Blast from the past: Detroit Wheels [[1974 - RIP)

**emu steve** · August-04-14, 12:26 PM

http://www.detroitnews.com/article/2...eels-went-flat

1974 was a crazy year. Nixon was impeached. The Detroit Wheels [[World Football League) went flat broke and into a ditch. My personal life wasn't much better that year [[I had a job so I wasn't flat broke but my life was in a ditch).

I remember this team although their life was so short it seems more like a hour than part of one season.

They played their games at EMU's Rynearson Stadium. As mentioned in the article, the team put up $ to add lights and renovations to the stadium.

I believe the Detroit [[or Ypsilanti) Wheels played night games until they went out of business.

I might have attended a game or two. How I found the stadium I don't know. Doubt they published Ypsilanti maps and mapping programs were a few decades away...

**EastsideAl** · August-04-14, 04:34 PM

I remember the Wheels well. One of the major owners of the Wheels was Mike Ilitch, who could barely afford to invest in the deeply under-capitalized franchise [[how times have changed...). Coleman Young, then newly in office, was a big supporter of the Wheels, which he saw as a potential replacement for the Lions, who were set to move to Pontiac after the 1974 season. But Tiger Stadium refused to rent to them, so they had to play out at EMU.

A girl I knew was the daughter of one of the many minority owners of the team, and we went out to Ypsi to see the team's opening game. It was a pretty pitiful bush league spectacle. The highly padded "10,000" fans they turned out for that game was the largest crowd they ever drew for the hopeless team, and they folded midway through the season with only a single win.

http://www.funwhileitlasted.net/2013...etroit-wheels/

A rarely seen Detroit Wheels helmet

In action, with QB Bubba Wyche

**emu steve** · August-04-14, 05:08 PM

I was there for the opening game and presumably one more.

Little did I know that later I would be going to Rynearson to watch EMU play.

**Downriviera** · August-05-14, 08:51 PM

Saw the Michigan Panthers but never these guys. Did the World Football League play NFL rules?

**EastsideAl** · August-06-14, 08:39 AM

Originally Posted by Downriviera

Saw the Michigan Panthers but never these guys. Did the World Football League play NFL rules?

The WFL used mostly NFL rules, or rules that would soon become NFL rules [[goalposts moved to the end line, hashmarks moved closer to the middle of the field, missed field goals come back out to the original line of scrimmage, overtime). The biggest difference was that teams got 7 points for a touchdown. TDs were followed by an "action point" for a possible 8th point, which was basically like a 2 point conversion but only worth a single point.

**Danny** · August-06-14, 10:16 AM

The World Football League didn't even last 14 weeks. Lots of poor investments, its players didn't receive more money and supplies. It effected the Detroit Wheels a lot. The WFL was about 1.4 million dollars in debt, It's franchise could pay if off in an instant, but they were having trouble paying other creditors.

What the WFL execs and its owners should have done. It's take the businesses one step at a time just the NFL when its football players didn't make any money to live on.

1. Get advertisers

2. Show how your product is competitive.

3. Throw in some other entertainment and build fundraisers.

Then WFL should survive like the NFL.