Category: History and More

I started my newspaper career covering a high school football game in Ashland, Ala., in 1987. The last game I wrote about as a credential-carrying member of the media was Clemson’s victory over Wake Forest last fall at Memorial Stadium.

In between I had “beat” duties for Alabama, Auburn, Georgia and Clemson in the college ranks, as well as the Carolina Panthers and Atlanta Falcons of the NFL.

But I guess after all this time I’m finally free to admit that my favorite brand of outdoor tackle football isn’t even played in the United States.

Thursday starting at 8:30 p.m., I’ll be situated on the far right corner of the futon watching the Edmonton Eskimos go head-to-head with the Winnipeg Blue Bombers.

A day later, at 9 p.m., I’ll take in the Toronto Argonauts vs. Saskatchewan Roughriders game.

And on Saturday, it’ll be a six-hour marathon for me, beginning with the Hamilton Tiger-Cats challenging the Calgary Stampeders and ending with the Montreal Alouettes trying their luck against the BC Lions.

Yep, it’s a new season of the Canadian Football League, and for me, it’s the most wonderful time of the gridiron year.

Anyone who knows me knows I’ve been enamored with the Canadian game for more than 40 years, so I won’t waste your time with an origin story.

I will tell you, however, that I started rooting for the Ti-Cats back in the 1970s, and last season adopted the Alouettes as my “backup” team.*

* I cheered for the Birmingham Barracudas in 1995 during the CFL’s brief stop in the southeastern United States (and still miss them).

And after all these years it’s funny to me that so many people seem gobsmacked that I dare take the CFL “seriously.”

Not only do I take it seriously, but I’ll take it over every other brand of tackle football that exists.

Why?

The answer is simple: I like the rules better.

Teams have 12 players to a side (an extra back on offense and an additional secondary player on defense).

The field is 110 yards long and 65 yards wide, and end zones are 20 yards deep with goalposts located on the goal line. So you might actually hear the announcer say, “Hamilton has first down at the Calgary 53.”
Teams have only three downs to make a first down, so you don’t see a lot of line plunges to test the opposing “D.”
If a ball is fumbled out of bounds, it becomes the possession of the last team to touch it.
Then there’s the rouge … the beautiful, quirky rouge.

It’s a 1-point score (also called a single) awarded to a team that kicks a ball into the end zone that isn’t returned (except on an extra point, or in CFL terminology, a “convert”).
Even if a kicker misses a field goal, his team still gets a point if the ball goes out of the end zone or if a kick returner takes a knee.

Yet my favorite play – albeit a rarity – is the “onside punt.”

Yep, any player who lines up behind the punter is considered “onside” and can recover a punted ball. Oh, and no fair catches are allowed on punts, either.

If you don’t follow the CFL, you may see these rules as gimmicks.

Not me … I view them as upgrades, and they make the game faster and more wide-open.

That translates to a more enjoyable experience for me.

This isn’t to say that I don’t also love “traditional” football.

On Saturdays in the fall I’ll watch an American college game, and on Sundays I’ll make room for the NFL.

As a graduate of UAB, I’m extremely interested in the Blazers’ revived program, and I’ve been a New York Jets fan since their American Football League days.

But nine times out of 10 – if I have to choose between the NCAA, NFL or CFL – I’m going to watch the game played north of the border.

It might not feature the world’s best football players, but I think it features some of the world’s best football games.

I want the team to be called the Birmingham Battalion and their color scheme should be Army green, black and silver.

Right now I’m thinking Army green helmets, but then again, silver hats always look nice.

Sorry, I’m getting ahead of myself.

Birmingham today became the seventh city to land a franchise in the fledgling Alliance of American Football, joining Atlanta, Orlando, Memphis, Salt Lake City, Phoenix, and San Diego.

It already introduced its coach (longtime NFL assistant Tim Lewis) but soon the team will need a name and colors and I’ve already provided those.

You’re welcome.

Of course more than that, the team and league will need a lot of luck, and about all I can do toward that end is send my well wishes, promise to buy AAF-branded apparel, and hope there are plenty of four-leaf clovers in their path.

The eight team league (there is one more franchise still to be named) will start play next February, the week after the Super Bowl. And for a Birmingham boy, this will be the sixth outdoor pro football team I’ll be able to call my own.

And I hope it beats the odds, because my hometown teams have had extremely short shelf lives.

Let’s take a trip down memory lane, shall we?

It’s no secret that the Birmingham Americans (1974) of the World Football League were my first and greatest love. As a 13-year old kid, I didn’t know it was a business – I thought all these guys loved me so much they wanted to show up at Legion Field and play for me whether they got paid or not.

Of course the WFL limped to the finish line that year, and even though the Americans won the World Bowl, the bloom was already off the rose by the time the season ended.

The WFL actually folded after its first season, but reorganized as New League Incorporated (doing business as the WFL) for 1975.

The Americans were replaced by the Vulcans, which had new ownership but the same colors and many of the same players. My dad even owned $25 worth of stock in the franchise, so I felt like a big shot.

I felt like less of a big shot when the WFL folded for good in October, 1975.

Then came the Birmingham Stallions (1983-85) of the United States Football League, a good team in what, in my opinion, was the best non-NFL league to be formed since the American Football League.

It had big names and big talent, and its spring schedule meant it didn’t have to go head-to-head with pro football’s ultimate juggernaut.

But …

New Jersey Generals owner Donald Trump convinced the other owners to move to the fall and put all the USFL eggs in an antitrust suit basket.

It won the suit, collected three dollars in damages, and never played again after July, 1985.

I like to think the USFL would’ve survived and thrived had it stuck to its original plan, but it was killed by stupidity. And once it folded, I was pretty jaded about leagues that didn’t have “NFL” as their acronyms.

Having been a New York Jets fan since I was seven, I figured I’d just stick with Gang Green the rest of my days and not get emotionally involved with any of these fly-by-night circuits that parachuted into the Magic City.

That didn’t mean I wasn’t curious – and sometimes even quietly hopeful.

By the time the World League of American Football (1991-92) came along, I was already working for a newspaper and actually covered the Birmingham Fire. Since the league was funded by the NFL I thought it had a chance, and it did live on for years as NFL Europe (and later NFL Europa).

But American cities were only around for two seasons and, quite frankly, it never captivated me. I don’t recall a single memorable game or performance.

Now when the CFL expanded to the United States and the Birmingham Barracudas were founded in 1995, I did allow myself to get excited. Not only was I a longtime fan of the Canadian game (with a rooting interest in the Hamilton Tiger-Cats), but the CFL was an established league.

I was sure its foray into the Lower 48 would be a great success and the Cudas – while sporting a ridiculous nickname – would give me a “home” team in the “Longer, Faster, Wider” circuit.

Nope.

Except for the Baltimore Stallions (reborn as the Montreal Alouettes) the CFL’s expansion in the U.S. was a failure, and Birmingham was one and done.

And that was when I basically washed my hands of pro football in The Ham.

When the XFL came along in 2001 I didn’t care, and when the league folded after one season I still didn’t care. I covered the Birmingham Bolts but can’t say I particularly enjoyed it; I thought the league as a whole was a sleazy misfire.

Now, however, I’m retired from sports writing and have time – once again – to formulate kinships with teams.

So I’ll give the AAF a chance.

I’ll embrace its rule changes (no kickoffs, no PAT kicks) and trust that the league will stock its rosters with the best available talent.

And when AAF officials explain how this league will work even though all others like it have failed, I’ll listen politely and hope they’re right.

And then I’ll wait patiently for the announcement of the Birmingham team’s nickname.

I’m really looking forward to going to Legion Field and yelling, “Charge, Battalion, charge!”

I spent 30 years working for daily newspapers, and I don’t think I wrote a single story about rugby during my entire career. In fact, the only times I even used the word was contextually – as in explaining how the Interprovincial Rugby Football Union merged with the Western Interprovincial Football Union to form the Canadian Football League.

However, I’ve become a pretty big fan of the game since my retirement, and thanks to NBC Sports Network’s coverage of Premiership Rugby and Six Nations competition, I’ve gotten up to speed on its rules and a bit of its history.

But being a guy tucked away in the southeastern portion of the United States, I kinda wanted to have a circuit rooted closer to home.

With Major League Rugby, which began its inaugural season last Saturday, now I do.

And I like it a lot.

I watched the debut match on CBS Sports Network, an exciting contest that saw the Glendale (Colorado) Raptors beat Austin Elite, 41-26. And throughout the weekend I tracked the other two games (there are seven active clubs this season, including the Seattle Seawolves, New Orleans Gold, Houston SaberCats, San Diego Legion and Utah Warriors. New York and Dallas entries are expected to join in 2019).

I’m hardly an expert, and I’m sure those who follow rugby closely had some nits to pick, but I was impressed. I thought there was quality across the board and it made me want to put it in my regular sports-watching rotation.

I even decided the NOLA Gold would be my favorite team this year because, well, why not?

I won’t bore your with a rules breakdown; if you’re interested, you can fire up the ol’ Google Machine and find them for yourself. But my favorite sports are association football and American football, and it combines the best elements of both.

I like the fast-pace of the games and how rugby successfully balances brute physicality with great skill.

So why hasn’t pro rugby ever caught on here before?

Although the game itself has been around since the 19th century, it didn’t spawn professional leagues until the 1990s.

So to that end, it’s still in its infancy.

But while it enjoys a strong following throughout much of the rest of the world, it has seemingly been stuck in neutral in the U.S.

Before MLR, a league called PRO Rugby tried to gain a foothold back in 2016. However, that five-team organization lasted just one season.

MLR – which has a single entity structure – has placed flagship franchises in hotbeds of the sport, and is attempting to build on the strong amateur rugby infrastructure of its communities.

The Gold, for example, is spawned from the New Orleans Rugby Football Club, which was formed in 1973 and has won several amateur championships during its existence.

And while there are some international players dotting the rosters (each team is allowed five), there are many more who have come up through the ranks of elite American-based clubs.

The result is a league that is serious about making pro rugby in the United States stick, and I hope MLR has found a recipe for success.

It’s certainly off to ambitious start; landing a TV contract right out of the gate was no small feat.

I plan to watch the Glendale vs. Seattle match on CBSSN this Saturday. In fact, I’m going to try to watch as many contests as I can going forward, because it’s worth my time and interest.

You might discover it’s worth your time and interest, too, if you give it a shot.

It’s a great sport with great players, and perhaps one day it’ll have even more franchises scattered across North America.

In the meantime, Geaux Gold.