USFL Expansion Finalists Announced

Sporting News, April 6,1986

Today in their New York headquarters the USFL has reported on the eight final expansion which were put forward by its expansion committee. These eight finalists will be reviewed by all 16 current franchise representatives, and a vote on the four expansion franchises is expected to take place during the league’s spring meetings in Tampa Bay later this month. As anticipated, with Chicago already pre-approved for one of the 4 expansion clubs, a necessity if the league wishes to retain its current television contracts, there are two competing Chicago bids. The other six bids represent six cities hoping to obtain a USFL franchise for the first time: Atlanta (GA), Miami (FL), Portland (OR), San Antonio (TX), San Diego (CA) and Seattle (WA).

While one might expect that cities such as Seattle, Portland, and Atlanta, which represent regions or states without current franchises, should have a leg up in this competition, but inside sources seem to indicate that the expansion committee minimized potential clashes between expansion locations and current franchise locations in their vetting process, favoring instead market demographics, ownership qualifications, stadium suitability, television market, and financial backing. With no inside sense of which factors will win out during discussion among the owners, we have to expect that some owners, such as Tampa Bay’s John Bassett, Houston’s Jerry Argovitz, or LA’s Alan Harmon may try to argue that having a franchise in Miami, San Antonio or San Diego will produce financial hardship for their franchises. How much this will overshadow other interests remains to be seen.

While not a lot has been made public about the various bids, basic research on the different locations and ownership groups may help us predict which franchises may be joining the USFL in the spring of 1987.

CHICAGO

Bidding Group 1: Led by Eddie Einhorn, minority owner of the Chicago White Sox of MLB, the Einhorn bid seems to focus on the ability of the franchise to use the cozier confines of Comiskey Park over the larger, and often with the 3 years of the Chicago Blitz largely empty Soldier Field. There are questions about the financial structure of the proposal, and the liquidity of Mr. Einhorn’s holdings. Additionally, there are concerns that Major League Baseball may balk at the dual ownership aspect of this bid, as well as the potential for poor optics as the White Sox and USFL franchise share the baseball stadium from April through July.

Bidding Group 2: This group, which includes a larger pool of investors, is headed by the principal owner of the Chicago Black Hawks NHL franchise, Bill Wirtz. Unlike the Einhorn group, Wirtz’s consortium plans to retain use of Soldier Field. While there remains some concern about dual ownership with this group, the concerns are certainly less formidable than with the White Sox, since the venue will be distinct and there is no conflict of interest regarding use and maintenance of the facility.

ATLANTA

Ted Turner, another MLB owner, has put in this proposal, and again the same potential concerns arise. Can the Braves and a USFL franchise effectively share Atlanta Fulton County Stadium? Will the USFL franchise be a secondary (or tertiary) franchise in its own stadium? Unlike Chicago, the Atlanta bid has some regional advantages. The South has proven to be an attendance leader in the USFL, and while some may voice concerns that an Atlanta franchise will draw away from the Jacksonville and Birmingham fan bases, there are others who believe that all 3 fan bases would be exclusive and that natural rivalries, split along the lines of already existing SEC fanaticism, will only fuel greater interest in the USFL rivals in the South.

MIAMI

Sherwood “Woody” Weiser, a Miami-based real estate developer, is the face of this proposal. Again we are looking at another southern team, and there has been concern expressed by Tampa Bay owner John Bassett about cannibalization of the fanbase of the Bandits should Miami be awarded a franchise. The team would seek to play in the Orange Bowl, and with no MLB in the Miami area, the market is clear, however, there have been concerns that the owners of the Miami Dolphins will try to assert pressure on the Orange Bowl with claims that between the Dolphins and U. of Miami Hurricanes, the field is already a concern, and that adding a spring team will not provide the field adequate time to revitalize and strengthen after the fall football season, leading to a gradual breakdown of field quality. Whether that argument will take shape or not is yet to be seen, but in several other aspects of importance to the USFL, Miami looks promising.

PORTLAND

Considered a definite black horse in this race, Portland, Oregon is looking at some potential negatives, particularly in comparison to its neighbor to the north, Seattle. The Portland Civic Stadium is small by comparison to most other cities under consideration (just over 30,000) and USFL officials may fear another situation akin to what led the Breakers to leave Boston. The market is considerably smaller than several others, including Seattle, and there is some uncertainty about the long term viability of an ownership group led by sneaker producer Phil Knight. While Portland can boast a growing, high income market, and no competition from MLB in the Spring, we have to view the Portland bid as perhaps the weakest at this time.

SAN ANTONIO

A second team in Texas seems a natural, but there are some concerns about the San Antonio bid. First off, the proposed AlamoDome is several years away from coming to fruition, and if it fails then the franchise would be resigned to a clearly past-its-prime Alamo Stadium for the foreseeable future. The market is a good one and is growing rapidly, the love of football in the region is undeniable, and the closest parallel, Houston, has done well financially despite struggling to put together a winning team. The ownership group, led by local businessman Clint Manges, has been under some scrutiny, and may be one of the proposals with lower capital investment capacity, but can the USFL pass up on creating a natural rival for the Gamblers and getting a stronger foothold in the gridiron-mad state of Texas?

SAN DIEGO

The bid put together by Fresno-based developer William Tatham has a lot going for it. The funding is there, the potential for another location with good early spring weather, a west coast addition to help balance the expansion across the league’s four divisions, but it also has one big issue: Los Angeles. Not only has the LA Express ownership expressed consistent resistance to the San Diego bid, the struggles of LA to garner considerable attention in Southern California, to attain solid attendance, and to develop a passionate fanbase is well-documented. Tatham will argue that San Diego is not LA, and that the two cities should not be seen as sharing the same fanbase. There will also be the need to obtain a solid lease on Jack Murphy Stadium, home to the NFL’s Chargers. Tatham is in negotiations, but the foundations of a deal are not yet in place, and that may concern USFL owners who are wary of potential NFL-USFL stadium complications.

SEATTLE

The Seattle bid is an interesting one in that the city boasts several attractive features, but the ownership group creates concern. Seattle is a high income, growth market, with a solid NFL fanbase. It boasts two suitable stadiums, the King Dome (home to the Seahawks) and Husky Stadium (home to the U. of Washington), and while the Mariners are potential competition for both attention and revenue, they have hardly been a major force in the city’s sports culture. The biggest concern is that the proposing ownership group seems to have identified these factors, rather than a local connection, as the reason for selecting Seattle for the proposal. The investment group, headed by Henry John Heinz (yes, of the ketchup Heinz) is based predominantly out of Washington D.C. and Pennsylvania, not the Northwest. Other than a couple of 1-2% investors with Seattle ties, there is nothing which links the ownership to the city. Now, that can work, as was seen when the Buffalo Bills were created despite Ralph Wilson’s ties to Detroit, not Buffalo. So the question is whether or not a coveted market with a carpetbagging ownership group is a direction the league wants to go.

Our prediction: We readily admit that we simply do not know what the 16 USFL owners will do, but we are going to take a shot in the dark and say that San Antonio, Miami and Seattle will win out as the three expansion franchises. There is still a good shot for San Diego, and the Chicago decision is too close to call.