FRENZIED AGAIN

OAKLAND —  Gaze into some of the menacing faces among the costumed horde in the Black Hole today.

Now picture elementary-school kids.

The Raiders are in the playoffs for the first time since the 1993 season, but that was in Los Angeles. The view is a little different from here.

There hasn’t been a Raider playoff game in Oakland since 1980, when Jim Plunkett was the quarterback and Art Shell was an all-pro tackle.

Evidence of the frenzy: The Oakland Tribune published an 18-page special section Friday proclaiming, “They’re back!”

It’s little wonder the Raiders are the heaviest favorites in the four playoff games this weekend, at nine points.

The Miami Dolphins had to survive overtime just to defeat Indianapolis last Saturday.

Now they have traveled west to Network Associates Coliseum to try to survive a Raider team that has had a couple of weeks off and Raider fans who have had a couple of decades off from playoff football here.

The winner will play either Baltimore or Tennessee for the AFC title next week. Even if Baltimore Coach Brian Billick thinks this game won’t produce the team that will make it to the Super Bowl, these players don’t believe that.

It could be a tough, old-fashioned game.

Dolphin running back Lamar Smith carried 40 times for 209 yards against the Colts and will play, despite a week of soreness and a mild ankle sprain that limited his practice time.

Smith’s fitness level will be crucial, because quarterback Jay Fiedler hasn’t been very effective down the stretch.

The Raiders counter with quarterback Rich Gannon, a solid group of receivers and about the most effective running-back-by-committee you’ll find.

The Raiders led the NFL in rushing at 154.4 yards a game, even though their leading rusher, Tyrone Wheatley, ranked 20th in the NFL after missing two games because of a sprained ankle.

But adding in Napoleon Kaufman, Randy Jordan, Zack Crockett, Terry Kirby, and some help from Gannon, the Raiders had 2,470 yards rushing.

There’s a subplot as well. Wheatley was cut by the Dolphins last season in training camp, then joined the Raiders and ran for 936 yards. That was the best total of a career that until then had been considered a disappointment after Wheatley was drafted in the first round by the New York Giants in 1995.

“I have no resentment toward anybody,” Wheatley said. “This is the NFL. It’s going to happen. You are going to be traded, going to be let go.”

The Dolphins have had the Raiders’ number recently in Oakland, defeating them each of the last three seasons, twice with Jon Gruden as the Raider coach.

Last season, Miami won, 16-9, in a game in which Gannon completed only seven of 28 passes.

In 1998, the Dolphins intercepted six of Donald Hollas’ passes and won, 27-17.

In 1997, a 4-12 Raider team coached by Joe Bugel lost to Miami, 34-16.

But the Raiders consider this a new era, and it certainly is for Gannon, who, although he’s the oldest quarterback in the playoffs at 35, never has started a playoff game.

In 1992, Gannon helped the Minnesota Vikings reach the playoffs, only to have Coach Dennis Green replace him with Sean Salisbury.

In 1997, he helped the Kansas City Chiefs reach postseason play after Elvis Grbac was injured, but Grbac came back for the playoffs.

“It was very difficult,” Gannon said.

This time, the show is all his. He finished fourth in the NFL most-valuable-player voting, and he just might have the mobility to give the Dolphin pass rush, led by Trace Armstrong and Jason Taylor, some trouble.

“If I could have started my career in this situation, then of course I would have been successful,” Gannon said. “But that’s not the way things work. You have to grab opportunities and not let go.”