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NEWSMAKER: BERNIE GLIEBERMAN Enemy
No. 1 in Ottawa
CBC Sports Online | April 9, 2006
Bernie Glieberman (left) during happier
times with son Lonie. (CP Photo) |
The third time proved to be no charm for Ottawa
Renegades owner Bernie Glieberman.
Commissioner Tom Wright put the Renegades up for sale on March 22
after the CFL rejected a financial proposal tabled by Glieberman that
called on the league to give the team a $2-million loan to help fund
the 2006 season.
After failing to find a new owner, the CFL decided to mothball the
Renegades for a year, announcing on Apr. 9 it had suspended operations
for the franchise for the 2006 campaign.
Glieberman, a Detroit-area businessman, bought the Renegades last
May, becoming the majority owner in a deal worked out with fellow
owner Bill Smith. But in February, both of them indicated they would
not be willing to continue to invest in the team.
The Renegades lost nearly $4 million last year, a figure that was
estimated to rise to $6 million this season. With this in mind, Glieberman
approached Wright.
However, the league and the other eight team owners decided not to
lend a helping hand to Glieberman, who was in his third stint as the
head of a CFL franchise.
This is not the situation Glieberman
had in mind when he and son Lonie bailed out the Renegades prior
to the start of last season, just as it did with the troubled Rough
Riders for two years in the 1990s.
But when you consider how their latest tenure in Ottawa began, maybe
it's not so surprising.
The Gliebermans didn't take long to make a personnel change, installing
71-year-old Forrest Gregg as the Renegades' new vice-president of
operations, even before holding the press conference announcing
they purchased the team for the second time.
It was a decision many questioned: Gregg, a Hall of Fame offensive
lineman and former CFL and NFL coach, had been out of pro football
for 10 years.
Even more controversial was Lonie's scheme to lure a younger crowd
to Renegades games by running a Mardi Gras promotion where men were
given beads to hand out to women, who have traditionally earned
the trinkets in such contests by baring their breasts.
At least things looked good on the field for a while, but even that
didn't last long. Ottawa began the year with a 5-3 record but then
lost six in a row and finished third in the East Division at 7-11.
It was the team's fourth straight losing season.
Before Ottawa's final game, the Gliebermans announced Joe Paopao,
the club's popular and likeable coach, would not be back for the
2006 campaign, creating even more discontent among Ottawa's fickle
football fans.
Bernie and his son have had a tenuous relationship with Ottawa football
fans ever since first setting foot in the nation's capital in 1991
with wads of American greenbacks and promises aplenty.
Bernie, a third-generation builder and sole shareholder of Detroit-based
Crosswinds Communities, the construction company he established
in 1971, bought the Rough Riders that year for a buck, assumed nearly
$1 million in debt and - temporarily at least - revived the team's
fortunes before turning it into a three-down circus.
Backed by Bernie, and fronted by Lonie, Ottawa finished a respectable
9-9 that first season and its stock rose. After all, it marked the
first time since 1979 that the Riders had played .500 football.
But one year and several misguided moves later, the Riders were
the CFL's laughing stock and the interventionist Gliebermans became
public enemies No. 1.
Lonie fired general manager Dan Rambo on the eve of the 1993 CFL
season, a move that proved to be the first of many mistakes made
by the impish, if not immature, team president.
Mistakes continued, like bringing former all-pro sack machine Dexter
Manley and his considerable cocaine habit to town, despite the fact
he was banned by the NFL. Not to mention washed up, as CFL fans
quickly discovered.
When Glieberman ordered the coaching staff to start Manley, and
to bring back training-camp cuts Reggie Barnes and Brian Bonner,
assistants Jim Daley and Mike Roach quit in disgust.
Lonie's bodyguard remained loyal, however, making headlines after
he got into a fight at an Ottawa bar. Lonie himself raised a ruckus
by dating Riders cheerleaders.
Fans scoffed at Lonie's hilarious pursuit of former NFL head coach
Mike Ditka and fumed over Bernie's constant threats to relocate
the team stateside.
Instead, Bernie sold the Riders to Bruce Firestone for $1.85 million
and established the Shreveport Pirates, considered a key element
in the CFL's (failed) expansion into the United States.
As he left for Louisiana, Lonie was sued by the City of Ottawa for
monies owed and, in turn, filed a countersuit.
The Pirates posted an 8-28 record over two seasons in steamy Shreveport
before local politicians politely showed Glieberman the door.
With no football to be played in the nation's capital in 2006, don't
expect Bernie Glieberman to return to Ottawa a fourth time.
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