Under the terms of a new lease, the Raiders will be paying a higher rent to play their home games in Oakland this season and they won’t be able to defray any of the costs from a naming rights deal with Overstock.com.
The company had that sponsorship, which named the building the O.co Coliseum, since 2011, but they have opted out of the final year of what was a six-year deal. Per the San Jose Mercury News, the deal called for the company to pay $7.2 million with half of the proceeds going to the Raiders and half split between the city and Alameda County.
“They’ve always been able to terminate the contract if they wanted,” Oakland-Alameda County Coliseum Authority executive director Scott McKibben said, via the San Francisco Chronicle. “Like a lot of corporations, they sit back and look at their sponsorships and marketing efforts and came to the conclusion they wanted to go in another direction. They have been at this for five or six years.”
The Raiders saw their rent go from $925,000 to $3.5 million under the terms of the lease they signed this year. The lease includes options to remain in Oakland for two more years, although the Raiders continue to explore other possibilities in their search for a new stadium.