Category: Alternative Football

Does August 8, 1961, mean anything special to you?

It should … I mean, it was a pretty big day.

The Atlas-F missile was launched from Cape Canaveral.

The Fantastic Four were introduced by Marvel Comics, available to comic book fans for the first time.

“The Edge” – U2 guitarist – was born.

All three have varying degrees of significance, depending on what you think is important.

For me, though, the biggest story of that fateful day took place in Hamilton, Ontario.

Why?

Because for the first time – and only time – a Canadian Football League team defeated a team from the “modern” American Football League.

It was also the only time a CFL and AFL team played, but still … pretty, pretty cool.

Playing by CFL rules (three downs to make a first down, 12 players to a side, etc.), the Hamilton Tiger-Cats beat the Buffalo Bills, 38-21.

According to the game report in United Press International:

Hamilton quarterbacks Bernie Faloney and Tom Dublinski, both Americans and former NFLers, riddled the Buffalo defense with a consistent passing attack. Faloney connected for three of Hamilton’s five touchdowns, while Dublinski kept the Ti-Cats rolling along when he was sent in to spell Faloney. Just to add icing to the cake, Frank Cosentino, the Ti-Cats’ No. 3 quarterback, flipped a 50-yard TD pass to Ralph Goldston in the final minute of play to put the game completely out of reach.

While just an exhibition played in front of 12,000 fans, it still was a point of pride for the Canadians.

Buffalo was one of the founding franchises of the AFL in 1960, and for a CFL side to beat a major American pro team was significant; the league was winless against NFL competition.

Its only other conquest of a United States-based pro team was in 1941 when the Winnipeg Blue Bombers beat the Columbus Bullies, 19-12. (Columbus played in an earlier iteration of the AFL that lasted from 1940-41).

Looking back years later, the Tiger-Cats should’ve won considering the talent on their team.

Faloney was an All-ACC performer at Maryland who went on to help three different CFL teams win the Grey Cup. He’s enshrined in the Canadian Football Hall of Fame, Canada’s Sports Hall of Fame, Ontario Sports Hall of Fame, the University of Maryland Athletic Hall of Fame, the Pennsylvania Sports Hall of Fame, and the Western Pennsylvania Hall of Fame.

His jersey was retired by the Tiger-Cats in 1999.

Cosentino was also elected to the Canadian Football Hall of Fame and was a two-time Grey Cup champion, while Goldston was on a pair of Grey Cup teams himself and named to the CFL All-Star team four times.

Dublinski was the first Utah player to sign a pro football contract, and threw for 30 TD passes and 3,561 yards while playing for the Toronto Argonauts in 1955.

The Ti-Cats finished their 1961 season 10-4, losing to Winnipeg in the Grey Cup, while the Bills struggled to a 6-8 mark.

There was talk after Hamilton’s exhibition triumph that the CFL – which was 0-8 against the NFL over the years – would concentrate solely on playing exhibitions against the AFL going forward.

Turns out, this game was the last interleague matchup ever played.

Bud Adams, owner of the AFL Houston Oilers, proposed a game between CFL and AFL All-Stars in which Canadian rules would be used when the CFL team had the ball and American rules would apply when the AFL All-Stars were on offense. (That would’ve been a logistical nightmare considering how much longer and wider the CFL playing field is).

There was even some discussion about the possibility of the CFL and AFL champions meeting in a two-game set at the end of each year, with the rules of the home team in effect for each game.

Ultimately, nothing came of either plan.

Perhaps the biggest obstacle was timing; the CFL season ended roughly a month before the AFL played its championship game.

So call it an experiment, a gimmick, or whatever you like, August 8, 1961, was the end of a professional football era.

It’s just a footnote to the game’s history, but an interesting one.

I love doing research, so one of the most rewarding things about writing my first book (the working title is Cheers Through The Years: My Hot (And Sometimes Cold) Bromance With Birmingham Pro Football) is digging into history.

As someone who is obsessed with the Magic City’s frequent brushes with the play-for-pay gridiron game, I pride myself on having a good bit of walking around knowledge when it comes to the World Football League, United States Football League, World League of American Football, etc.

But sometimes you forget a detail here and there, and that’s when it’s time to take a deep-dive into newspaper archives.

And while doing a second draft of Cheers Through The Years and cross-referencing the section devoted to the USFL’s Birmingham Stallions recently, I came across some pretty cool stuff.

And I was reminded that when it comes to alternative football leagues, there’s really nothing new under the sun.

I knew, for example, that the United States Football League (1983-85) was the brainchild of Louisiana sports executive Dave Dixon, who had the idea for it nearly two decades earlier.

What I didn’t realize, however, was that he not only planned the league back in the mid-1960s, but was on the verge of actually getting it up and running.

On April 11, 1965, the Dallas Times-Herald ran a story announcing the formation of the United States Football League, which would begin play in 1966 with franchises in Anaheim, Atlanta, Houston, Los Angeles, Miami, New York, New Orleans and either San Francisco or Seattle.

But instead of going head to head with the National Football League and the American Football League, the USFL would – you guessed it – play in the spring.

The season would begin in January and end in May, with the championship game staged on Memorial Day.

Aside from the gimmick of offseason football, the league was to feature a central scouting system that would draft players and assign them to teams, and encourage “non-standardized professional offenses” by including the I-formation, double-wing and single-wing.

And the players would need to be in top physical shape; there would be no halftime intermission. The idea was to fit a contest into a two-hour window and make the USFL a made-for-TV football production.

Dixon was also courting both the NFL and AFL in hopes of landing an expansion team in New Orleans, so a cynic might wonder whether or not his formation of the USFL was more about leverage than creating a legitimate third major league.

“I do think pro football is just in its infancy,” Dixon told the Associated Press. “There are a number of other deserving cities – at least a dozen besides New Orleans – who want and can support pro football.”

But wait – as the obnoxious TV announcer might say – there’s more!

Remember the World League of American Football, which had North American-based teams in 1991 and 1992 before being reformed as NFL Europe?

It had roots in 1965, too.

Almost immediately after Dixon announced the formation of the USFL, Dallas Cowboys general manager Tex Schramm said the NFL was also considering its own January to May league.

The difference between the NFL’s circuit and the USFL was that it would be something of a farm system, which would feature some NFL players but mostly hopefuls working to earn a place on a big league roster.

Teams would be placed in cities that didn’t have NFL or AFL franchises.

“We have thought of going into this as an adjunct to our own league,” Schramm told the Los Angeles Times. “Television is very anxious to have us get involved in it.”

Obviously, the earliest iterations of Dixon’s and Schramm’s leagues never made it from the drawing board to the field. Yet the seeds were planted.

The USFL we know and love started 18 years after Dixon proposed it, and played three glorious spring seasons.

It featured some of the best football players in the game (eight USFL alumni are in the Pro Football Hall of Fame). In fact, four Hall of Famers began their careers in the modern USFL – Jim Kelly, Reggie White, Steve Young and Gary Zimmerman.

Aside from introducing concepts such as the coach’s challenges and two-point conversion, it also forced the NFL to dramatically increase player salaries.

As for an NFL spring farm system, Schramm finally got his World League up and running 26 years after he thought it up – with the NFL underwriting it. Ironically, the closer the league came to fruition the more Schramm wanted to make it less a feeder league and more of an “aggressive, broad world league.”

That difference in philosophy ended up getting him fired before the WLAF ever played a down.

So, what’s the moral of this story?

Well, as much as goobs like me love the idea of “new” football leagues, the ideas behind them aren’t really new at all.

Creating one built to last, though … now that would be a first.

 

As a longtime fan of the Canadian Football League, I’m already a satisfied customer. There’s nothing the circuit needs to do to ensure my continued interest because as long as they play, I’ll follow.

But I have to give the movers and shakers of the league credit – they aren’t shy about testing unchartered waters.

Last weekend it was announced that the CFL was entering into a partnership with the British American Football Association, bringing the number of its international alliances to 10.

Aside from Great Britain, the CFL is now officially working with football organizations and/or leagues in Austria, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Italy, Mexico, Norway and Sweden.

“This new relationship will help introduce Canadian football to a wider audience in the U.K. and allow us to develop all aspects of the British game – not just on the field, but from a business perspective, too,” BAFA Director Bruce Leatherman said. “There is so much we can learn through sharing knowledge and ideas, and we’re also hugely excited to have new opportunities for our coaches to develop and our players to grow and achieve their full potential.

“BAFA is delighted to be working in partnership with the CFL to grow the sport we all love.”

The BAFA oversees all levels of the gridiron game in Great Britain, from tackle to flag, and includes men, women and youth. Currently there are 78 adult teams which are community-based. That “from the ground up” philosophy is based on the business model of traditional association football clubs.

“BAFA brings a lot of energy, passion and knowledge to the movement, with its more than 10,000 male and female members playing for more than 250 university and club teams,” CFL Commissioner Randy Ambrosie said. “We’re thrilled to work with our friends there to improve the game in Canada, Great Britain and around the world.”

Since all these international alliances are still in their infancy, there’s no way to predict what kind of impact they’ll ultimately have.

In theory, Canadian amateur players will have more options if they choose to play on beyond college, and the CFL will have a larger pool of prospects to choose from.

“We are expanding our international footprint, expanding our talent pool, and looking to create new broadcast and streaming markets for our games,” Ambrosie said. “At the same time, we want to contribute to and learn from leagues around the world and provide greater opportunities for Canadian players in other countries. Working together, we can make football even bigger and better everywhere.”

Of course a unique aspect of the CFL is its “Ratio Rule.” An active roster of 46 players has to include 21 Canadians (Nationals) and seven of them must be allotted starting positions.

This season the CFL added a “Global Player” pool which excludes Canadians and Americans. When the 2019 campaign began in June there were 24 global players plucked from a combine held in Mexico and international draft.

Perhaps in the future the global player allotment will be expanded to include more international athletes. And who knows? There could come a time when a skill position player hailing from one of the 10 countries the CFL is working with finds his way into the starting lineup.

What would be cool (although very expensive and, therefore, highly unlikely) would be some sort of international tournament featuring teams from each of the 10 organizations that have hooked up with the CFL.

All-Star squads or club champions from each association/federation could compete in a pool play (five teams per pool, four games guaranteed) format using Canadian rules, giving players a chance to show what they can do in front of CFL scouts and coaches.

Hey, I’d watch it.

I even know what to call it – the World League of Canadian Football.

Hmmm … maybe I’ll give the trademarks branch of the Canadian Intellectual Property Office a call, just in case.