Category: Alternative Football

On March 28, 2021, Skip Holtz was 10 days into Louisiana Tech’s spring football practice. The Bulldogs’ spring game would be played on April 24, then the coach had three months to plan before resuming workouts on August 6 ahead of a September 4 season opener.

On March 28, 2022, time is a luxury Holtz doesn’t have.

Now coaching the Birmingham Stallions of the fledgling United States Football League, he started putting his new team through drills just last week and they’ll face the New Jersey Generals in the USFL opener at Protective Stadium on Saturday, April 16, at 6:30 p.m. CDT.

That’s a fast turnaround from first practice to first contest, but the coach is more excited than stressed by the situation.

“It’s been interesting to say the least … it’s like drinking through a fire hose,” Holtz said earlier today following a morning practice in Hoover. “There’s no way you can absorb all the information we’re trying to throw at these guys, but they’ve been great. We have a great group of young men and I’ve really been impressed with how much they’ve picked up. This is only day four, which is just a little walk-through. We’ve had three spirited days and three days where they’re probably been really confused, so just coming out here today we were just trying to clean some things up and take care of some of the little details.

“Then the next three days we’ll get some pads on and have some good practice and grade film, and just keep growing and developing. That’s all we can do.”

All eight teams are playing in a Birmingham hub this season, with four different sites hosting camps divided into morning and afternoon sessions. The Stallions and Tampa Bay Bandits are training at the Hoover Metropolitan Complex; the Philadelphia Stars and Michigan Panthers are occupying Legion Field; the Generals and Pittsburgh Maulers are using the facilities at Miles College; and the New Orleans Beakers and Houston Gamblers practice at Samford University.

Due to safety reasons, practices are closed to the public unless otherwise announced.

“Everybody’s in the same boat,” Holtz said. “It’s not like everybody else had spring ball and extra preparation. We all had the draft the same day and we’ve all had the same amount of time, it’s just you don’t try to do too much with your football team so you can execute what you’re trying to do.”

Stallions defensive back Brian Allen, who has experience with the Pittsburgh Steelers as well as five other NFL teams, says he’s not only learning the playbook as quickly as he can but trying to help some of his younger teammates along the way.

“I just finished the season with the Cleveland Browns in January, so for me this is a case of jumping right back into it and learning the playbook, which is a playbook I’m familiar with,” Allen said. “I’m just trying to come in and give my knowledge to some of the younger guys and get the ball rolling.

“A lot of these guys are coming from the CFL or The Spring League, and so it was kinda like all of us jumping back in and Coach Holtz has just eased us back into it. We have guys coming from different systems and we’re trying to build chemistry and be the best team we can be.”

Allen says he’s also stressing to his new teammates that standing out as a Stallion can pay bigger dividends down the road.

“In my group after practice or after dinner we’ll sit down and talk I try to share some of my experiences with them, like it’s not about where you started or how it’s going, but how you finish,” he said. “Just try to let the guys know they need to get out there, make plays, put some plays on film, and know that their hope for the NFL isn’t over. You’re still playing football and we all have dreams of getting back, so we need to get out here and do what we need to do.”

Quarterback Alex McGough has taken a “nose to the grindstone” approach to getting up to speed, saying he rarely leaves his hotel except for practice.

“I have 100 or 200 flash cards – plays, formations, signals – and I try to record myself using signals then try to watch and tell myself what those signals are,” McGough said. “I have a lot of ways to learn. Some might be odd or different from others, but it works for me. But it’s been great. We’re getting used to the playbook. It takes some time to adjust because everybody is coming from a different place and a different system and different schemes, and we’re kinda like trying to blend it all together and get everyone on the same page.”

Holtz said a prime factor in moving the process along is the hard work of his assistants. Holtz is serving as offensive coordinator/QB coach as well as head man, while his staff is made up of Jonathan Himebauch (offensive linemen); Corey Chamblin defensive backs); John Chavis (defensive coordinator/linebackers); Bill Johnson (defensive linemen); Larry Kirksey (running backs); and Mike Jones (wide receivers).

“We flew the staff in and met as an offense, met as a defense, and tried to get everybody in on the playbook,” Holtz said. “I’ve been coaching the offensive staff and John (Chavis) has been coaching the defensive staff with what the calls are going to be and how we’re going to do things. Normally this is something you’d do in January, but we had a week so we just try to whittle everything down. You can’t carry as much maybe at the beginning of the year because you have to give your players the opportunity to execute.”

Despite the truncated practice time, Holtz says this new chapter in his coaching journey is certainly worth it.

“This is as much fun as I’ve ever had in coaching … I mean that sincerely,” Holtz said. “I had to coach for 35 years to finally find professional football. We’ve got a great group of guys and I’ve really enjoyed it. The logistics has probably been the hardest part, just trying to get the schedules put together, when do we leave to come out to Hoover, when do we leave to go back to the hotel, when do we come back, when are we gonna meet, when are we gonna lift – that’s been the hardest part of this whole thing. The football part of it – this is my sanctuary.

“To have the opportunity to be with these guys and coach football, I’ve absolutely loved it. These are exciting times.”

After the United States Football League’s “Welcome to Birmingham” news conference back in January, I asked the league’s president of operations, Brian Woods, what kind of rules fans could expect. He told me it would be “90 percent” of the NFL playbook, with a few tweaks here and there to speed up the game.

I’m not gonna lie – that kind of bummed me out. One of the things that draws me to alternative football leagues is innovative (and sometimes off the wall) rules, and that comment made me think things this spring and summer wouldn’t be much different than what we see on Sundays in the fall and winter.

This morning, however, I was pleasantly surprised when the fledgling league announced its “10 percent” modifications. Truthfully, there’s not a single one I dislike.

“Fans are the USFL’s top priority, so our rules are designed to give fans the traditional physical play they know and love while adding some modern fast-paced elements,” Mike Pereira, USFL head of officiating, said in a statement. “The overwhelming majority of rules that govern game play in the USFL are standard at the professional or collegiate level. But we are incorporating a few unconventional ideas that we’re convinced will add offense, alter some coaching decisions and strategy for the better, and make it easier to get major penalty calls correct. Collectively, these changes will be good for the game of football and keep fans more engaged and entertained.”

For starters, post-touchdown conversions can be old school or new school. In recent years in alt-football there has been a move away from the kick entirely, but the USFL will offer the option of a single point kicked from the 15-yard line; 2-point conversion attempt ran or passed from the two-yard line, or a 3-point conversion for a successful run or pass from the 10-yard line.

Solid multiple choices, there.

The kicking game is also getting an upgrade as the league improvises an innovation from the 2020 XFL.

Kickoffs will be from the 25-yard line and no kicking team member may line up any further back than one yard. The receiving team must have a minimum of eight players in the set-up zone between their 35 and 45-yard lines. After a kickoff travels 20 yards, the first touch must be by the receiving team. If an untouched kick becomes dead, the ball belongs to the receiving team at that spot.

(The XFL rule had 10 players from the receiving team lining up on their own 30-yard line while the kick coverage team lined up five yards away on the 35-yard line).

I think this trend of eliminating high speed collisions on kickoffs is the wave of the future, and I like this rule very much.

Punts will be safer as well, since the USFL rule forbids gunners from lining up outside the numbers and being double-team blocked until the ball is kicked. 

The onside kick vs. scrimmage play will make for some tough decisions by coaches. After scoring, a team can either attempt an onside kick from the 25-yard line or run a fourth-and-12 play from its own 33-yard line. If the team makes a first down, it retains possession.

(The Alliance of American Football had a similar rule in 2019, although the fourth-and-12 play was made from the 28).

Overtime looks fun, too, thanks to a “best-of three-play shootout” also inspired by the XFL. Each team’s offense will alternate plays against the opposing defense from the two-yard line. Each successful scoring attempt will receive two points. The team with the most points after three plays wins. The subsequent attempts become sudden death if the score is tied after each team runs three plays. The overtime period will extend until there’s a winner.

Other rule changes include the legality of two forward passes from behind the line of scrimmage; the clock stopping on first downs inside the final two minutes of the second and fourth quarters; all replay decisions made at the Fox Sports Control in Center in Los Angeles; defensive pass interference 15 yards from the line of scrimmage unless a defender intentionally tackles a receiver beyond 15 yards, which is a spot foul; and if a pass doesn’t cross the line of scrimmage, there can be no pass interference or ineligible player downfield penalties.

Pereira and the rules committee deserve a lot of credit. There are people like me who have no trouble with changes that go way outside the box, while others don’t want to see anything too abrupt.

The USFL rules package for 2022 does a nice job, I think, of making all of us relatively happy.

What If …? is an animated series based on the Marvel Comics anthology that tells stories of superheroes through the lens of alternate timelines in the multiverse.

And because I’m a nerd, today I’m playing the What If …? game with the Canadian Football League. What if New York, Tampa, Detroit, Chicago, San Antonio and Mexico City had been granted CFL expansion franchises in the early 1970s?

“Gee, Scott,” you say, “That’s a specific list of non-Canadian cities wanting to join the CFL. What made you choose them?”

Good question, imaginary questioner. But I didn’t think of them – the Canadian Press reported the news in an October 8, 1971, story.

An interview with CFL commissioner Jake Gaudaur revealed that representatives from these locales had either made “formal or indirect bids” for inclusion in the nine-team league. He said all bids would be considered, with the caveat being the chances of admission were practically nonexistent.

“Two groups in New York have, in writing, said they intend to make formal applications for a CFL franchise,” Gaudaur told CP. “We also have a letter from a lawyer in Mexico City purporting to represent a group seriously interested in acquiring a franchise.”

One of the New York bidders was crooner Paul Anka, an Ottawa native. The Chicago query came via telephone conversation. As for the interest from San Antonio and Tampa, Gaudaur seemed to dismiss those as “less than serious.”

The most intriguing proposal (at least to me) came from a group representing both Detroit and Windsor, Ontario, although the team would have its home office in Windsor and play in Detroit. That bid had already been dismissed by the time the other cities came calling.

“It’s flattering to have all this interest and I think it’s academic proof we’re becoming better known outside,” Gaudaur said.

But he added that his opposition to expansion beyond Canada was based on his thought that it would hurt smaller Canadian cities and possibly lead to the NFL putting franchises north of the United States border.

“And as bigger U.S. centers came in, a smaller Canadian center would be forced to drop by the wayside,” he said. “But it’s my responsibility to bring any interested applications before the executive committee for consideration.”

Gaudaur met with Anka and another New York ownership group headed by Robert Schmertz (then co-owner of the NBA Portland Trail Blazers) in September, 1971. The pitch from the Detroit-Windsor group had been made earlier.

In both the New York and Detroit cases CFL franchises were seen as “replacements” for NFL teams; New Jersey was building the Meadowlands and luring the Giants to East Rutherford, while the Lions were heading to the Pontiac Silverdome.

A CFL team in New York would play in Yankee Stadium while Detroit-Windsor would share Tiger Stadium with the American League baseball team.

“I spent a day with a five-man delegation from Detroit,” Gaudaur told the Vancouver Sun in February, 1971. “What they want to do, really, is get a franchise for Windsor, put the offices there, and play the games in Detroit. I don’t think it’s a spite thing, that they’re just using us as a way of getting back at the NFL or (Lions owner Clay Ford). They’re serious. Naturally, they’re looking for a revenue producer for their stadium but there would be so many obstacles.”

In the early 1970s the CFL was often able to convince American college superstars (like Joe Theismann) to come north instead of jumping immediately to the NFL. But pro football’s biggest league was making inroads with Canadian fans, and Gaudaur realized the CFL was at a crossroads.

He explained the situation during an expansive interview with the National Post:

“Look, if we accept the application – if we put a team in New York – we open ourselves up to a possible National Football League invasion of Toronto, Montreal and Vancouver. Or, we face the possibility of successfully expanding into New York, then getting applications from Miami, Detroit, Chicago, or wherever.

“Eventually, we could have more American cities in the CFL than Canadian. And eventually they would be calling the shots, just like the National Hockey League. Then how long would the Canadian rules stick, how long would the limits on American players last, and finally, how many Canadians would be playing in this league?”

On November 25, 1971, the CFL’s executive committee was supposed to consider the New York application, but instead referred it to “further discussion.”

That further discussion took place on December 1, 1972, when the group rejected Schmertz’s application for the franchise in New York as well as any immediate expansion into the United States.

“There was not sufficient evidence put forward that the league needed to expand to the United States,” Gaudaur said.

So how close did the CFL come to expanding way down south in North America in the early 1970s?

Obviously, not very. I mean, at every turn Gaudaur said there was no appetite for it, and he was right.

But American expansion talk never seemed to go away completely and was realized (however briefly) with the mid-1990s “CFL in America” experiment.

Using the What if …? approach, one can assume that somewhere in the multiverse a 15-team Canadian Football League was formed in 1972, possibly preventing the formation of the 1974 World Football League because it was, in fact, already a world football league. I hope it survives and thrives.

I’m just bummed that in our timeline we’ll never know if the shared Canadian-American franchise was called the Detroit-Windsor Navigators or Windsor-Detroit Wayfinders.