Category: Alternative Football

If social media had been around on this day 30 years ago, Canadian Football League accounts would’ve been blowing up.

I mean, as far as CFL news days go, February 16, 1995, was epic.

For openers, San Antonio’s arrival as a CFL city was made official when that town’s city council approved an agreement to move the Sacramento Gold Miners to South Texas.

Elsewhere, the sale of the Ottawa Rough Riders remained in limbo, and matters became more complicated when head coach and director of football operations Adam Rita bolted for Memphis to become that expansion franchise’s offensive coordinator.

And the Las Vegas Posse, whose inaugural season was a disaster both on the field (5-13 record) and at the box office (8,953 was the average per game attendance), was pondering a move to either Los Angeles or Jackson, Mississippi.

Yet while all that made for hot conversation topics in the land of rouges and 20-yard deep end zones, it paled in comparison to rumors that the CFL was going to fold within six weeks and rebrand under a new name.

The Toronto Globe and Mail, citing confidential sources, reported that, “ … Owners and lawyers have been secretly examining the idea of folding the league and then reopening a few days later under a new name, in time for the 1995 season.”

Now, if you’re not a CFL fan (and really, you should be because it’s fantastic) you might have either forgotten or didn’t know that the circuit was in the midst of experimenting with U.S.-based franchises.

The Sacramento Gold Miners joined in 1993, and in 1994 the Baltimore CFL Colts (later renamed the Stallions because the NFL has a lot of lawyers), Las Vegas Posse and Shreveport Pirates were added.

In 1995 the league had 13 teams, including five in the United States (the Stallions, Birmingham Barracudas, Memphis Mad Dogs, San Antonio Texans and Pirates).

The CFL’s “ratio rule” stipulated that at least 20 players on a team’s 37-player active roster had to be Canadian. However, labor laws in the United States prohibited such restrictions, so American teams could load up on U.S.-born talent.

Thinking that would tip the power balance heavily in favor of teams south of the Canadian border, a “new” league would end the ratio rule and, thus, level the playing field.

“Yes, it looks like it could be coming to this – the end of the CFL,” a management source told the paper. “It’s unfortunate, but it may be the only way we can get rid of the Canadian quota.”

So, while legacy clubs such as the British Columbia Lions, Calgary Stampeders, Edmonton Eskimos, Hamilton Tiger-Cats, Ottawa Rough Riders, Saskatchewan Roughriders, Toronto Argonauts and Winnipeg Blue Bombers would still be around, they’d be in the North American Football League or Can-Am Football League, and be able to fill out their rosters with no restrictions.

Canadian rules (three downs to make a first down, 12-players per side, longer and wider field, etc.) would remain in effect, though.

“If the CFL folds up and then becomes another U.S. Football

League or World Football League, it would do irreparable damage to its reputation,” CFL Players Association rep Dan Ferrone told the Globe and Mail. “It would be taking a major step backwards, in my opinion.”

As you can imagine, reaction to the bombshell was swift, with CFL commissioner Larry Smith calling it “totally preposterous.”

“The author and the source of this story have a vivid imagination and are obviously attempting to undermine our negotiations with the Players Association,” Smith said in a statement. “The league and the Players Association have agreed to negotiate in good faith between the parties and not in the press.”

Well, six weeks passed and by April, the CFL was still the CFL. And when the season started later in the summer, the ratio rule was in place for the Canadian teams and the American sides got to ignore it.

The end result was the Stallions winning the league title with an 18-3 record and establishing themselves as one of the great Canadian Football League teams in history.

But leading up to the 1996 campaign, the only folding being discussed involved sides that called the United States home.

With the NFL returning to Baltimore, the Stallions exited Maryland and morphed into the rebooted Montreal Alouettes. The other American teams simply went out of business. Thus, there was no longer a need to change the CFL’s name because it was – once again – truly the Canadian Football League.

And 30 years later, I’m grateful that it still has its identity, still has the ratio rule, and still proudly reps its nation. It might not employee the world’s best tackle football players, but it might just have the world’s best style of tackle football.

At least I think so.

I’ve made no secret of the fact that Luis Perez is my favorite non-NFL player. It’s not just his spring football pedigree – the Birmingham Iron (Alliance of American Football), Jousters (The Spring League), Los Angeles Wildcats and New York Guardians (XFL 2.0), New Jersey Generals (modern USFL), Vegas Vipers (XFL 3.0) and Arlington Renegades (XFL 3.0 and United Football League) – it’s his college journey.

The guy didn’t come to pro ball from a blue blood program, but rather community college (Southwestern) and Division II (East Texas A&M University).

He recently announced he was returning to Arlington for the UFL’s second season, which is a good reason for alt-football fans to keep an eye on Bob Stoops’ team. But now the Renegades have given me another guy to root for: Luke Lehnen of North Central College.

Maybe you haven’t heard of Lehnen or his school.

That’s understandable.

Lehnen didn’t spend his playing days shining under the national spotlight, because North Central College is Division III. That classification is about as far as you can get from big budget, major college football.

So, there was no scholarship to lure him to the Cardinals, or the promise of a multimillion dollar NIL deal. What there was, though, was an opportunity and man, did he ever take advantage of it.

The two-time Gagliardi Trophy winner (the top award for D3 players) played every game the last four seasons for North Central College. He completed 178 of 257 passes for 2,960 yards and 39 touchdowns and ran for 924 yards and a career-high 14 rushing touchdowns this year in leading his team to a 15-0 record and D3 championship.

In a 41-25 win over Mount Union in the tile tilt on January 5, he accounted for five touchdowns and finished his college career with a 57-2 record.

He owns the NCAA record (all-divisions) for touchdowns responsible for (208) and is the only player in collegiate history with at least 50 rushing touchdowns (50) to go with at least 100 passing touchdowns (158). 

The Renegades signed him on Thursday.

“We are excited to bring in a player like Luke and provide him an opportunity to showcase his skills,” Renegades general manager Rick Mueller said in a statement released by the club. “The talent he brings will capitalize on the experienced roster we have. We look forward to working with him this upcoming season.”

In 2023, he led the nation in completion percentage and touchdown passes, setting records for passing efficiency (263.2), yards per pass (14.7), yards per completion (20.0) and percentage of passes completed for touchdowns (20.7). 

A native of Chatham, Illinois, Lehnen has thrown at least one TD pass in a record 58 consecutive games, and owns the Division III mark for career total offensive yards (15,632).

His 162 touchdown tosses ties him with John Matocha (Division II Colorado School of Mines) for most in the annals of the college game.

While the UFL is designed to help players either get their first shot at the NFL or another chance at a roster spot, it’s also about opportunity. Most of these guys aren’t gonna stick in the biggest league of all, but they can still make a living playing professional football.

In the case of the 6-1 202-pound Lehnen, I doubt that was a realistic goal when he first suited up for the Cards. There is an old NCAA commercial featuring student-athletes who proclaim, “Almost all of us will be going pro in something other than sports.”

That’s especially true for those coming out of the D3 pool.

And considering Lehnen was a finalist for the William V. Campbell Award – college football’s highest academic award – he obviously has the brains to take him far in life.

Still, how cool is it for him to be able to pay for play?

It reminds me of what Birmingham Stallions coach Skip Holtz said before the USFL initiated the new era of spring football back in 2022.

“Every meeting, we have a player stand up and talk about his ‘Why,’” he said. “Why are they playing the game? What’s their passion? What’s their motivation? What drives them to do what they’re doing right now? And the whys are incredible. When you listen to why these young men are here and what they’ve had to overcome to be here and what they want to accomplish being in this league, it’s been really rewarding.

“Every player under that helmet has a story. Everybody’s overcome adversity to get here and everybody has dreams and visions of where they want to go. This is another opportunity to keep those hopes and dreams alive.”

Now, Lehnen is getting such an opportunity.

Obviously, this is hardly a done deal.

The UFL keeps three quarterbacks and only two are on the game day active roster. With Perez returning – and a lot of NFL near-miss signal callers looking for work – Lehnen has a steep climb ahead.

However, a D3 product getting a chance to make that climb is quite an honor.

The Renegades are providing the harness and rope. The rest is up to him.

Nine days after the Birmingham Americans won the 1974 World Football League championship – and had all their equipment confiscated due to non-payment of debts – the struggling circuit completed two rounds of crucial meetings in New York.

The result was a decision to try again in 1975 with a potentially smaller, more financially responsible league.

“I had guarded optimism before,” WFL commissioner Chris Hemmeter told the Associated Press for a December 15, 1975, story. “But I think I can see the light at the end of the tunnel. Before, I think all we saw were reflections on the wall.”

The WFL began play in July, 1974, with 12 franchises – the Americans, Chicago Fire, Detroit Wheels, Florida (Orlando) Blazers, The (Honolulu) Hawaiians, Houston Texans, Jacksonville Sharks, Memphis Southmen, New York Stars, Philadelphia Bell, Portland Storm and Southern California (Anaheim) Sun. Early games were marked by big crowds in most markets and the national buzz was largely positive. However, it was soon learned that the league had major money issues and attendance figures were being inflated. At least one city – Philadelphia – was “papering the house.”

By the time the league limped to the finish line, the Wheels and Sharks had folded before completing the season; the Texans and Stars relocated (Houston became the Shreveport Steamer and New York was reborn as the Charlotte Hornets); and only two teams (Memphis and Southern Cal) met payroll every week.

Oakland Raiders quarterback Ken Stabler, who had signed a futures contract with the Americans for 1976, successfully sued to void the deal after the club failed to pay $30,000 owed to him in 1974.

In terms of financial disasters, the WFL fiasco was one of the worst in pro sports history.

“The prime reason for the failures was unfounded optimism that we could launch a new league and survive on the proceeds,” Hemmeter said. “It was poor economic planning. The collective judgments made by this league should be questioned since they obviously didn’t work.”

Still, Hemmeter – the former primary owner of The Hawaiians who replaced original WFL commissioner Gary Davidson during the ’74 campaign – thought the NFL competitor was worth saving.

That meant rebooting with possibly as few as eight financially sound franchises and exploring new locales.

“I think there would be some new major markets in the league next year,” Hemmeter said. “These new investors represent new and substantial money from the top financial and social strata of the various communities.”

Yet while the WFL sought major league status – and did have NFL standouts such as Paul Warfield, Larry Csonka, Daryle Lamonica, Calvin Hill and John Gilliam on board for ’75 – the business plan was hardly big budget.

On December 19, Hemmeter revealed that the league was undergoing a reorganization that would put tight constraints on spending. Later dubbed the “Hemmeter Plan,” it was a system in which players received one percent of the gate. Any prospective owner would be required to clear up existing debts and put a minimum of $700,000 in escrow to guarantee payment of club salaries and bills.

“We know there is a market for a second league,” Hemmeter said in an interview with United Press International. “Our main problem is credibility. We must create stability and function in an environment of credibility.”

He added that if the reorganization was not complete by March, 1975, the WFL was over.

The good news – at the time, anyway – was that the league got the green light for another year. Well, it was actually New League Inc. doing business as the World Football League. So, technically, the original WFL was no more.

However, there was a glimmer of hope that the brand could be salvaged (and polished).

The biggest news moving into Year Two was that a major push by the league to sign Joe Namath away from the New York Jets was under way. He would be the face of the league as well as the star attraction of the new Chicago Winds franchise.

Perhaps if Broadway Joe became Magnificent Mile Joe, the WFL could attract more fans and a network contract. Without TV, the future was grim.

Returning from 1974 were the Bell, Southmen, Sun, Steamer, Hawaiians and Hornets, while joining the Winds as new additions were the Birmingham Vulcans, Jacksonville Express, Portland Thunder and San Antonio Wings.

Games moved to weekends (the 1974 WFL played primarily on Wednesday nights with syndicated TV games on Thursdays) and the regular season started in August.

Alas, Namath ultimately balked at jumping leagues, and network television shied away from partnering with the leaner WFL.

In reality, those gut-punches meant there was no legitimate path forward.

The Winds folded after five games, and the entire league followed suit after 12 weeks, averaging just 13,370 fans per game. On October 22, 1975, the World Football League officially went out of business.

Hemmeter had a solid plan in place, but the credibility crisis from 1974 simply could not be overcome.