{"id":10951,"date":"2025-06-24T14:37:12","date_gmt":"2025-06-24T14:37:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/10951\/"},"modified":"2025-06-24T14:37:12","modified_gmt":"2025-06-24T14:37:12","slug":"rich-stephens-former-raiders-offensive-lineman-dead-at-59","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/10951\/","title":{"rendered":"Rich Stephens, former Raiders offensive lineman, dead at 59"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Former Raiders offensive lineman Rich Stephens has died at the age of 59, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.stlfuneral.com\/obituaries\/rich-stephens\/#!\/Obituary\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">according to his obituary<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Stephens played in the NFL for two seasons in the mid-1990s, both with the Raiders.<\/p>\n<p>He made 29 appearances, starting two games.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><img style=\"aspect-ratio:0.66699219;display:block\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" data-modal-image=\"36332289\" width=\"394\" height=\"590\" src=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/GettyImages-151861773.jpg\" alt=\"WASHINGTON,DC - SEPTEMBER 10: Rich Stephens #77 of the Oakland Raiders in position during a football game against the Washington Redskins on September 10, 1995 at RFK Stadium in Washington, DC. The Raiders won 20-8. (Photo by Mitchell Layton\/Getty Images)\" class=\"wp-image-36332289\"  \/>Rich Stephens played for the Raiders in 1993 and 1995. Getty Images<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe Raiders Family is mourning the passing of Rich Stephens, who played in two seasons with the Silver and Black,\u201d the Raiders wrote in a statement.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe thoughts of the entire Raider Nation are with Rich\u2019s family at this time.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The St. Louis native stood at 6-foot-7 and weighed 310 pounds, playing college football at Tulsa before being picked by the Bengals in the ninth round of the 1989 NFL Draft.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>He never played for Cincinnati, instead making his NFL debut with the Raiders, previously located in Los Angeles.<\/p>\n<p>Stephens played 16 games with the Raiders in 1993, then missed the 1994 season before making 13 appearances in 1995.<\/p>\n<p>The Raiders went 10-6 and made the playoffs in 1993, while failing to qualify for the postseason in 1995 with an 8-8 record.<\/p>\n<p>Before his NFL career, he enjoyed a two-year stint with the Sacramento Surge of the World League of American Football, a developmental league that featured eight teams across the U.S. and Canada, plus teams in London, Barcelona and Frankfurt.<\/p>\n<p>Stephens helped the Surge become the first and only American team to win a World Bowl title in 1992, before the league was suspended and restructured.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>The Surge rebranded as the Sacramento Gold Miners and joined the CFL, and Stephens moved along to the Raiders.<\/p>\n<p>Stephens was once named one of the WLAF\u2019s top 10 prospects, per his obituary.<\/p>\n<p><img style=\"aspect-ratio:1.77777778;display:block\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" data-modal-image=\"36332368\" width=\"1024\" height=\"576\" src=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/former-raiders-offensive-lineman-rich-107046139.jpg\" alt=\"Photo of Rich Stephens, former Raiders offensive lineman.\" class=\"wp-image-36332368\"  \/>Rich Stephens played 29 games with the Raiders. Las Vegas Raiders<\/p>\n<p>\u201cRich was dearly loved within the Raiders Organization as his personality was a blessing to the morale and wellness of many,\u201d his stlfuneral.com obituary states.<\/p>\n<p>He is survived by his sisters, Stephanie Stephens and Deanna Griffey.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Former Raiders offensive lineman Rich Stephens has died at the age of 59, according to his obituary.\u00a0 Stephens&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":10952,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[4446,535,1232,593,62,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-10951","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-sports","8":"tag-death","9":"tag-las-vegas-raiders","10":"tag-nfl","11":"tag-obituaries","12":"tag-sports","13":"tag-united-states","14":"tag-unitedstates","15":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/114738852213747263","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10951","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10951"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10951\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10952"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10951"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10951"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10951"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}