1984: Walker & Generals Defeat Williams & Outlaws

The Oklahoma Outlaws were one of six new franchises in the United States Football League’s second season, and they had gotten off to a good start. Coached by Woody Widenhofer, the offense featured QB Doug Williams, formerly of the NFL’s Tampa Bay Buccaneers, with TE Ron Wheeler and WR Alphonso Williams the top receivers. However, after attaining a 6-2 record and keeping pace with the defending champion Michigan Panthers atop the Central Division, the Outlaws lost two consecutive games by big margins.

On May 6, 1984 the Outlaws took on the New Jersey Generals at Giants Stadium in the Meadowlands. The Generals were 8-2 and just coming off of a win over the Panthers the previous week. They offered no relief to a team with a slumping defense, and no relief was to be had for Oklahoma.

New Jersey scored on its first four possessions, taking a 28-3 lead by halftime and winning 49-17. The Generals dominated on the ground, outgaining the Outlaws by 219 yards to 56. Star RB Herschel Walker led the way, accounting for 127 yards on 16 carries with three touchdowns on runs of 62, two, and four yards. Walker’s backfield mate, FB Maurice Carthon, gained 77 yards on 14 attempts. Carthon also scored on a 9-yard touchdown pass from QB Brian Sipe.

Sipe only threw seven passes, but made them count as he completed six for 103 yards and two TDs. TE Sam Bowers scored the first touchdown of the game on a 13-yard reception. TE Jeff Spek was the top receiver for New Jersey, catching two passes for 67 yards. Only one pass was completed to a wide receiver – a five-yard reception by Clarence Collins – but all things considered, it hardly mattered.

Behind from the start, Williams passed often, completing 31 of 51 throws for 381 yards with a touchdown and three interceptions; one of the pickoffs was returned for a 19-yard touchdown by Generals LB Bob Leopold. Alphonso Williams and RB Andrew Lazarus led the Outlaws with 7 pass receptions apiece, for 95 and 84 yards respectively. WR Jack Steptoe also had 95 yards, on five catches that included a 47-yard touchdown reception. Lazarus was also Oklahoma’s top ground gainer, with 30 yards on 9 carries.

Things never got back on track for the Outlaws. They lost the remainder of their games and finished at 6-12 and in fourth place in the Central Division. Over the course of the 10-game losing streak, they gave up 308 points. New Jersey cruised to a 14-4 tally, good enough for second place in the Atlantic Division and a wild card spot in the playoffs; they lost to the eventual champions, the Philadelphia Stars, in the first round.

Doug Williams had a disappointing year, suffering a knee injury and throwing for 3084 yards with 15 touchdowns and 21 interceptions with a passer rating of 60.5. The lack of a strong running game (they were at the bottom of the league in team rushing), and the defense’s collapse that had the Outlaws constantly playing catch-up, certainly didn’t help his cause.

Alphonso Williams had a solid season, catching 50 passes for 1087 yards (a 21.7-yard average) and seven touchdowns (Williams led the club in receiving yards, but Ron Wheeler led in receptions with 51).

The hundred-yard game for Herschel Walker was just his third of an eventual five during the ’84 season. Playing with a sore shoulder, he ranked third in the USFL with 1339 yards on 293 carries with 16 touchdowns. Maurice Carthon also crossed the thousand-yard threshold for the season, with 1042 yards on 238 attempts and 11 TDs. Not surprisingly, the team ranked second overall in rushing for the year.

1985: Herschel Walker Runs for USFL-Record 233 Yards vs. Houston

Since signing with the United States Football League’s New Jersey Generals as an underclassman in 1983 after a legendary college football career at Georgia, RB Herschel Walker had gained a lot of yards and received his share of plaudits, but had taken criticism along the way as well. The problem was one of immense expectations for a player who had been a dominating force at both the high school and college levels.

While Walker had led the league with 1812 yards in ’83, the Generals had compiled a weak 6-12 record. And while the club went 14-4 and made it to the postseason in 1984, Walker ranked “only” third among the USFL’s rushers with 1339 yards. Moreover, he was criticized for running tentatively and being too quick to head out of bounds rather than challenging defending players for extra yards; in reality, a sore shoulder was hampering him and thus altering his style.

In 1985, the Generals added another Heisman Trophy winner, QB Doug Flutie, who took some of the media attention off of Walker. During the preceding offseason, the star running back had surgery to correct the shoulder problems. He started off slowly, gaining just six yards in the season opening game and averaging 83.3 yards over the first six contests.

But on April 7, 1985 against the Houston Gamblers at Giants Stadium, Walker broke loose for 233 yards, breaking the existing league single-game record of 208. Included were two touchdown runs, one an 88-yard sprint that also was a league high and another with a one-yard plunge on fourth down. Flutie contributed a seven-yard touchdown run as the Generals set a team rushing record of 343 yards and defeated the Gamblers, 31-25.

Houston, having won its first five games, dropped to 5-2 on the way to a 10-8 final record and third place in the Western Conference; the Gamblers lost to Birmingham in the quarterfinal playoff round. New Jersey improved to 4-3 and went on to finish in second place in the Eastern Conference at 11-7, also losing in the quarterfinal round to the eventual champions, the Baltimore Stars.

The record-setting performance spurred Herschel Walker to a record-setting season. Over the course of the 18 games, he accumulated 2411 yards on 438 carries for a 5.5-yard average with 21 touchdowns. He also led the club in pass receiving with 37 catches for 467 yards and a TD. His 22 total touchdowns made him the USFL’s scoring leader with 132 points and he was named MVP by both the league and The Sporting News.

At 6’1” and 222 pounds, Walker ran with both power and speed. While he was criticized for being strictly a straight-ahead runner without great instincts, he still gained 5562 rushing yards in three USFL seasons, and went on to add another 8225 yards in twelve years in the NFL (and that doesn’t count another 11,496 yards when adding pass receptions and kickoff returns). As Generals president Jason Seltzer once said, “No matter what Herschel does, it’s never enough.” But in the game against Houston, and over the course of his career, he did plenty.

1984: Steve Young Debuts with USFL’s LA Express

The April 1, 1984 matchup between the Los Angeles Express (2-3) and visiting New Jersey Generals (4-1) at the Memorial Coliseum before a small crowd of 19,853 didn’t provide any surprises; the Generals won handily, 26-10. But it did mark the first professional start for QB Steve Young, who had signed a 10-year, $40 million contract to join the USFL club after an outstanding career at Brigham Young.

The Express had failed to score more than 14 points in any of its first five contests, with Tom Ramsey and Frank Seurer splitting time at quarterback, and were ripe for an infusion of new talent. Young gave them that, completing 19 of 29 passes for 163 yards with a TD and an interception and also leading the club in rushing with 32 yards on six carries. His first pro touchdown pass was a nine yard toss to fellow rookie WR JoJo Townsell late in the second quarter, and at one point he completed nine consecutive throws.

“Steve is going to be a great quarterback,” said LA’s Head Coach John Hadl afterward. “He went up against one of the best defenses in the league and performed well. I like his leadership. He saw some things on the field that another quarterback wouldn’t see for a year.”

With his outstanding mobility to complement his passing, Young put together a solid rookie season. He completed 57.7 % of his 310 passes for 2361 yards with 10 touchdowns and 9 interceptions and ran for 515 yards on 79 attempts for a healthy 6.5-yard average and seven TDs. Moreover, he rallied the Express to a 10-8 record and the Pacific Division title. After averaging 10.7 points and 296.8 yards per game over the first five contests, the Express averaged 22.9 points and 338 yards the rest of the way.

It was a rather ordinary performance for the Generals, with star RB Herschel Walker gaining just 59 yards on 16 rushing attempts but scoring on a 50-yard pass play from QB Brian Sipe as he accumulated 66 receiving yards on three catches. The Generals outgained the Express on the ground, 111 yards to 56.

The 34-year-old veteran Sipe, a high-profile signee from the NFL’s Cleveland Browns who had started slowly in the USFL due to injury, completed 13 of 21 passes for 219 yards with two touchdowns. It was a solid outing for him as well, and afterward he commented, “This was probably my best game. I felt more comfortable than I have felt so far. And it was nice to see us do a lot of different things. My knee injury was a real setback to me, but each week, I seem to feel more and more comfortable.”

New Jersey went 14-4 for the season, finishing in second place in the Atlantic Division and qualifying for a wild card playoff spot. They lost convincingly in the first postseason round to the team that finished ahead of them in the division (and went on to win the USFL title), the Philadelphia Stars.

The greater significance of the game, however, which lasted far beyond the ’84 season and the USFL itself, was the beginning of Steve Young’s 17-season career (two in the USFL, 15 in the NFL) that ultimately earned enshrinement in the Pro Football Hall of Fame.

1983: Herschel Walker Signs with USFL

Football fans received stunning news on February 23, 1983 as the new United States Football League (USFL), slated to begin play in just a few weeks, announced the signing of Heisman Trophy-winning RB Herschel Walker to a contract with the New Jersey Generals. There had been something of a false start earlier in the month when Walker, whose agent had been in contact with the league for some two months, signed but then took advantage of a 24-hour escape clause to back away. However, this time it was a done deal and the 6’1”, 220-pound phenom, just short of his 21st birthday, was officially a professional.

The news was both surprising and controversial. Walker, who had been a Heisman candidate since his freshman year at Georgia in 1980 (he finished third in the voting), had won the award as a junior in ’82. It was widely anticipated that he would duplicate Archie Griffin’s feat of twice attaining the Heisman trophy, especially since at the time it wasn’t possible for underclassmen to enter the NFL draft.

The USFL had initially stated that it would follow the NFL’s no-underclassmen rule. It had also been the new league’s policy to take a go-slow approach to challenging the older league. They would be playing in the spring, rather than going directly head-to-head with the NFL in the fall, and payrolls were to be held to $1.6 million per club.

The payroll structure began to unravel even before the Walker signing as several major players coming out of college such as North Carolina’s RB Kelvin Bryant, Grambling WR Trumaine Johnson, and Michigan WR Anthony Carter had inked contracts that stretched their respective team payrolls beyond the limit (the owners used personal services contracts to circumvent the cap). Walker’s deal, which was a personal services contract with Generals owner J. Walter Duncan, came to $3.9 million for three years and included incentives that took the figure over $4.2 million.

Both the NFL and NCAA cried foul at the signing of the underclassman Walker, and several colleges banned the new league’s scouts from their campuses. USFL Commissioner Chet Simmons insisted that no other underclassmen would be signed and that Walker presented a “special case”. The truth was that, in having his agent approach the new league, Walker had already compromised his college eligibility for 1983, and had he pressed a court case, he might well have forced his way into the USFL through judicial decision (a threat of a lawsuit challenging the draft was something the NFL feared and ultimately led to its ending the ban on underclassmen).

There may have been plenty of controversy, but Herschel Walker was the biggest name in college football and a huge prize for the new league. Signing with the team that would play in the New York metropolitan area only enhanced the effect. It also assured that he would receive intense scrutiny, and when he started slowly (he gained just 65 yards on 16 carries in his first game, a nationally-televised 20-15 loss to the Los Angeles Express) the criticism was quick to come. However, maintaining his composure throughout, Walker ended up leading the league in rushing with 1812 yards over the course of the 18-game season, although the Generals were a disappointing 6-12.