We would wiseguy. The CFL had teams in the US during the 90's. That's a time that Canadian fans would like to forget. Birmingham was one of those cities. They had great attendance at the start of the season. The CFL season started months before the college season. College won over when fall arrived, but it proved that one can have a good league without having to compete directly with NFL/College Try the USFL, which did fine until it switched to a fall season.
I went to some Ohio Glory games at Ohio Stadium in the first go-round for the "World League", which eventually became NFL-Europe. I remember $2 available at work. I remember a Florida team with (Tampa?) with glowing green uniforms. I remember seeing Scott Mitchell play before he became perenial NFL backup. I remember seeing someone kick a 61 yard field goal, which I think is a pro-football record. Larry Little was the Ohio Glory's head coach. Why no NFL2? Because the NCAA does it for them for free. I don't think NFL-Europe was really intended to be a developmental league as much as a way to market the game to a new audience. No mention of the USFL can be complete without talking about the lawsuit. When they moved to the fall, they sued the NFL for anti-trust. They said the NFL conspired to lock up all the stadiums. They won the lawsuit. The jury couldn't arrive at an amount to award them, so they awarded them $1.00. Supposedly they thought the judge would adjust the amount. The judge let it stand at $1.00, and that was the end of the league. I've always thought that whole thing was a little fishy.
The NFL record is 63 yards, by Tom Dempsey of the New Orleans Saints in...somewhere in the early 70s. And it was tied 5 or so years ago... by a guy on the Broncos....I'm gonna guess it was Ehlo (?) before I google and try to make sure. EDIT: Jason Elam. Of the Broncos. 1998.
Quote from the article: "Doug Quinn, NFL Senior Vice-President, NFL International, said: "World Bowl has established a place as one of Europe's major sporting events and that is represented by the global exposure the event now commands. " They like to blow their own horn, lol. It even mentioned highlights on STV (scottishTV) what it didnt say is those highlights were on at 3 in the morning after "weirs way"(a repeat of a 70's series about a 90ish year old writer who shows us what he likes about certain places up in the highlands,yes its THAT interesting) and before the repeat of "trisha"(the english version of jerry springer without the fun stuff and with more rednecks), your right they dont do much for themselves in the credibility stakes.
Oh gosh....now you just reminded by of the Cavs' guard of the late 80s...early 90s who Im sure still has nightmares of Jordan
This is incorrect. The second incarnation of the World League, which became NFL Europe, was always a joint venture between the NFL and FOX, from the time it was announced on March 23, 1994. It has continued to be a joint venture. Whether it still is after the decision by the NFL to go forward, I don't know. But you'd think it would be. Birmingham's attendance, 1995 CFL season: Saturday, July 15.......Hamilton........31,185 Saturday, July 22.......Saskatchewan....25,321 Saturday, July 29.......Baltimore.......30,729 Saturday, August 12.....Winnipeg........17,328 Saturday, August 26.....Calgary.........19,652 Sunday, September 17....Ottawa...........5,289 Sunday, October 1.......Shreveport.......6,134 Sunday, October 8.......San Antonio......6,859 Thursday, October 19....Edmonton.........8,910 ........................Average.........16,843 Actually, they filed the suit October 17, 1984, before the move, but they had announced some two months prior that they planned to move to the fall in 1986 (though they went back and forth on it, unofficially, a couple of times after that, before finally firming up the move). And stadia were a small part of it. The suit was mainly concerned with finding that the NFL conspired to lock up contracts with the TV networks, and asked that the NFL be limited to no more than two networks, and that the USFL be given $1.32 billion in damages. The rest is essentially correct. One juror said after the $1 award, "The NFL clearly was wrong, but I didn't think the USFL deserved any significant amount of money because it seemed like (its) motive for the suit was not an honest one." The "we thought the judge would set the award" thing appears to be a canard. In any case, the USFL was awarded $1, automatically trebled to $3 under antitrust laws, and with interest, the NFL eventually wrote a check for $3.76, which a former USFL exec (Steve Ehrhart) has kept all these years as a souvenir (the USFL did eventually get $6 million from the NFL for legal fees, but that was that). I, too, have always thought they should have NFL2 instead of NFLEL. You would think they could do what NFLEL does but do it cheaper by doing it over here, but maybe for some reason they can't. Maybe now with the relationship they have with Arena Football, they wouldn't want to step on those toes (even though they seem to look at the AFL more as sort of a brand extension than a developmental league, because they're not taking a whole lot of guys from the AFL, the Kurt Warners of the world notwithstanding). I don't know. But if there was a springtime NFL-sanctioned developmental league, it would (a) probably do okay on some low level if you picked the right places, (b) would be a great training ground for more than just players---for front office people, trainers, broadcasters, etc., and (c) absolutely preclude any other group of yayhoos starting a spring football league ever again (though after the XFL debacle, it was going to be a while anyway).
From what I've seen of Arena football, it's a horrible tool for developing linemen and linebackers. The nature of the game means you can't have big linemen, and the NFL requires it. (Oversimplifying, but you get the point.)
Wow. The NFL Europe marketers seem to have a unbeatable combination of arrogance and ignorance. The bottom line is that the game is totally unfamiliar in Europe. The game is complicated with too many rules to absorb in one sitting, has no internationally marketable stars, and the games probably don't fit the European TV scheduling formats. And the NCAA system has serious deficiencies. All the other sports leagues are moving away from it. From a football standpoint (not financial), there is a good case for a NFL 2. 1) There needs to be a better place to develop players. 2) There needs to be a better place to develop officiating crews. 3) The developmental league could also serve as a place to experiment with the rules. 4) A reserve of third string quarterbacks, backup kickers, backup punters, backup long snappers, etc. needs to be created.
This is a bit of a long winded article from the Boston Globe this weekend that is sort of related to some of the things we've been talking about in this thread. The Goodwill Games Billions of people worldwide are getting their impressions of America not from US economic or military might but by watching its sports on television. And they like what they see.