Canton, Ohio, has long been the city that gives fans a sneak peak of a new National Football League season.
The Pro Football Hall of Fame Game has been played there since 1962, which coincided with groundbreaking of the HoF itself. In 1970 it became the first exhibition game of each season, and has been the lid-lifter ever since (with notable exceptions being the game’s cancellations due to a lockout in 2011, unsafe playing conditions in 2016, and the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020).
Last year it showcased the inaugural postseason of the new United States Football League, hosting two playoff contests and the USFL Championship Game.
This year Canton will again be site of the USFL title game, as well as the North Division playoff. But in 2023, it’s also the home away from home for both the Pittsburgh Maulers and New Jersey Generals. Canton, Birmingham, Michigan and Detroit are the four hubs being utilized in the league’s second season.
“The USFL is excited that the Pittsburgh Maulers and the New Jersey Generals will practice and play games in Canton during the 2023 regular season,” USFL president Daryl Johnson said when the announcement was made on January 25. “The outstanding regional support we received during our first postseason from football fans in Ohio and Pennsylvania, including the great city of Pittsburgh, coupled with our successful partnership with the Hall of Fame Village, led to this moment.”
I get it … the league is still in hub mode, and it has positive history with the city. It makes sense to add some dates to Tom Benson Hall of Fame Stadium.
What would really be cool, though, is for the Canton Bulldogs to join the USFL.
Why not?
The USFL has already built a bridge to its 1983-85 namesake, so linking to one of the iconic names in professional football history seems like a smart move, too.
The original Bulldogs were formed in 1903 and played in the Ohio League from 1903-06 and 1911-19.
In 1915, Jim Thorpe joined the Maroon and White and was a player/coach for five of the six seasons he was with the club. Having a man considered the world’s greatest athlete on the team helped turn the Bulldogs into a major box office draw, and that notoriety carried them into the American Professional Football Association, which later became the NFL.
Canton won NFL titles in 1922 and 1923 and went 22-0-3 between 1921 and 1923, still a league record for longest unbeaten streak.
The franchise folded in 1927, but there have been other manifestations of the Canton Bulldogs over the years.
The 1964 United Football League had a team that played under that identity, finishing 12-2 and winning the UFL championship.
And remember the American Football Association?
It didn’t have a strong financial foundation and franchises came and went. Still, it had a handful of pretty good football teams during its seven-year run and featured the Canton Bulldogs in its farewell season of 1983.
In fact, that version of Bulldogs was invited to jump to the International Football League and become one of the IFL’s flagship franchises in 1984.
Unfortunately for Canton football fans – and everyone associated with the planned league – it never got off the ground thanks to the successful launch of (spoiler alert) the United States Football League the year before.
Canton’s most recent pro football team was (is?) the Ohio Force, which is part of Major League Football and was supposed to begin play last year. However, MLFB – which has been around since 2014 but has yet to play a game – had to shut down its July, 2022, training camp due to unpaid bills.
Whether the team or league will take the field this or any year is a crapshoot, and has no bearing on my desire to see Canton have an even bigger role in the USFL someday.
Although the Maulers are considered the “home” team of the hub, Pittsburgh is still roughly 100 miles away. It’s asking a lot of local football fans to come out and cheer for teams that aren’t theirs.
But the Canton Bulldogs?
Although no one who remembers the original club is still among us, I bet there’d be an audience for a modern reimagining. I mean, if you want to honor pro football’s past, what better club to have for future expansion?
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