Canadian Football League in the United States
In earlier decades when the CFL season started much later than it does today (i.e. around the same time as that of the National Football League), NFL teams were occasionally invited northward for exhibition interleague play.
NFL teams handily won most of these contests, however the most compelling reason they were discontinued was that minor league baseball attendance in both countries fell drastically in the 1950s and 1960s, a development which coincided with MLB telecasts reaching an ever-larger audience.
Starting in the 1930s, Western Canadian teams had begun aggressively scouting for and recruiting players from the rich American talent pool, largely in an effort to achieve parity with the East.
The American Pacific Northwest became a frequent site for WIFU and later CFL preseason games in the 1950s and 1960s with Western Canadian teams, particularly the BC Lions, being called upon to entertain their regional neighbours.
Two years later, in 1982, after NFL players went on strike in September, the CFL got another chance at major network exposure when NBC bought out the ESPN rights for $100,000 a game to make up for its lost football programming.
[25][26] The idea of expansion into the United States began to take shape in the early 1990s, prompted by precarious ownership situations and chronic money shortages among the existing Canadian teams.
Both Southern Ontario teams faced competition at the gate and for general attention from the NFL's Buffalo Bills, then in the middle of their run of four consecutive Super Bowl appearances.
[32] Against this economic backdrop, a new generation of venture capitalist owners took the place of the community groups, local consortiums, or philanthropists that typically had owned the teams and operated them without any serious profit motive.
[36] With the green light from the owners, Smith began the task of expanding the league across the border, beginning with a June 1992 exhibition game between the Argonauts and Stampeders in Portland, Oregon.
Owned by Jim Speros, the team was marketed as a revival of the Baltimore Colts NFL franchise, who had left the city 10 years earlier and had also played at Memorial Stadium.
As part of a settlement with the CFL, Glieberman sold the Rough Riders to Bruce Firestone for CA$1.85 million, and in return was granted a US-based expansion team which became the Shreveport Pirates.
[57] There was a groundswell of local support for the club, but also significant difficulties in its first year, including stifling weather, cultural clashes, organizational gaffes, and serious hints of under-capitalization (during training camp the team was housed in a dorm above a milking barn).
[65] The Mississippi team was even included on the 1995 internal schedule and had hired a general manager and coaching staff, only for the deal to collapse amid squabbles with the Las Vegas corporation that owned the Posse.
[69][70] The Memphis deal was hailed as a large step forward for the league's presence in the U.S., as it brought in the wealth of team owner Fred Smith (the founder and CEO of Federal Express) and his marketing connections.
Led by future Hall of Famer Matt Dunigan at quarterback, the Barracudas fell short of the South Division title, but remained competitive throughout the year.
Despite selling only 2,000 season tickets and facing community apathy after numerous attempts at pro football squads had failed in the city, attendance for the first three games exceeded expectations.
As was the case in Birmingham, Smith persuaded the CFL to let the Dogs play their late-season home games on Sundays to avoid competing against high school and Tennessee/Ole Miss football.
[80] Archer, entering his fifth year as Anderson's quarterback, led the second best offence in the league; he nevertheless suffered an injury late in the season, prompting the team to hire 45-year-old Joe Ferguson (whom Stephenson had coached as a member of the Buffalo Bills) out of retirement to serve as a backup.
"[90] Led by quarterback Tracy Ham and running back Mike Pringle, the Stallions started 2–3, but then steamrolled through the rest of the season, winning 13 games in a row to finish first in the South Division.
They proposed that the end zones be reduced to 15 yards in length, that the Grey Cup be played earlier in the year, that player quotas be removed for all teams, and that a league name change be considered.
[102] In Toronto, Bruce McNall found it increasingly difficult to justify massive losses from an asset 3,000 miles away from his base in Los Angeles, and put the team up for sale.
[103][104] Later that year, McNall's finances imploded in the midst of revelations of financial wrongdoing[105] With these troubles still fresh, the NFL then dealt the CFL's American expansion a critical blow.
Nonetheless, by November the rumors were enough to seriously impair the Stallions' marketing efforts, and attendance for the team's semi-final against Winnipeg (played two days before the Browns' announcement) was a franchise low of 21,040.
[107][108] The Pirates held out a little longer and flirted with a relocation to Norfolk, but local officials broke off talks after they learned that Glieberman was still facing legal disputes in Shreveport.
[114] The 84th Grey Cup was nearly canceled before the coffee shop chain Tim Hortons stepped in and provided enough sponsorship money to allow both competing teams to collect their paychecks.
[116][117] After the indictment of McNall, Ryckman was the second major architect of expansion to run afoul of the law; the Stampeders were later bought by Sig Gutsche via a receivership court for $1.6 million on April 3.
Louisiana courts eventually ordered the Gliebermans to repay Shreveport US$1 million with interest; the dispute centered over whether the city had agreed to share losses or simply lent money to the ownership group.
[123] McMahon would instead partner with NBC to create the XFL, which would place teams in Birmingham, Las Vegas, and Memphis at the same stadiums as their respective CFL franchises previously played.
[127] The CFL re-gained financial stability in the 2000s, mostly thanks to enforcement of a salary cap, stricter standards of ownership, and increasingly lucrative television contracts negotiated with Canadian networks.
Longtime Alouettes starting quarterback Anthony Calvillo was the last remaining active player that played for an American CFL team (Las Vegas) upon his retirement after the 2013 season.
