The Kanas City Monarchs are perhaps the best known Negro Leagues baseball team of all time. They played from the inception of the first Negro league in 1920 until finishing up as a barnstorming team in 1965.
The Harrisburg Capitols were a minor league football outfit in Pennsylvania’s capital city during the mid/late 1960’s. The Capitols were members of the Atlantic Coast Football League. The ACFL was a bus league with clubs clustered in New England, New York, Pennsylvania, Maryland and Virginia. From 1966 to 1969 Harrisburg served as a farm club for the NFL’s Baltimore Colts and the team went by the name “Capitol-Colts” during the 1968 and 1969 seasons.
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.
The Salt Lake Golden Eagles hockey team was a popular mainstay on the Utah pro sports scene for a quarter century. That Eagles endured despite the shocking and untimely deaths of two team owners, the collapse of two hockey leagues of which they were members, and several 11th hour rescues from financial calamity.
Omaha, Nebraska has hosted the top farm club of the Kansas City Royals since the Major League club’s inception in 1969. Initially known as the Omaha Royals, the Class AAA club won four league championships of the American Association, including back-to-back titles in their first two seasons in 1969 and 1970. The Royals survived the closure of the American Association, joining the Pacific Coast League in 1998. From 1999 until 2001, the team was briefly known as the “Golden Spikes” before returning to the Royals nickname. In 2011, the club re-branded as the Omaha Storm Chasers while simultaneously moving into the new $36M Werner Park.
Major League Soccer (1996-1999) Born: June 15, 1994 – MLS founding franchise Re-Branded: October 27, 1999 (San Jose Earthquakes) First Game: April 6, 1996 (W 1-0 vs. D.C. United) Last Game: October 6, 1999 (W1-0 vs Kansas City Wizards) MLS Cup Championships: None (during Clash era) Stadium: Spartan Stadium (26,000) Team Colors: Cloudy Jade,
Arena Football League (1987, 1989-1990) Maryland Commandos Born: 1987 – Arena Football founding franchise Folded: Postseason 1990 First Game: June 19, 1987 (L 48-46 @ Pittsburgh Gladiators) Last Game: July 28, 1990 (L 37-28 @ Dallas Texans) Arena Bowl Championships: None 1987 & 1989: Capital Centre (17,000) Opened: 1973 Demolished: 2002 1989: Baltimore Arena
The Oakland Oaks were charter members of the American Basketball Association (ABA) and were introduced, along with the rest of the new league, on February 2, 1967. The franchise’s initial investors were league co-founder Dennis Murphy, along with Los Angeles-based insurance executive S. Kenneth Davidson. The latter pulled in entertainer Pat Boone, an avid basketball fan.
In the spring of 1982, the Canadian Football League’s venerable Montreal Alouettes franchise collapsed under a mountain of debt. Seeking a clean slate for new ownership, league officials folded the Alouettes on May 13, 1982 and awarded a new Montreal expansion club to Seagram’s liquor baron and Montreal Expos founder Charles Bronfman the next day. The club embarked on a star-crossed four year voyage under the new name “Concordes”, drawing inspiration from the iconic supersonic transatlantic jets of the era.
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