Soon after Gary Davidson announced the WFL's formation in October 1973, he was approached by a man named Bud Hucul about putting a team in Detroit.

The Wheels' owners didn't appear to make an initial capital investment, instead opting to pay team expenses out-of-pocket as they arose.

Despite selecting such future stars as Ed "Too Tall" Jones, Rick Middleton and Randy Grossman, the Wheels initially refused to spend more than $10,000 per player.

Harris received $30,000 from local promoters and the Storm got their first win of the year, 18-7, in front of an announced crowd of 5,105 (though newspaper reports indicated there were only 2,000 people there), in the only World Football League game played outside the United States.

Boisture and Grandelius badly wanted to put together a viable professional football organization, but the owners refused all requests for more money.

They couldn't pay their phone bill, and they were unable to reserve hotel rooms or fly to away games without advance payment.

Wide receiver Jon Henderson had to pay his son's hospital bill out of pocket after finding out the team's insurance policy was cancelled for non-payment of premiums.

The August 28 game in Philadelphia was carried by fledgling Home Box Office to its handful of subscribers, none of which were in the Detroit area.

Assistant coach Owen Dejanovich was forced to live in the basement of fellow assistant Chick Harris for a time because several landlords refused to rent houses to him when they found out he worked for the Wheels (even after sending one landlord $1700 to cover two months rent and security deposit, a large sum of money at the time).

The next choice was Charlotte, where former New England Patriots general manager Upton Bell was hoping to put together financing for a WFL team.

[2][3][4][5][6][7] With underfinanced ownership, an ever-changing roster (no fewer than 83 players appeared in least one of Detroit's fourteen contests in 1974), an ongoing recession, a non-existent fan base, and just plain bad luck, the Wheels had no chance to succeed.

A week later, Detroit dropped a 14-11 decision to the former Houston franchise, now in Shreveport (coincidentally, one of the cities the Wheels had considered moving to).

On October 7, in the face of $1.4 million in claims, Davidson postponed the Wheels' upcoming game against the Chicago Fire, and announced that the league would fold the team unless new owners could be found within three days.

[1] While the franchise officially folded on October 10, players and coaches had been taking their uniforms and personal items home with them for some time to keep them from being seized.

Playing in the tough Central Division with the league's two best teams, Memphis (17-3) and Birmingham (15-5), made things even more difficult for the hapless Wheels.

After the debacle, Dan Boisture, who had helmed successful teams at the high school and college levels, decided to leave coaching altogether.