Author: Scott Adamson

A football league of your own

The Freedom Football League vows to kick off its inaugural season next May with a lineup that includes the Austin Revolution, Birmingham Kings, Connecticut Underground, Florida Strong, Oakland Panthers, Ohio Players, Oklahoma City Power, Portland Progress, San Diego Warriors and St. Louis Independence.

Scott Adamson writes about alternative pro football leagues because it makes him happy, Follow him on Twitter @adamsonsl

It still has no coaches, players or stadiums, so whether that target date will be hit is anyone’s guess at this point.

Should it actually get off the ground, however, I’m interested to see if it sticks to its planned business model.

If so, tackle football fans will truly have a league to call their own.

According to its website:

The Freedom Football League was formed in 2017 by a legion of former NFL football players, entrepreneurs, football operations experts, health and wellness thought-leaders, innovative legal minds and financial visionaries committed to reimagining, rethinking, reinventing, and reforming professional American Football.

The current NFL ownership, with a market capitalization of over $100 billion is closely held and controlled by 32 wealthy billionaire families and generates, on average, over $100 million of annual profits per team per year. This ownership schism creates an exploitative dynamic between ownership and the players and coaches, neglects the long-term health and well-being of the players, and gouges the fans with outrageous ticket prices.

The Freedom Football League is rethinking all aspects of the game of football and it starts with the ownership and money. The FFL’s teams will be owned by a unique consortium that includes former NFL players, active players from each FFL team, the local franchise operators, and most uniquely, you the fan.

 You can sign up as a potential owner right there on the website and even pledge an investment amount (which must be less than $25,000). Founding stakeholders include Ricky Williams, Simeon Rice, Terrell Owens and Jeff Garcia, and management teams are already in place at a couple of clubs.

It’s intriguing, and would certainly change the dynamic of a sport that – professionally, at least – is locked into franchise mode.

Like most ideas, however, it’s not new.

The late, great Dave Dixon – the man who pioneered the United States Football League – had a similar organization in mind just a couple of years after the USFL played its final game.

Ladies and gentlemen, allow me to reintroduce you to the Fan Ownership Football League (which also flirted with the name American Football Federation).

“I think there is always room for a new league,” Dixon told the Associated Press in October, 1987. “It would combine the best of the two concepts – private ownership and public ownership. I want my team owners to invest $2.5 million and then agree to sell off 75 percent ownership of their team in the second year to individual season-ticket holders.”

Dixon said the league was looking to start in cities such as New York, Chicago, San Francisco, Los Angeles and Detroit, as well as towns that didn’t have pro football.

“Places like Sacramento finds itself in a position where it wants an NFL franchise, but probably won’t get one,” Dixon said. “The NFL has never expanded unless it did so to choke off competition or by the threat of an antitrust suit.”

The talk of a new league quickly died down, but Dixon revived the idea again in 1995 – just days after the Cleveland Browns announced they were moving to Baltimore and the Houston Oilers were in the process of relocating to Nashville.

This gave the entrepreneur some new talking points.

“Do you think a Cleveland team majority owned by 70,000 Clevelanders would have voted to move to Baltimore?” Dixon told AP. “That 100,000 Houstonians would move to Nashville?”

In the 1995 version of the Fan Ownership Football League, Dixon said eight founding owners had put up a one-time fee of $5 million, plus $2 million to offset first-year operating expenses.

I hope they got their money back because sadly (or at least sad for those of us who crave alternative football leagues), nothing ever came of the fan-owned venture.

And while it might seem radical to those who are used to franchises, this community model is quite common in international soccer. In fact, single entity ownership is forbidden in Germany’s association football system.

In pro tackle football, though, only the Green Bay Packers of the NFL and Edmonton, Saskatchewan and Winnipeg of the CFL follow any semblance of a supporter-based ownership plan.

I’d love to see the FFL make this happen; if you invested, you could honestly say it was “your” team.

But with its first game roughly eight months away and so many questions still unanswered, the latest idea for a “Fan Ownership Football League” doesn’t seem any closer to becoming a reality than the original.

 

Birth of a hockey fan

September 21, 1976, was a big day for Birmingham, Alabama.

Scott Adamson’s sports column appears when he feels sporty.

Turns out, it was a pretty big day for me, too.

The brand new Birmingham Civic Center Coliseum opened for business – a 17,000-plus seat palace designed for sports and concerts. What I remember most as I walked through the doors were the smells … popcorn, hot dogs and just a hint of Hai Karate aftershave, which was apparently standard issue for Southern adult males.

But I wasn’t there for the olfactory sensations or a tour of the facility.

I was there for professional hockey – something as alien to Birmingham as glaciers and polar bears.

By the end of the night, however, the Civic Center felt like home. And the Birmingham Bulls became a part of my family.

Just a few months earlier, the World Hockey Association franchise was based in Toronto and known as the Toros. But owner John Bassett (who I was familiar with because he owned the Memphis Southmen of the defunct World Football League) decided to take a big gamble by moving his team to the Deep South.

The Bulls’ first introduction to fans came a few days earlier when 4,000 showed up to watch an intrasquad scrimmage. On this night, though, the National Hockey League’s Atlanta Flames provided the opposition in an exhibition game, and it was hard to imagine a better opening gambit.

I don’t think anyone had a clue how many people would show up on a Tuesday night (although 4,000 season tickets had been sold), but by the time the teams took the ice 8,868 sports fans were in the building.

I try to avoid using the word “awesome” because it’s so overused it has lost much of its meaning.

But man, that night was awesome.

From the moment the skaters left the tunnel and glided in formation on the frozen pond, I was mesmerized.

But, I was also prepared.

When it was announced in June that the Toros were headed to Alabama, I made a point to read everything I could about the sport – the rules, the history, and the stars.

Birmingham, for example, featured Frank Mahovlich, who was already one of the most decorated players in hockey history.

The “Big M” had played on six Stanley Cup-winning teams, and was a cinch for induction into the Hockey Hall of Fame.

Paul Henderson was another Bulls standout. The two-time NHL All-Star led Canada to victory over the Soviet Union in the famous 1972 Summit Series, scoring the game-winning goals in the sixth, seventh and eighth games.

And then there was Mark Napier, a 19-year-old phenom who was named WHA Rookie of the Year in 1975.

The public address announcer spent much of the night explaining nuances of the game, but I was already a step ahead of him. I studied hockey rule books like I was prepping for a test, and not only knew why the ref blew his whistle but was happy to explain it to anyone sitting near me.

It was the first time I had ever seen this high speed collision sport up close and personal, and I was hooked. It was ice skating with attitude, and I absolutely loved it.

With the death of the WFL less than a year earlier, I wondered if there was any team – in any sport – that could fill the void.

After a couple of hours, I wondered no more.

For the record, Birmingham won the inter-league showdown in overtime, 7-6. Napier scored three goals, his last coming with just 46 seconds remaining in O.T. to clinch it for the WHA side.

I don’t know how many fans understood everything that was going on, but they all understood what a game-winning goal was. The place erupted when Napier’s backhander flew past Atlanta goalie Dan Bouchard’s glove and the red light behind goal lit up.

Normally all I would ever talk about in a given September would be football, but thanks to one magical night in the Magic City, hockey moved to the top of the chart and remained there throughout the Bulls’ history.

Even though the WHA is now just a distant (but fond) memory, it brought professional hockey to my hometown. Gordie Howe, Wayne Gretzky, Mark Messier – Birmingham was never one of the league’s better teams, but the Bulls faced some of the best players on the planet. I’m extremely lucky I got to see them in the flesh.

And while that exhibition game 43 years ago didn’t count, don’t ever tell me it didn’t matter.

It did … and still does.

Guess I’ll never be a werewolf

For most of my life, I’ve hoped that one day I’d transform into a werewolf. Now, however, I’m about ready to give up on the dream.

Scott Adamson’s humor column appears when he feels humorous.

I mean, if it didn’t happen yesterday, it probably ain’t ever gonna happen.

Friday the 13th … harvest moon … there was absolutely no better time.

Ever heard the expression, “Luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity?” It’s attributed to Seneca. (I actually thought late football coach George Allen came up with it, but that’s beside the point.) The point is, I’m not lucky because I have spent decades preparing myself for a metamorphosis and the perfect opportunity came and went.

Do you know when the next full moon pairs up with a Friday the 13th?

August 13, 2049.

I’ll be 89.

I guess I could still be alive, but my best werewolf days will be behind me. Oh, I might be able to foam at the mouth – a wolf man cliché – but that’ll probably be more a function of age or acid reflux than lycanthropy.

I already drool a little, anyway.

Now, before you think I’m some sort of nut, I realize that it would be extremely difficult for me to turn into a werewolf. I have not been bitten by a werewolf nor do I carry the gene. And even if I could shift my shape, I have no desire to be the kind of monster you’ve seen in movies like “The Howling” or “An American Werewolf In London.” I don’t want to hurt any animals or other human beings. About the worst thing I’d do is wrestle a nut away from a squirrel, or steal some kale from hippies.

As the world’s first documented vegetarian werewolf, basically I’d just want to get hairy and run around in the woods while wearing tattered clothes. I’ve always thought that would be a good look for me.

My obsession started when I saw Lon Chaney Jr. play “The Wolf Man” in the classic 1941 film.

It’s responsible for the first poem I memorized …

“Even a man who is pure in heart
and says his prayers by night
may become a wolf when the wolf’s bane blooms
and the autumn moon is bright.”

 Dude just sat down on a chair and before I knew it, hair sprouted all over his face, he developed an under bite and – dressed smartly in a long sleeve, button-down shirt and slacks – jumped out a window and wolfed out all night long.

I thought that was just fantastic.

I remember seeing it late at night one weekend and then coming to school on Monday and excitedly asking my teacher what she knew about werewolves.

She didn’t know shit, and that disappointed me.

But being a precocious little fellow, I learned all I could on my own.

One big takeaway from my studies is that “lycanthropy” has two definitions.

The first is, “the supernatural transformation of a person into a wolf, as recounted in folk tales.”

I like that one. It speaks to my soul.

The second is, “a form of madness involving the delusion of being an animal, usually a wolf, with correspondingly altered behavior.”

That’s disturbing, and takes much of the fun out of the fantasy. Plus, you might wind up contracting rabies or have to get a tetanus shot should you happen to rip your legs on barbed wire while trying to capture and eat chickens.

But before I discovered sportsball, I spent many a day on the playground pretending to be a werewolf. As I think I’ve told you before, I even carried a tube of toothpaste with me so I could put a dab in my mouth and create foam.

It was kinda gross, but I had the freshest breath in second grade.

I still miss those carefree days, but realize if I did that now the manager at Publix might think I stole the toothpaste, and it’d make for an uncomfortable situation for all involved.

It might be worth the risk, though.

So here we are, on Saturday the 14th, and there is no evidence whatsoever that my dream came true the night before.

No tattered clothes.

No mud on the floor.

Nary a wolf’s bane corsage to be found.

I’m sorta depressed about it now, but as time goes by and 2049 draws closer, I might build up for one last shot.

Either way, I’m bringing my own toothpaste to the assisted living facility.

My playground days aren’t over until I say they are.