July 2022 - Adamsonmedia.com

Remembering TRAC

At its core, auto racing is a team sport. There might be only one driver who winds up in victory lane, but it takes an entire crew to make it happen.

But what if there was a league that made racing a team sport in the more traditional sense?

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

Actually, there was – the Team Racing Auto Circuit, or TRAC.

On May 15, 2001, it was announced that TRAC had been formed in Charlotte, with the plan to feature teams – possibly representing cities – comprised of young drivers. The founders (working under the umbrella of Team Sports Entertainment based in Huntersville, North Carolina) made it clear they had no intention of competing with NASCAR, although stock car legend Cale Yarborough served as spokesperson for the upstart organization.

“This league is not going after NASCAR drivers,” Yarborough told the Associated Press. “There is a pool of talent throughout the United States and the world that hasn’t been tapped yet. We want to bring in those drivers.

“I guess it’s hard to see (NASCAR) welcoming us with open arms, but I would hope they understand and recognize there is room for this sport to grow.”

In TRAC all the cars would be uniform, borrowing a page from the International Race of Champions (IROC). In that series, the idea was that drivers determine the outcome of a race, not the better-equipped vehicle.

“The equipment here is going to be equal,” former NASCAR owner and TRAC board member Michael Kranefuss told AP. “You aren’t going to need $3 million or $4 million for testing.”

TRAC hoped to land a national TV contract and race on some of the ovals that hosted big-time NASCAR events.

I was working in Talladega, Alabama, at the time, so auto racing was a major part of what I wrote about. And personally, I thought TRAC was a terrific concept.

I wasn’t sure how it would be structured – or if NASCAR would ultimately consider it a threat or a feeder system – but I at least wanted to see it get off the ground.

In 2002 TRAC announced a deal to run races at Speedway Motorsports Inc. tracks (including Charlotte Motor Speedway, Atlanta Motor Speedway, Bristol Motor Speedway and Texas Motor Speedway) and use cars based on production models of the Dodge Viper, Chevrolet Corvette and Ford Mustang.

TRAC President Jon Pritchett told The Greenville News team names such as the Carolina Storm, Indianapolis Speed, Chicago Blaze and Orlando Orbit were being kicked around.

“The is traditional team sports meets authentic, full-fendered racing,” Pritchett said.

Drivers would be selected by team owners via a draft, and were to be paid a base salary of $200,000 per season. Original plans called for each team to feature three cars with three primary drivers and three backups.

As is the case with virtually any alternative sports league I was intrigued, and already trying to figure out where they would get their drivers.

I assumed the Automobile Racing Clubs of America (ARCA) series would get raided, as well as the myriad short tracks scattered across the country. And as unlikely as it seemed, I was hoping for a “Joe Namath moment” that would see a big-name NASCAR star decide to be a pioneer and join the new league.

Things really heated up by the spring of 2003 when TRAC announced a TV deal with ESPN. With its inaugural season set for a May, 2004, launch, the cable network had agreed to televise all of the league’s events. The format had changed a bit; six, four-car teams were planned for the first year, which would compete in 13 events.

It was an exciting development, and it appeared TRAC was off and running.

Turns out, though, TRAC was not off and running at all. In fact, it was dead just a few months later.

On August 26, 2003, Team Sports Entertainment announced that it was halting its efforts to form TRAC because it was unable to sell sufficient sponsorship packages.

The end came via a brief statement:

“Following extensive and ongoing discussions between management and the company’s various consultants, the company’s board of directors has concluded that such sales are not possible.”

A year later TSE executives were sued by four TRAC shareholders, who alleged “breach of contract, wrongful conversion of company monies, mismanagement, breach of fiduciary duty and fraud.”

Thus, we never got to experience the border rivalry between the Indianapolis Speed and Chicago Blaze, and I never got to write about a cool new alt-sports league.

But who knows? Maybe some enterprising entrepreneurs will give the stock car team concept another shot one of these days. If at first you don’t succeed …

Devouring the details

I’ve enjoyed spending the morning learning more about XFL 3.0 now that the league is taking shape. Even though the names of the eight cities that will begin play next winter had already been leaked, it was still good to get the official word. With that done, I’m curious about things like nicknames and logos and all the stuff that has caused me to goob out over alternative football for decades.

So, will I be watching when the league kicks off on February 18, 2023?

It depends.

If UAB or Birmingham’s G League team don’t have basketball games that day, I might. If the Blazers or Squadron are playing, however, then I’ll probably settle for watching the highlights on SportsCenter.

See, I learned a hard new truth about myself during the recently completed United States Football League season; when it comes to alt-leagues, I’ve reached the point in my life where I’m more interested in hearing about the labor pains than actually seeing the baby.

I know … I’m as surprised by that plot twist as you are.

I love discussing the structure of the organization, stadium agreements, coaching hires, pay scale, draft pools, roster size, and cool rule innovations. Seeing a league go from an idea to a product is fascinating, and right now I’m having fun tracking all the USFL guys who are being signed by NFL teams (I was especially happy to see one of my favorites, QB Luis Perez, ink a pact with the Los Angeles Rams on Saturday). These are topics I never grow tired of.

Yet, while there was once a time when football was my top sports viewing choice any time of year, I realized this spring my most fervent interest starts with the first week of the Canadian Football League regular season and ends with the Super Bowl. The non-traditional leagues that occupy the other months have become entities I want to analyze more than watch. They often lose out to everything from hockey to rugby when I flip on my sports fan switch.

That’s a “me problem,” though, and not a knock against their quality at all. There are some truly outstanding players outside of the NFL and CFL, and it’s great they have multiple showcases to display their talent. I’m all for more athletes getting more opportunities.

It’s just that as I’ve gotten older, I don’t mind taking a break from the gridiron game.

Fortunately, these new ventures don’t need me. The 2022 USFL didn’t cater to the tired eyes of retired guys, but rather the demographic who likes their games with a truly modern touch. With its inaugural campaign in the books – capped off by a fantastic championship clash in a mostly packed Tom Benson Hall of Fame Stadium in Canton – the FOX-owned USFL showed there’s a place for spring pro football. And with plenty of close and exciting games augmented by everything from drones to helmet cams to post-play interviews, it gave fans a solid product. It was a success story during a time of year when football has failed and often failed spectacularly.

That said, I didn’t care for the hub format – even if it was in my hometown – and seeing games not involving the Birmingham Stallions played in front of just a handful of fans made for bad optics.

I wish the league had done some sort of local promotion along the lines of, “Hey, we know the Stallions are your favorite team, but who is your second favorite?” Have team reps and mascots from the other seven USFL clubs give away pennants and T-shirts, and that might’ve made a big impression on a little kid.

Dave the Wave could’ve quite possibly convinced a youngster (and his ticket-buying elders) to cheer for the New Orleans Breakers when Birmingham wasn’t playing at Protective Stadium or Legion Field.

Better yet, if you’re going to attach a city/region name to a team, let it play its home games in that city/region. I mean, the Philadelphia Stars never got closer than 900 miles to their “home” during the regular season.

But the idea was to keep costs down, and the circuit did that with its bubble. Job One was to figure out a way to be viable during its maiden voyage in order to keep sailing, and that mission was accomplished. According to an article in the Sports Business Journal, the USFL will expand from two to four hubs in 2023 (including Birmingham), which is better that this year’s format and shows forward progress. And considering the best business practice is to stay in business, it’s hard to argue with their approach.

Yet that circuit is as much a TV series as it is a sports league. The third version of the XFL, on the other hand, is apparently just as concerned about its in-house appeal. All you have to do is take a look at its 2023 teams.

In selecting the eight clubs for its latest reboot, it’s fairly obvious sites were chosen because they have a history of putting butts in the seats. Here’s per game attendance figures from the cities’ last spring football stints: Arlington/Dallas (17,163, XFL 2.0), DC (16,179, XFL 2.0), Houston (18,230, XFL 2.0), Las Vegas (22,618, original XFL), Orlando (19,648, Alliance of American Football), Seattle (25,616, XFL 2.0), San Antonio (27,721, Alliance of American Football) and St. Louis (28,541, XFL 2.0).

It’s Texas-heavy and has no presence in the top four Designated Market Areas (New York, Los Angeles, Chicago and Philadelphia), and that seems risky. But people with far more money than me put the league together and they didn’t ask for my opinion, so I’m not going to worry about it.

I do find the league’s hybrid hub model interesting; the eight teams are kept together in one city (Arlington) for practice and on-site support, but will then travel to “home” locales for games.

Regardless, beer snakes should be magnificent when the XFL takes the field the weekend following Super Bowl LVII.

With its season starting in February and Disney (i.e., ABC and ESPN) handling TV coverage, it’ll get a head start on the USFL in 2023 since the FOX league once again plans to start up in April. Will folks in couch potato land who don’t have a team in either league be burned out by the time the XFL season is done, or get excited for season two of the USFL? We shall see.

And don’t forget the dark horse entry among spring leagues, Major League Football. Training camp is underway (a jamboree-style scrimmage was held on Sunday) and its inaugural mini-season is scheduled to start on August 9 with the championship game set for September 6. Despite the late summer/fall slate, the plan is to become a full-fledged spring league by 2023. And you can even invest in the league; details are available on its website.

This year all games (except for one) will be played on Tuesdays, with the idea to make it the only tackle football game available to watch on that day of the week.

This format is not unprecedented in alt-football history; the 1974 World Football League played most of its games on Wednesday nights with the TV game of the week staged on Thursdays. I’m looking forward to learning more about how Major League Football plans to conduct its business following next month’s soft launch.

So, if you happen to be one of those year-round football fanatics as I once was, I’m thrilled that you’ll (theoretically) never go wanting again. The XFL will lead into the USFL and MLFB, which will lead into the CFL, which will lead into the NFL, and then the cycle of professional football starts anew.

And who knows? Perhaps all these options will spark a rebirth in my desire to again make “offseason” pro football priority viewing. Until then, well, please tell me more about those labor pains …

Kyle Rote Jr.

During my preteen and early teen years, my bedroom displayed plenty of “art.”

There was a Batman figurine, a jointed Spider-Man cutout that hung on the door, a red and white plush football doll I’d won at the Alabama State Fair, and a New York Jets pennant that was the centerpiece of the wall above my bed.

I never was much for posters, but after falling in love with soccer in the early 1970s, I decided to break that rule and give Pelé and Kyle Rote Jr. the big picture treatment in my room.

Pelé was an obvious choice; his tour de force in the 1970 World Cup ignited my passion for the Beautiful Game, and led to my devotion to the North American Soccer League and longtime support of the New York Cosmos.

Pelé represented the exotic side of the sport. It was played by athletes from distant places like Brazil, Germany and England – athletes who were born in a world where the world’s most popular brand of football was everything.

But Rote? Well, he made me think that I could not only watch soccer, but maybe even play it, too. He didn’t even pick up the game until he was 16, became a star forward at a southern college (Sewanee in Tennessee) and went on to be the No. 1 draft pick of the NASL Dallas Tornado in 1972.

I first “discovered” him in a 1973 edition of Sports Illustrated, which came out just before he was named Rookie of the Year in the league. After that I read everything on him I could, from the yearly editions of The Complete Handbook of Soccer to any issue of Soccer America I got my hands on.

Fifty years later it’s fun to look back on his origin story, which was chronicled by an Associated Press article in 1972. A Dallas native whose first love was tackle football (he is the son of 13-year NFL veteran Kyle Rote), he was a late-comer to soccer.

“A bunch of us on the (Highland Park High School football team) were looking for a way to stay in shape during the summer, so we formed a soccer team and challenged church teams and private schools,” Rote told the news service.

The second-generation football player was highly decorated as a prep quarterback/defensive back, and hoped to parlay that into more gridiron success at Oklahoma State. But a broken leg ended that brand of football for Rote, so he headed to Sewanee to give association football another shot. During his senior year at his new school (now called the University of the South) he had 17 goals and seven assists in a 12-game season.

By the time he graduated, the NASL was still in its early stages. When it held its first college draft, the circuit jumped at the chance to give a homegrown player an opportunity to put his stamp on the league.

“When it was first tried on the professional level, it was handled very poorly,” Rote said of soccer’s earlier attempt at attracting supporters in the United States and Canada. “They tried to sell it like a product on television, without regard to the future. In order to get support for soccer you’ve got to start in the junior high schools and get the parents as well as the kids involved.”

Rote didn’t join Dallas until later in the summer of 1972 and didn’t play that year. But once he suited up in 1973, he made an immediate impact.

When the season was done, he had 10 goals and 10 assists, earning Rookie of the Year accolades while helping the Tornado reach the NASL finals (where they lost to Philadelphia).

“I think my success has lent some credibility to the sport,” Rote told the New York Daily News. “Here’s a kid from an old traditional American football family forsaking football for soccer. People must think one of two things; either I’m crazy, or maybe there’s something to this foreign game, soccer.

“If people ever asked me if I believe in miracles I’d say yes and point to this year. At the beginning of the season the only goal I had in mind was to make the team. Now, here I am being called soccer’s ‘Great American Hope.’”

I was never an accomplished American football athlete (my career ended in eighth grade) and I was, at best, a serviceable soccer player (I can still remember the three goals I scored as a high school junior, though … I’ll be glad to tell you all about them). But knowing Rote could excel at a sport that was still largely alien to many Americans did inspire me – and many others – to suit up.

“There are 35,000 kids playing soccer in Dallas, and now they have someone to identify with,” he said. “They can look at me and say, ‘If he made it, there’s a chance for me.’ That’s what it’s all about.”

He inspired me further with his showing in the old ABC Superstars competition where he competed against other athletes in various events. Any time one of my peers would roll their eyes at soccer and belittle it, I’d point to the fact that Rote’s success in everything from swimming to biking to tennis allowed him to win the event three times (1974, 1976 and 1977).

As for his soccer playing career, he finished with 43 goals and 38 assists, playing with Dallas through 1978 and spending the 1979 campaign with the Houston Hurricane.

Rote was inducted into the National Soccer Hall of Fame in 2010.

I have no idea what happened to my old soccer posters; like many things from my youth, they now exist only in my memories.

But sometimes when I look at my high school letter – or pick up one of the soccer balls displayed in my fan cave – I’ll remember Kyle Rote Jr.’s influence.

I’ll just let this column serve as a thank you note.