While each team negotiates a new stadium in respective hometowns of San Diego and Oakland, the NFL's Chargers and Raiders are set to officially announce their joint pursuit of a new, shared NFL stadium in Carson near Los Angeles.

The LA Times reports that such a stadium is proposed for a 168-acre site at a cost of $1.7 billion. There, the teams will launch a petition drive for a ballot initiative in hopes of garnering voter approval for the build.

“We are pursuing this stadium option in Carson for one straightforward reason," the teams said in a combined statement to the Times. "If we cannot find a permanent solution in our home markets, we have no alternative but to preserve other options to guarantee the future economic viability of our franchises.”

Meanwhile — and perhaps with added urgency as a result of the announcement — the Chargers and Raiders will continue to seek public subsidies for new stadiums in San Diego and Oakland. The deadline for making deals to stay put could be the end of the year, the teams say. As of now, both the Raiders and the Chargers are on year-to-year leases.

In some ways the move could be seen as a homecoming. The Raiders spent 1982 to 1994 in Los Angeles after unsuccessful attempts to have improvements made to the Oakland Coliseum. As for the Chargers, the squad says that 25 percent of their fan base resides in Los Angeles and Orange counties.

Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf, who isn't eager for Oakland to subsidize a stadium, said she "respects" the Raiders' desire to explore the option of a new home, according to an update to the Times story. "They have done it before and they will do it again," said Schaaf.

Currently the New York Jets and the Giants are the sole NFL teams sharing a stadium (it's in New Jersey). If the Raiders and Chargers were to move to LA, they would likely play for at least two seasons in a temporary LA home while their new stadium was constructed.

By the way, our colleagues down at LAist are supremely unconvinced this will come to pass, but hey, we can all dream.

Previously: The Raiders Really Might Move To San Antonio

As we bid adieu to yet another playoff-less football season, SFist gives thanks for the return of "The Wire" to give them something to feel depressed about on Sundays.

Browns 20 49ers 7- This game had the feel of one of those late September baseball games where both teams have their mind elsewhere and the roster is full of names you've never heard of. Anyways, thus ends another lousy season for the Niners as we head to an off-season full of rumors and intrigue. First up is news that one of the people under Nolan-- Scott McCloughan, the VP of player personnel-- will now have Nolan under him as he will be promoted to GM. Smart move or mere chair moving? Is the answer really someone in the organization? And how long will it be before the entire offensive coaching staff gets fired? Today? Tomorrow? Next Thursday

Chargers 30 Raiders 17- As the Raiders' season was pretty much over, this game was rather meaningless but still rather large as it stands as the first, official, start of JaMarcus. And how was he? Other than one big play to Jerry Porter, he didn't look that hot but he wasn't really allowed to do much during the game But man, he is big. Capital B-I-G, BIG. Watching him dink and dunk all game was like watching some High School student playing a bunch of Middle School kids and trying to take it easy on them.

Regardless, there's one team in the Bay Area that has a good outlook on life these days and the colors ain't scarlet and gold.

Warriors 105 Nuggets 95- The Dubs began their run-through their peers in the Western Conference by getting sweet revenge on Denver for last Friday's loss.

Poor Cal-- so close yet so far. Our theory about what happened is that the idea of Cal having the #1 ranked team in the country was so crazy that even in this year (decade, actually) of sports craziness, the God of Sports deemed that just too crazy and set the upset in motion. Of course, we're also looking at the Rockies in the World Series, so whadda we know?

Okay, before the Raiders recap, here's a rant...if you've been following the baseball playoffs, especially the American League, it's been nothing but Yankees..Yankees...Yankees. When they lost to the Indians, the story wasn't "Cleveland beats the Yankees" but "Yankees lose to Cleveland." Then you'd watch ESPN and you'd have twenty minutes on the Yankees and at the most a few minutes on the Indians. Hell, if you watched ESPN after the Yankees were eliminated, you'd have difficulty knowing just who they lost too. Next time we turn ESPN on, we're half expecting a story to go "and this just in, the Yankees are still not in the playoffs." And now that it's Cleveland/Boston, it's the same thing all over again. After Game 2, the story wasn't Cleveland winning, it was Boston losing and why, as if the Sox were so destined to win and the fact they didn't was somehow they're doing, not the fact that the Indians are a pretty damn good baseball team. And even when watching the games, you barely know who the Sox are playing because not even the announcers on Fox acknowledge anything other than Boston.

And now...

Chargers 28 Raiders 14- The Raiders, it appears, had the misfortune of playing the Chargers not at the beginning of the season, but halfway through the season when a team many people consider Superbowl contenders finally got out of their stupor and realized that they're Superbowl contenders. Or, at least realized that their bread & butter is basically to do nothing than handoff to LaDanian Tomlinson, a cat who just kills the Raiders and did so to the tune of 198 yards (seriously, everytime we looked up, he was busting some twenty yard run). Something which would obviously be known by the Chargers coach, Marvelous Norv Turner, who used to see LT2 do it to him. As for the Raiders, they didn't play very well at all (Daunte was sacked 6 times) but it's hard to know whether they really are that good or whether they just got caught by one pissed-off Chargers team.

A lot of it just comes from what kind of team they were; especially back in the Glory Days of the '70's. You have an owner who looks straight out of Goodfellas, a color scheme of Silver & Black, and a logo of a pirate on it. What else are people going to think of the team? Throw in a reputation for cheap shot hard-nose playing and a rowdy crew of players made up of people discarded from other teams refuse, and you got the whole outlaw thing going.

And that’s where the fun begins.

The story most associated with the Raiders is the legend that they bugged the visiting team’s locker room. It was so widespread that the then Head Coach of the San Diego Chargers, Harland Svare, scoured the locker room before a game trying to find the damn thing. When he didn't find one, he looked up at the light fixture and yelled, "Damn you, Al Davis! Damn you! I know you are up there." Al's response? "The thing wasn't in the light fixture. I'll tell you that much.'' Yeah, Al was joking. Or was he?

Another coach, Weeb Ewbanks of the Jets, believed that the Raiders flew a helicopter over the Jets’ practice fields to spy on them. And in a great read on CNNSI, longtime football guru Dr. Z recounts how Ewbanks claimed to receive anonymous harassing phone calls during halftime and discovered an Al crony just randomly making himself at home on the Jets bus. The Raiders were also accused of watering down the field before a game if they played a team known for its speed (a trick that happens in baseball all the time).

This is all on KPIX tomorrow (8/30), kids.

If you're excited about the big game between the 49ers and the Chargers, that all gets under way at 7 p.m. Go 49ers!

Big Brother 8, if you're still watching it (we're almost not), will be on at 1:37 a.m. CSI will follow.

P.S. Does anyone know if the Bay Bridge will be closed this weekend?

San Diego Chargers at the Kansas City Chiefs, Saturday, 12/24/2005, 10:00 AM PST

Wild Card playoff football is nothing compared to the atmosphere for two teams clawing for that last playoff spot at the end of the regular season. Truly, when it is said that "this is what it's all about;" then is what it is all about, son. Redemption. To overcome a season's worth of missed opportunities, to feel that sweet week of optimism between Week 17 and the Wild Card week, to slough off the looming disappointment of a season near-lost -- that chance is what these two teams will be fighting for. Hope. They're fighting to make the sun rise on their season one last time. And they'll be going at it like rats trapped in a corner to get at that fleeting opportunity. If you watch no other game this wknd, for sheer distractive entertainment value, this is the one to catch.

The Chiefs and Bolts have been traveling their path to this sort of a game all year long, neither franchise able to rise into the safely playoff-bound echelon of the AFC despite both being able to defeat the defending NFL champion New England Patriots. KC's power running game will go headlong into the Chargers' #1 rated rushing defense. San Diego's defensive coordinator Wade Phillips has been been one of the National Football League's deans of the 3-4 set for years, and what he's been able to do with his defensive personnel has been quite a stirring tale this season. Seriously, outside of vaunted rookie LB/DE Shawne "Lights Out" Merriman and crafty veteran LB Donnie Edwards, can you name any of San Diego's front seven? Can you name any of their defensive lineman? Some great work you done there, Wade.

So, for each of these franchises, they must have this game to see the sun rise on their season for one more week. Even if their playoff chances would be described with the phrase "and-get-some-help," any chance is better than knowing that you'll be home for the Wild Card wknd, and that your season was all for naught. We all want to see the sun rise on our own chances, to feel as though we will find the happiness that we seek at the end of our path.

By SFist Christopher Rogers, contributing

TV note of the week- the Rai-duhs game is blacked out due, once again, to not enough ticket sales. Good for the TV viewer, right? Nope. We're getting the god-awful Bengals/Lions snooze-fest for some unknown reason. Hopefully, the game will be over the end of the 1st quarter so they can switch to a good game. Also, instead of showing us the Colts/Chargers game, you know the one featuring the team shooting for NFL history and one of the few teams who can beat them, they're only showing us the Niners/Jags game. Looks like a good excuse to go bar-hopping all day if you ask us.

The biggest, most compelling reason to watch is that it is now official--the Rai-duhs have a new QB. Yep, it's Tui time as Marvelous Norv Turner has announced that Marques Tuiasosopo will indeed start as Kerry Collins has become the new Jay Schroeder. Collins, as you might as well imagine, is not happy.

The other compelling reason to watch this weeks games is that this week's slate of games involves two out of the four teams involved in the Reggie Bush Bowl, the Jets (who play the Rai-duhs) and our own San Francisco 49ers, two teams the Sports Guy today called "sucktastic". It’s like the Bizarro Pennant race this weekend. And yes, the Niners are saying they'll take Bush if they can draft him, screw the chintziness.

As for other reasons to watch this weekend games, we dunno. How about the fact that it's cold out there? And do you really want to be seen in public going to see Brokeback Mountain (soon to be probably the most NetFlixed DVD of all time)?

Oh, and by the way, remember the rant about how we always get screwed by the networks come Sunday? Well, the football gods are actually giving us another game to watch besides the God-awful Rai-duhs/Jets game. That game? The Chargers/Dolphins game, this because somebody up there thinks that because the Rai-duhs are in the same division as the Chargers, we'd care more. We don't. In fact, at this point, considering all the buzz surrounding the undefeated Colts, we should be shown every game the Colts play. Kind of like how whenever the Sox/Yanks play, every network shows them. But no.

We hate you, NFL.

Let's take a look at this week's game, shall we?

-- from the song "Winners Never Quit" by Pedro The Lion

Friends, as we've said before, these are indeed dark time for American Football in the Bay Area. As both of our professional football clubs' fortunes plummet, ever closer we are to the dreaded Double Blackout. Down into pro football's depths fall we -- much like Bill and Ted fell that one time during Bill And Ted's Bogus Journey.

Just this past Sunday, Gary Radnich turned to the camera and said "Football is over in the Bay Area in mid-October." Ugh. Golly. That sound, somewhat like pots 'n pans falling from a badly stacked kitchen cabinet, is the sound of peeps falling off your Raiders' bandwagon. No one saw the Chargers take apart the Raiders in Oakland last week, as the typical TV blackouts roll in like Halloween advertisements. LaDainian Tomlinson caught a touchdown, ran for a touchdown, and threw a touchdown. Moss got hurt. How far down does the rabbit hole go? This week's game vs the resurgent Buffalo Bills will tell if there is to be any prayer of OAK turnaround.

SFist Christopher Rogers, contributing