United States Football League (1983-1985)
Tombstone
Born: May 11, 1982 – USFL founding franchise
Folded: August 4, 1986
First Game: March 6, 1983 (L 20-15 @ Los Angeles Express)
Final Game: July 1, 1985 (L 20-17 vs. Baltimore Stars)
USFL Championships: None
Stadium
Giants Stadium
Opened: October 10, 1976
Demolished: February 4 – August 10, 2010
Branding
Team Colors:
Ownership
Owners:
- 1983: J. Walter Duncan
- 1984-1985: Donald Trump
Attendance
Tap (mobile) or mouse over chart for figures. Tilting your mobile device may offer better viewing.
Source: Kenn.com Attendance Project
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Background
When the United States Football League (USFL) launched in 1982, founder David Dixon introduced franchise owners from 12 cities. Key to the league’s success, he felt, was having a team in New York City, which the USFL did, although it would soon be named the New Jersey Generals.
Trump Passes
When Dixon lined up potential owners for his new springtime football league in 1981, he approached real estate mogul Donald Trump about taking the New York franchise. Trump was initially interested but bailed just before a conference call with fellow prospective owners.
Instead of joining the new league, Trump decided to head up a six-man syndicate, fronted by former Washington Redskins and L.A. Rams coach George Allen, to purchase the Baltimore Colts. The group offered Colts owner Robert Irsay $50 million but was turned down. Trump would later claim that Irsay was asking too much, but newspaper reports indicate that Irsay wasn’t interested in selling to anyone and had declined several offers.
Meanwhile, Dixon convinced Oklahoma oilman J. Walter Duncan to take on the New York franchise. Duncan, in turn, brought in Chuck Fairbanks as a minority partner, GM, and head coach. George Allen wound up in a similar position with league’s Chicago franchise. Trump, though, did not show any interest in rejoining the fledgling league.
What’s in a Name?
Upon being hired, Fairbanks insisted that New York would be part of the team’s name and identity no matter where it played in the metro area. The only practical option for a home, though, was Giants Stadium in East Rutherford, New Jersey, across the river from Manhattan.
The team inked a 20-year deal with the New Jersey Sports and Exposition Authority, who insisted the team’s geographical name be New Jersey. On the same day the lease was signed, the team announced it would be known as the New Jersey Generals.
On the Field
The Generals’ first game was scheduled for March 6, 1983, in Southern California against the Los Angeles Express. A month before the league kicked off, the Generals scored a major coop when they signed Heisman Trophy winner Herschel Walker, an underclassman from the University of Georgia. While his $4.2 million contract went way above the league’s per-team salary cap, fellow owners knew the young running back would provide the league instant credibility. If attendance was any indicator, the plan worked, at least for the Generals. Despite a 6-10 finish, they drew over 41,000 fans. That was third-best in the league.
Duncan quickly grew tired of commuting from Oklahoma to watch his team’s home games and wanted out. He soon found a buyer in one Donald J. Trump, who purchased the Generals on September 22, 1983, for $10 million.
Trump Returns
Trump fired Fairbanks and pursued several high-profile candidates for the head coaching position, including Joe Gibbs, Don Shula, and Joe Paterno. Former Jets head coach Walt Michaels got the gig. The new owner then set about signing several big-name free agents. Cleveland Browns quarterback Brian Sipe, San Francisco 49ers linebacker Bobby Leopold, the Kansas City Chiefs’ Gary Barbaro, as well as Jim LeClair and Dave Lapham from the Cincinnati Bengals, signed with the Generals for the 1984 season.
The influx of talent propelled the Generals to a 14-4 record in. However, they lost in the first round of the playoffs to the eventual league champions, the Philadelphia Stars. A month after the July championship game, Trump began lobbying hard for the league to abandon spring and switch to a fall schedule in direct competition with the National Football League (NFL).
By November, on the heels of a lawsuit filed by the USFL against the NFL for antitrust violations, Trump had convinced most of his fellow owners to switch to a fall schedule starting with the 1986 season.
In USFL lore, Donald Trump is the man who single-handedly killed the league. Indeed, if there is one person who shoulders most of the blame, he’s the top candidate, as it were. However, he had lots of help, and his reasoning wasn’t unsound, merely unfortunate.
A Possible Merger?
Trump, or someone close to him, realized, probably even before he bought the Generals, that the way to owning an NFL team wasn’t through an expensive purchase of an existing or expansion team but through a rival league like the USFL. In 1983, almost half the NFL’s teams had come from leagues that at one time challenged the established circuit. Four NBA teams and four NHL teams had made the leap from rebel leagues just a few years earlier.
Trump gambled that the NFL would sue for peace and take in at least some USFL teams, including his. His accomplices, many losing far more money than they had anticipated, hoped for the same, or at least to be paid off.
In testimony during the USFL’s lawsuit against the NFL, Trump denied that that was the strategy. The NFL, however, produced a letter from Myles H. Tanenbaum, owner of the Baltimore Stars, contradicting that claim.
Shortly after the start of the 1985 season, the owners cemented their plans to move to fall, regardless of how the lawsuit turned out. The Generals did not look like a lame duck at this point, as they signed Heisman Trophy winner Doug Flutie, the former Boston College star quarterback. Sipe was unceremoniously shipped to the Jacksonville Bulls.
Third and Final Season
As the starter, Flute struggled initially but eventually found his footing. A broken collarbone suffered during a Week 15 game against the Memphis Showboats ended his season. The Generals finished with a mark of 11-7, still good enough to make the playoffs.
However, they lost in the first round to the Stars, now in Baltimore, just as they had the year before. In the off-season, in preparation for fall 1986, the Generals merged with the Houston Gamblers, with the former as the surviving team. This brought star QB Jim Kelly and WR Ricky Sanders to New Jersey. Teamed up with Walker, the Generals looked unstoppable. The dream team, though, never took the field. The USFL won its lawsuit but was famously awarded only $3 in damages. On August 4, the Generals and the other seven surviving teams suspended operations, never to return.
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Editor's Pick
Football For A Buck
The Crazy Rise and Crazier Demise of the USFL
By Jeff Pearlman
The United States Football League—known fondly to millions of sports fans as the USFL—did not merely challenge the NFL, but cause its owners and executives to collectively shudder. In its three seasons from 1983-85, it secured multiple television deals, drew millions of fans and launched the careers of legends such as Steve Young, Jim Kelly, Herschel Walker, and Reggie White. But then it died beneath the weight of a particularly egotistical and bombastic team owner—a New York businessman named Donald J. Trump.
In Football for a Buck, Jeff Pearlman draws on more than four hundred interviews to unearth all the salty, untold stories of one of the craziest sports entities to have ever captivated America. From 1980s drug excess to airplane brawls and player-coach punch outs, to backroom business deals and some of the most enthralling and revolutionary football ever seen, Pearlman transports readers back in time to this crazy, boozy, audacious, unforgettable era of the game. He shows how fortunes were made and lost on the backs of professional athletes and how, forty years ago, Trump was already a scoundrel and a spoiler.
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In Memoriam
Linebacker Rod Shoate (Generals ’83) died of AIDS on October 4, 1999. The former Oklahoma Sooner was 46.
General Manager Jim Valek died on September 4, 2005 at age 77.
Original Generals owner J. Walter Duncan died of Parkinson’s disease on February 21, 2009 at the age of 92.
Linebacker Ray Costict (Generals ’83) passed away at age 56 on January 3, 2012.
Head Coach Chuck Fairbanks (Gens ’83) passed on April 2, 2013 of brain cancer. Fairbanks was 79.
Downloads
May 1985 Generals Orders Newsletter
May 1985 General Orders Newsletter
June 1985 Generals Orders Newsletter
Links
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