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GUNSLINGERS
TRIVIA |
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| Under
the terms of the Gunslingers expansion franchise
agreement, the team was required to expand Alamo
Stadium to 62,000 seats by 1986. |
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| The
total cost of the San Antonio Gunslingers
franchise, including interest, was to be $6.25
million. Divided among the surviving 12
league teams from 1983, each team was to receive
$208,333 from the 'Slingers in 1983, $90,250 in
1984, $106,917 in 1985, and $115,333 in 1986. |
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Gil
Steinke, the first (and third) head coach of the
Gunslingers, coached Texas A&I (now Texas
A&M-Kingsville) to six NAIA football
championships during a quarter century of
coaching. His record there was an impressive
182-61-4. Steinke died on May 10, 1995 -
almost 12 years to the day of the announcement
that the USFL had been formed.
While viewed largely today as a team on the same
level as the Washington Federals/Orlando Renegades
or the 1985 Los Angeles Express in terms of
hopelessness, and despite its two-year winning
percentage of just .333, the Gunslinger football
team, particularly in its maiden 1984 season, was
no pushover. Eight of the team's 12 losses
in 1984 came by a touchdown or less, and while the
team went without paychecks during the final three
weeks of the 1985 season, they still managed to
win two games.
The Gunslingers were owned by South Texas Sports,
Inc.
Among the provisions in the Gunslingers franchise
agreement with the USFL was a provision
prohibiting the league expanding to Austin, Texas.
Though the San Antonio Gunslingers died, Clinton
Manges lives on. Now in his 80's, Manges
financial situation rebounded along with the oil
industry as a whole, and today he lives on his
ranch in Freer, Texas.
To listen to an MP3 file of Jim Simpson doing
play-by-play when the lights went out in Alamo
Stadium, click
here. |
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