands of the New England Patriots in the Divisional Playoffs.

After a weak 5–10 finish, head coach Tom Flores moved to the front office and was replaced by Denver Broncos offensive coordinator Mike Shanahan.

[10] As early as 1986, Davis began to seek a new, more modern stadium away from the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum and the dangerous neighborhood that surrounded it at the time (which caused the NFL to schedule the Raiders' Monday Night Football appearances as away games).

In addition to the team having to share the venue with the USC Trojans, the Coliseum was aging and still lacked the luxury suites and other amenities that Davis was promised when he moved the Raiders to Los Angeles.

On September 11, Davis announced a new deal to stay in Los Angeles, leading many fans in Oakland to burn Raiders paraphernalia in disgust.

[16] He was replaced by former Raider offensive lineman Art Shell, who had been voted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame earlier in the year.

This period was marked by the injury of Jackson in 1991, the failure of troubled quarterback Todd Marinovich, the acrimonious departure of Marcus Allen in 1993, and the retirement of Hall of Fame defensive end Howie Long after the 1993 season, where the Raiders went 10–6 and lost to Buffalo in the divisional round of the playoffs.

Shell's five-plus-year tenure as head coach in Los Angeles was marked particularly by a bitter dispute between star running back Marcus Allen and Al Davis.

In May 1995 after the departure of the Rams' for St. Louis, the owners of the National Football League teams approved with a 27–1 vote with two abstentions, a resolution supporting a plan to build a $200 million, privately financed stadium on property owned by Hollywood Park in Inglewood for the Raiders.

[24] Originally sought by the Raiders in 1987, plans continuously failed to materialize as the team looked to convert land formerly operated by a quarry as a candidate for a stadium site.

On February 19, 2015, the Raiders and the Chargers announced that they would build a privately financed $1.78 billion stadium in Carson, California if they were to move to the Los Angeles market.

[34] The council voted without having clarified several issues, including who would finance the stadium, how the required three-way land swap would be performed, and how it would raise enough revenue if only one team moved in as tenant.

[40] The committee set up by the league initially recommended the Carson Site,[41] but the Chargers and Raiders were unable to secure the votes they needed to move.

After hours of debate, the NFL owners voted to allow the St. Louis Rams to move back to Los Angeles after a two decade long absence on January 12, 2016, with the San Diego Chargers having the option to join them within a year.

The team's early success was coupled with brand exposure by Hollywood celebrities, notably the gangsta rap group N.W.A., wearing Raiders gear.

Chuck D wears Raiders colours on the cover of Public Enemy's It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back, despite being a New York Jets fan.

Today, a strong amount of Raider fans in Southern California still remain despite professional football having vacated the region for 20 seasons.