Spotlight

Pottstown Firebirds Atlantic Coast Football League

Pottstown Firebirds

May 17, 2017 5 Comments

Minor league football is – and always has been – so far off the radar in this country that it’s impossible to speak of there being any iconic teams.  The sport offers nothing like the Hershey Bears hockey team or Rochester Red Wings baseball club that have entertained locals for upwards of a century. To the extent that minor and semi-pro football at least has a cult favorite team – the sport’s answer to the Durham Bulls – it may well be Pennsylvania’s short-lived Pottstown Firebirds of the defunct Atlantic Coast Football League.

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historic Football

1984 Michigan Panthers media guide from the United States Football League

Michigan Panthers

June 1, 2014 No Comments

The Michigan Panthers were the original champions of the spring season United States Football League during the league’s 1983 debut season. The team launched the pro careers of future NFL stars Bobby Hebert (quarterback) and Anthony Carter (wide receiver), who sparked the Panthers to the USFL title as rookies. The Panthers played in the longest game in a professional football history, a 93-minute triple overtime playoff loss to Steve Young and the Los Angeles Express in June 1984. This also proved to the Panthers final game. The USFL’s planned move to a fall season in 1986 caused the Detroit-based Panthers to merge with the Oakland Invaders ahead of the USFL’s 1985 season in order to avoid going head-to-head with the NFL’s Detroit Lions in 1986.

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Honoring the Negro Leagues

Seattle Steelheads barnstorming poster

Seattle Steelheads

April 21, 2025 No Comments

The Seattle Steelheads were members of the West Coast Negro Baseball Association (WCNBA) in that circuit’s only season, 1946. The team was actually the Harlem Globetrotters baseball club and returned to barnstorming when the WCNBA ceased operations.

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Retro Hockey

Birmingham Bulls WHA

Birmingham Bulls (1976-1981)

May 16, 2014 No Comments

The Birmingham Bulls of the World Hockey Association were one of the first major pro hockey teams to make their home in the Deep South, sharing that distinction with the slightly older Atlanta Flames of the National Hockey League. The Bulls never posted a winning record and made the playoffs only once in three WHA seasons. But the team did make news for its controversial “Baby Bulls” youth movement that saw the team sign a parade of teenage stars from the junior ranks who would later go on to NHL stardom, including Ken Linseman, Michel Goulet, Rick Vaive, Pat Riggin and others. Read more…

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baseball History

Houston Colt 45s Program

Houston Colt .45s (1962-1964)

May 9, 2025 3 Comments

Houston’s dreams of landing a Major League Baseball team go back at least as far as the 1950s. The threat of a third major league, the proposed Continental League, yielded Houston a National League expansion franchise that was known as the Houston Colt .45s for its first three seasons.

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Soccer Indoor and outdoor

Utah Freezz World Indoor Soccer League

Utah Freezz

October 15, 2021 No Comments

The sport of indoor soccer spread across the country during the 1980’s and into the early 1990’s. Thanks to organizations like the Major Indoor Soccer League, National Professional Soccer League and the Continental Indoor Soccer League, practically every Major League city in the country had seen one or more indoor soccer teams come through town by 1999. Salt Lake City, Utah was an exception until the upstart World Indoor Soccer League (WISL) rolled into town at the E Center in West Valley in 1999.

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Arena Football

Quarterback Scooter Molander on the cover of a 1994 Las Vegas Sting program from the Arena Football League

Las Vegas Sting

March 18, 2012 No Comments

The purple and gold-clad Sting were Las Vegas’ first of several Arena Football League franchises. The team played at the newly opened MGM Grand Garden Arena in 1994 before moving to the Thomas & Mack Center for their final season in 1995. The franchise moved to Southern California under new ownership and became the Anaheim Piranhas in 1996. The AFL would try again in Las Vegas with the Gladiators (2003-2007) and the Outlaws (2015).

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Pro Basketball

1970-71 Sporting News American Basketball Association Guide

American Basketball Association (1967-1976)

March 25, 2012 1 Comment

The American Basketball Association (ABA) was formed in 1967 as a competitor to the established National Basketball Association (NBA). It started with 11 teams, and within a few years was angling for a merger with the older league. In 1976, the NBA took in four ABA teams, while three other surviving teams disbanded.

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Canadian Football League

Shreveport Pirates Canadian Football League

Shreveport Pirates

September 27, 2019 5 Comments

Yes, strange as it sounds, but the small, poverty-stricken city of Shreveport, Louisiana once had its very own Canadian Football League franchise: the Shreveport Pirates. The Pirates’ shambolic leadership made a series of head-scratching personnel moves, including the signings of troubled over-the-hill NFL stars Dexter Manley and Mark Duper, and fired the team’s first head coach before taking a regular season snap. Meanwhile the team staggered to a two-year record of 8-28 in the CFL before going out of business at the end of the 1995 season.

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HISTORIC UNIFORMS

Southern California Sun magenta jersey

Jersey of the Week

July 16, 2026 No Comments

Fun While it Lasted presents the Jersey of the Week, brought to you by Royal Retros. Each week, we feature a historic uniform. Click to learn more about the team that wore this classic gear.

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