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  • CFL Ends U.S. Expansion, Retreats Back to Canada

    On Friday February 2, 1996, the Canadian Football League officially ended its American expansion efforts. During the CFL’s annual winter meetings, the league announced that the Birmingham Barracudas, Memphis Mad Dogs, San Antonio Texans, and Shreveport Pirates were ceasing operations. And the Baltimore Stallions, having just won the Grey Cup a few months earlier, were…

  • Pirate Ball Comes to the CFL

    Of all the U.S. cities that the CFL awarded teams to as part of its American expansion in the 1990s, Shreveport had to be the most obscure choice. Whereas the other cities had teams in the defunct World League of American Football (e.g., Sacramento, San Antonio, and Birmingham) or were brought onboard after failed NFL…

  • A Fan Remembers the Baltimore Stallions

    Doug Phillips was just five years old when his father took him to his first football game at Memorial Stadium in Baltimore, Maryland. He got to see the Johnny Unitas, the legendary quarterback of the old Baltimore Colts NFL team. Sadly, the Colts left for Indianapolis in 1984, leaving the city of Baltimore without professional…

  • CFL Adds More American Teams

    After the Sacramento Gold Miners joined the Canadian Football League in 1993 and despite some scepticism and opposition, the league sought to grow its footprint in the United States with additional teams in 1994 and 1995. Here is a look back at some of the CFL’s other American-based teams. Las Vegas Posse The CFL’s second…

  • Winnipeg Leads Opposition to CFL American Expansion

    When the Canadian Football League rolled out American expansion in the early 1990s, support for the idea was far from unanimous. Yes, proponents argued that U.S. expansion was the way forward to grow the league and to help stabilize the struggling Canadian teams. But detractors countered that the CFL simply stood too much to lose…