August 2020 - Adamsonmedia.com

Baseball’s third major league

The history of professional sports is full of stories that end with the big fish swallowing the little fish.

**Scott Adamson writes stuff. Follow him on Twitter @adamsonsl and Instagram @adamsons60**

The American Basketball Association couldn’t match the money of the National Basketball Association, so the result was the NBA absorbing a handful of ABA franchises.

Same thing happened when the World Hockey Association ran out of gas in its quest to skate side-by-side with the National Hockey League.

Even the American Football League – which had become the equal of the National Football League – wound up playing under the NFL banner when the circuits combined.

But pulling off a “merger” without ever fielding a club – well, that’s impressive. And that’s basically what the Continental League of Professional Baseball Clubs did 60 years ago this month.

The idea for a third major league was unveiled on July 27, 1959, courtesy of New York lawyer William Shea. When the Dodgers and Giants left the Big Apple for Los Angeles and San Francisco, respectively, Shea lobbied both the NL and AL for an expansion franchise. New York had once shown it could support two other teams aside from the Yankees, and he knew fans would welcome a second team in the nation’s largest city.

But the big leagues weren’t interested, so Shea decided to be proactive and form a brand new circuit.

“We anticipate the cooperation of organized baseball,” Shea told United Press International. “But we’re all in this to stay and we’re not going to back out no matter what. It can’t cost them a thing. It creates vast new areas of interest and income with no risk on their part. On what grounds would they object to a deal like this?”

New York would be the crown jewel of the league and play in a brand new stadium. Other cities under consideration were Buffalo, Montreal, Atlanta, New Orleans, Portland, San Diego, Miami, Indianapolis, Dallas-Fort Worth, Seattle, and San Juan.

The league would begin play in 1961 with a minimum of eight clubs, each playing a 154-game schedule. It would create jobs for roughly 200 players and Shea envisioned a unique Fall Classic.

“A round-robin World Series would be a great spectacle,” he said. “Of course, the Continental League’s champion might not win it for a while, but can you picture anyone saying it’s not big league when it does?”

Shea brought in plenty of big money men to help jumpstart the league, and all were serious about getting up and running quickly.

“I believe the major leagues are sincere in their expressed wishes to help in the expansion of their game,” said former Western League President Edwin C. Johnson, who had also previously served as Colorado’s governor and senator. “But I also know major league baseball fears two things – the courts and Congress. We don’t want to start a war, but we’re not afraid of one.”

Perhaps the greatest boost to the upstart’s credibility came when 77-year old Branch Rickey was brought on board as president. Not only had he signed Jackie Robinson to break Major League Baseball’s color barrier, he was also the pioneer of the modern farm system. In terms of front office prestige, no name was bigger than Rickey’s.

“Our league will definitely be ready to operate in 1961 and I intend to devote my remaining years to seeing it prosper,” Rickey told the Associated Press. “I’m not worried about my age. My doctor told me I’ll live just as long active as I would inactive.

“This is a great challenge to me. It’s a great challenge to the citizenship of the country. It’s a great challenge to the majors themselves. They need to do it and I think they will. Several of the club owners are ready to embrace it.”

He also made it clear that it was in MLB’s best interest to accept the Continental League.

“We want your cooperation, we need your cooperation, we demand your cooperation,” he said. “I’m convinced a third major league will do baseball, especially the National and American League, a great deal of good.”

By the summer of 1960 the new league announced eight flagship franchises in New York, Minneapolis-St. Paul, Dallas-Fort Worth, Houston, Denver, Toronto, Atlanta and Buffalo. NL and AL owners wouldn’t listen to Shea before, but they had to listen to him now – especially since he was intent on luring players from their leagues to his.

But before any of the new teams could sign stadium deals or even get nicknames, the big league establishment offered quite a compromise. If the Continental League disbanded immediately, the two major leagues would agree to expand to four of its cities ASAP and put franchises in all of them eventually.

For Shea, whose primary concern was getting New York back in the National League, that was all he needed to hear.

“We accomplished the job I started and I believe (New York City) will be one of the first to get a team,” Shea told AP. “It’s been a lot of work, but I set out to get a team for New York three years ago and this is it.”

Major League Baseball Commissioner Ford Frick was happy to avoid a crisis.

“I always have been in favor of expansion and I’m happy the move has been made peacefully,” he said.

Thanks to the threat of a Continental League, the American League added the Minnesota Twins and Los Angeles Angels in 1961 (The Twins moved from Washington. D.C., although a new Washington Senators team replaced them that same season).

In 1962, the New York Mets and Houston Colt .45s joined the National League. Ultimately, seven of the original Continental League cities are now MLB cities, although Buffalo is still waiting.

Not a bad legacy for a league that never played a game, huh?

My soccer coaching career was never meant to be

Shortly after I put the newspaper business in my rear-view mirror back in 2017, I decided I’d try to do things I never had time to do during my 30 years covered in ink. One of those things involved coaching soccer – or at least exploring the option of coaching soccer.

Having not played competitively since 1978, I was a bit rusty on technique and tactics. And having never coached the game at all, I was flying blind when it came to Xs and Os. Sure, I had watched enough EPL matches to know I had the option of dressing up on game day (like Manchester United’s Ole Gunnar Solskjær) or dressing down (Liverpool’s Jürgen Klopp), but figured fashion wasn’t a priority at the outset of my new career.

So what did I do to prepare for my side hustle?

I bought the book “Coaching Soccer For Dummies.”

It has helpful information on everything from how to structure a practice to teaching the basic fundamentals of the game, and it brought back memories of my training days. The more I read the more I thought I could do it, and soon I had visions of guiding my ragtag group of underdogs (the club’s name would be Karma Karma Karma Karma Karma Chameleon FC) to victory over snooty Trust Fund SC in the finals of the Blue Ridge Mountains Cup.

And then years later, as I’m wandering pantless in an assisted living facility, one of my former players – who went on to win the Ballon d’Or after leading Celtic FC to a Champions League title – would track me down and thank me for inspiring him to greatness.

Then again I might’ve wound up coaching a girls’ team, meaning one of my former players – who went on to win the Best FIFA Women’s Player honor after leading the USWNT to yet another World Cup title – would track me down and thank me for inspiring her to greatness.

Either way, I’d get a lot of credit (and be pantless).

However, the book also takes a darker turn because it assumes you’ll have to “effectively communicate with parents.” It then goes on to detail how you should deal with those who are abusive, parents who complain about their child’s playing time, policies on participation, perceived preferential treatment, soccer as a babysitting service, etc.

And after reading that I decided I was not going to spend the fun years of my life coaching soccer. It’s nothing against parents – I had two of them – but I simply can’t deal with critical moms and dads anymore.

I don’t want to have to explain to Johnny’s ill-tempered father why Johnny is not my starting center midfielder, even though Johnny once attended a camp hosted by a player who knew a guy who was almost a Bundesliga coach but opted to sell insurance instead.

Nor do I want to be berated by Jenny’s mother, who demands that I start Jenny in goal even though Jenny’s the shortest player on the squad and has the reflexes of a ficus tree.

I dealt with these types of people throughout my time in newspapers, and do not want to deal with them ever again.

Honestly, though, I’m not sure what I expected when I thought I might do a little association football mentoring. The lack of a coaching background is a pretty big strike against me. And even though I have friends in the college and high school ranks, I don’t think any of them are looking to hire older, inexperienced assistants.

That meant youth soccer was my only foot-in-the-door option, but really that wasn’t an option, either. It’s gotten to be an expensive, cutthroat business. Parents need Thurston and Lovey Howell riches to get their kids on these “elite” teams, and they want high level coaches who’ll promise to give them their money’s worth.

That’s something I couldn’t promise.

And as much as I admire the legends of the profession like Sir Alex Ferguson and Rinus Michels, I fear my style would be a bit too experimental, especially for kids. While the big shots of world football might’ve successfully employed 4-3-3, 4-4-2, or even the 3-3-3-1 formations, I always wanted to see what would happen with a 1-1-9 attack. Sure, it leaves your defense exposed, but it would be quite the showcase for offensive-minded players.

So three years after thinking about coaching soccer, I think about coaching soccer no more. I admire those who do – from the men and women who guide kids at recreation fields in Birmingham, Alabama, to my buddies leading university squads in North Carolina, South Carolina and Georgia, to the gaffers who run the show at places like Allianz Arena in Munich and Tottenham Hotspur Stadium in London. But I guess when it comes to the Beautiful Game, I’m more of a follower than a leader.

And since I’ve been following soccer the better part of my life, why change now?

CFL to sit out season

I’d made peace with the fact that there would be no 2020 Canadian Football League season long before the plug was officially pulled this afternoon. A circuit that starts in the early part of the summer couldn’t due to the COVID-19 pandemic, and as each weekend passed it became more apparent that time was quickly running out.

**Scott Adamson writes about alternative football leagues because it makes him happy. Follow him on Twitter @adamsonsl and Instagram @adamsons60**

An infusion of government cash never seemed likely, and a six game season played in a locked-down Winnipeg hub was a desperate plan for a league that needs ticket-buying fans.

Everything hinged on maybes, but it was always closer to “maybe not.”

The last ray of hope was extinguished when the Canadian federal government denied the nine-team organization a $30 million, interest-free loan last Friday. That decision was made in what was supposed to be Week 10 of an 18-game regular season. Now – for the first time since 1919 – there will be no Grey Cup to determine the CFL champion.

“All the pieces that were required to play didn’t come together,” said CFL Commissioner Randy Ambrosie, who spoke to reporters via teleconference earlier today. “We were close to a new (collective bargaining agreement) for 2020 with our players and we had a health plan that had been approved by the officials in Manitoba, but what we really needed in the end was financial support from the federal government. That never materialized.”

A lack of transparency by the league has been cited as a major reason there was no financial aid, but Ambrosie insists that wasn’t the case.

“It was never brought to our attention that there was a lack of transparency,” he said. “Quite honestly, I thought we were as clear and concise and as transparent as we could possibly be. They did show us a couple of opportunities that we were clear with them would not work for us, and some new ideas surfaced and they looked even more promising, but they never materialized. I just really don’t think it was a lack of transparency. I just think in the end they couldn’t get done what we thought they would and what we hoped that they would.”

Like all people whose jobs have been impacted by the virus, CFL workers have taken a devastating hit. But the players – unlike their NFL counterparts who have plenty of financial wiggle room – were forced into a wait-and-see situation for months.

As late as last week the league was denying its players chances to bolt for NFL training camps, citing the fact that they were under contract. But considering they weren’t getting paid and have families to provide for, that put them in a horrible spot.

And it’s not like corporate generated much goodwill with the on-field talent. When Ambrosie and company originally began lobbying the government for money, they didn’t involve players in the negotiations. And although they ultimately came together to present a unified front, it wasn’t enough.

“I’ve never met a leader that I respect who doesn’t take responsibility when things don’t go well, so I do feel responsible for the fact that we’re not going to play this season,” Ambrosie said. “But there are things that we can learn. I can look back – and I have looked back – at how all this unfolded, and there are things I would’ve liked to have done differently. You just try to learn from those things and move on.”

If this was the NFL canceling its season, you could be confident that its players would be fine and it would return in 2021 with all 32 of its franchises intact.

And while I want to think that’s the case with the CFL, it’s hardly a sure bet. As I wrote back in June:

Compared to the NFL, its television deal is modest. A six-year contract with The Sports Network, signed in 2019, is worth around $37 million (in U.S. dollars) annually and shared among the nine Canadian teams. That sounds pretty good until you realize the NFL’s 32 franchises shared $8.78 billion in TV revenue in 2019 – about $275 million per club. Those figures are based on the annual report released by the Green Bay Packers, the only team that publicly releases its finances.

The CFL also counts on paying customers to help the bottom line (average attendance last season was 22,917 per game).

With no TV games in 2020 and attendance that averages zero, you can imagine what a huge blow this is to the Canadian Football League. Comparatively speaking, the NFL is a big box chain retail operation while the league north of the U.S. border is more of a mom-and-pop store.

And that’s not an insult; I love the CFL – everything from its unique rules to its tradition – and I miss watching it. While football season begins for many of you when the first NFL exhibition is played in August, mine always starts in June, somewhere in Canada.

“Our single biggest source of revenue is ticket sales, so that will be affected by this,” Ambrosie said. “We plan on 2021 to be a softer year for revenue based on everything going on with the virus.”

So what happens now?

“I talked to the governors today and there was a real spirit of resolve,” Ambrosie said. “We’re looking at our financial models, and we’re looking at ways to create more efficiencies. We need to find ways to share more together to make our league stronger. There are no magic answers to all the challenges we’re going to face, but I have the good fortune of waking up every day with a remarkable group of governors, and a remarkable group of owners, and I get a chance to go back to them with some time that we’ve never had before to really work on a long-term plan.

“We need to think about ways we can accelerate our plans to become more international and we need to look at revenue opportunities that will open the doors to a bigger and stronger future. I simply believe in the people we work with. I believe we will rise to this challenge and I believe with the support of our fans and our sponsors, this league can be position for the best future possible. It’s going to take a lot of hard work, but I believe 2021 will be the year of a great comeback for our league.”

I want to believe, too.

However, I’m going to err on the side of skepticism after the way this non-season played out.