Behind the 8-ball from the outset

Ohio Glory Head Coach Larry Little, left, and General Manager Peter Hadhazy had their work cut out for them in order to get the franchise ready for opening day.

If someone were tasked with putting together a timeframe for a successful launch of a professional football team, copying the one the Ohio Glory had to work with wouldn’t be a smart idea.

There were a couple major hurdles to clear before the Glory had an opportunity to come into being. First, the World League of American Football, which finished its first season as a National Football League-backed minor league in late spring of 1991, had to get the blessing from NFL owners to return for a second season. That didn’t happen until October 23, 1991 – about five months prior to what was to be the start of the 1992 WLAF season.

Second, WLAF higher-ups had to decide which city was going to replace the Raleigh-Durham Skyhawks, who went 0-10 and played to sparse home crowds during the league’s first campaign.

Whichever city was awarded the WLAF’s first-ever expansion team would have a lot of work to do – put together a front-office staff, coaching staff and a full training-camp roster from scratch – in a very short period of time.

On November 26, 1991 – less than four months until the start of the regular season – Columbus, Ohio, officially was announced as the site of the WLAF’s 10th team for the 1992 season. Sports-wise, Columbus mostly was known for being the rabid home of the Ohio State football program, and hadn’t had anything close to resembling an NFL franchise since the 1920s.

Columbus had been chosen over Washington, D.C.

Also on November 26, the WLAF made two other significant announcements – that the team would play its home games at venerable Ohio Stadium on the OSU campus, and that the team’s General Manager would be Peter Hadhazy, a former Executive Vice President/General Manager of the NFL’s Cleveland Browns. Hadhazy had prior alternative football experience as the Director of Operations of the United States Football League in the 1980s.

Starting life in a football-rich area, at a storied stadium and with a savvy football mind as a GM provided the franchise with a solid start. It didn’t, however, allow it to overcome the lack of time it had to prepare – or prevent an early negative public relations issue.

The franchise’s name – the Ohio Glory – was announced on December 16, 1991. The team’s colors would be Royal Blue, Nevada Red and White, and the team’s logo would be an eagle.

At the time, Hadhazy said of the name/logo, “Ohioans are very proud and patriotic people, and we believe the Ohio Glory and the American eagle symbolize the spirit and fiber of this state and local community. The logos and names of some teams aren’t dignified. I wanted ours to be dignified. I think it’s a great logo, one of the best in professional sports.”

While there was little to quibble about where the logo was concerned, the same couldn’t be said for the name. Not everyone was happy with the team’s name starting with “Ohio,” and not “Columbus.” Columbus Dispatch sports columnist Dick Fenlon said the team’s name added to the city’s identity crisis. The Dispatch also ran a story in which the majority of the local respondents viewed the name negatively.

The next step for the time-strapped Glory was to name a Head Coach. On January 22, 1992 – exactly two months before the regular-season opener – former Pro Bowl offensive guard and Head Coach at Bethune-Cookman Larry Little was announced as the franchise’s first field boss.

Little, who played on back-to-back Super Bowl-champion teams with the Miami Dolphins (1972-73) and led his alma mater for the previous nine seasons, received high praise from the likes of Don Shula and Marty Schottenheimer – which tipped the scales in Hadhazy’s mind.

“I have fulfilled my dream to move up to the professional level,” Little said at the time. “I have a lot of confidence in my ability. This is my biggest challenge, but I love challenges. I’m here to meet the challenge.”

If Little loved challenges, then he must really have loved the Glory.

Little’s coaching staff consisted of six assistants – Assistant Head Coach/Defensive Line Coach Wally Chambers, Special Teams/Linebackers Coach Mike Dunlevy, Offensive Coordinator Wally English, Offensive Line Coach Barry Pettyjohn, Defensive Coordinator Dennis Thurman and Running Backs Coach Joe Viadella.

In football circles, only Chambers, English and Thurman were known commodities. Chambers, the first assistant coach hired, played seven seasons in the NFL and had coached in the NFL and on the collegiate level. English had decades of experience at the NFL, major college and even international levels and counted Dan Marino and Jim McMahon as two of his quarterback pupils.

Thurman was a stellar and durable cornerback for the Dallas Cowboys in the late 1970s and early-to-mid 1980s, but the extent of his coaching history to that point was as a Phoenix Cardinals assistant in the late 1980s. He had been out of football for two years prior to joining the Glory.

With precious little time to accomplish each task, the Glory had its front office, talent evaluators and coaching staff in place.

      

 The next step – picking players.