Texas was given its first NFL franchise. The Dallas Texans. To say the least they were a far cry from the current Dallas Cowboys, to put it mildly the Dallas Texans were an NFL joke—a very bad joke.
With a roster of wide-eyed greenhorns and broken-down old hands, the Texans were saddled with a legacy of failure. When their first and only season was half over, they were kicked out of town and forced to wander the league as vagabonds. At year's end they disbanded, becoming the last NFL team to fold.
The Texans were the offspring of losers, the New York Yanks, who lost so many games and dollars for owner Ted Collins that he gave the franchise back to the NFL. A few weeks later, commissioner Bert Bell awarded the franchise to millionaire Giles Miller in Texas, which had long been a hotbed for college and high school football. Declared Miller, "There is room enough in Texas for all kinds of football." But not bad football.
On opening day, only 17,499 curious spectators watched the New York Giants welcome the Texans to the league with a 24 -6 drubbing. The fans had seen more than enough, and the Cotton Bowl turned into an empty echo chamber during the next 3 home games. Unable to meet his financial obligations, Miller turned control of the team over to the league. The squad was moved to Hershey, Pennsylvania, where it held loosely organized practices. For the second half of the year, the Texans traveled the country as an itinerant road team, although they performed more like a vaudeville road show.
They drew more flies than fans. While losing 11 of 12 games, they scored a per-game average of only 15 points and gave up a whopping 35 points per game. They finished last in total yards, missed 7 of 27 extra point attempts, and failed on all four field goal attempts.
Coach Jim Phelan had no luck with the kicking game. He tried turning collegiate passing star Don Klosterman into a kicking specialist even though the rookie wanted to be the team's quarterback. Unfortunately, Klosterman missed a field goal and was cut the next day. Before leaving, Klosterman claimed he deserved another chance. Later, when the team reviewed the game film, Phelan stopped the projector after seeing Klosterman's failed kick. The coach backed up the reel and ran the play over again. "There," he told his players. "Who says I didn't give Klosterman a second chance?"
One reason why the team stunk was that Phelan hated practice as much as the players did. Once, after they ran a few plays without fouling up, Phelan stopped practice, loaded everybody on a bus, and took them to the racetrack. Some players didn't take games all that seriously either. Rookie guard George Robison, for one, was always cracking jokes in the huddle. He certainly had plenty of material just from watching the team play. One of his favorite lines was asking a teammate in the huddle, "What comes after 75?" The teammate would answer, "76," and Robison would come back with, "That's the spirit!"
The Texans' only win ever came at the expense of the Chicago Bears in, of all places, Akron, Ohio. The game was slated as the second part of a Thanksgiving doubleheader. The morning game pitted two high school teams, who played to a full house. Then almost everyone went home before the start of the pro contest.
Looking over the few fans in the stands, Phelan told his troops, "Instead of running under the goal posts for introductions, let's just go up and shake hands with everybody. It would be faster. It won't take more than a minute or two."
Chicago coach George Halas took the Texans for patsies and played his second stringers until the Bears trailed 20-2. The Texans held on for a shocking 27-23 victory. Flushed with success, the Texans prepared for their next opponent, the Philadelphia Eagles. Not wanting to be a victim of an upset, Eagle coach Greasy Neale sent a scout to watch the Texans practice in Hershey. When the scout returned, he told Neale, "You're not
going to believe this, but they were playing volleyball over the goal posts." The Texans reverted to form and lost 38-211 to the Eagles. In their very last game, the Texans were trounced 41-6 by the Detroit Lions. Late in the game with the score 41-0, they finally made a touchdown, prompting Phelan to shout, "We've got them on the run now!"
When the season ended, half the Texans—twenty players-quit pro football. Among them were nine rookies who wished they had stayed in college. Twelve others went to the league's newest franchise, the Baltimore Colts. Lamented Phelan, "We got all the breaks—and they were all bad."