I wonder how that conversation went? Dude we are sinking this ship - let’s get Jeff Fisher to lead this dumpster fire. He doesn’t have much else happening in his life.
3 Likes
“Ahh, yep.”
1 Like
So here were how events unfolded last weekend alone after all else as chronicled.
Imagine being a player in this league wondering if the visiting team is going to show?
We shall see if anybody else poops the bed later today or on Saturday this weekend as we observe this slow-burning dumpster fire.
On Friday, May 10, the West Texas team worked out its beef with the competing arena league, and the injunction was lifted. But the day didn’t bring all good AFL news! Minnesota Myth coach Rickey Foggie resigned. Players for the Myth had threatened a boycott prior to last week’s season-opener over missing paychecks, before agreeing to play. The Myth are owned by Diana Hutton, a Minneapolis lawyer, and her husband, the league commissioner. Shortly after news of his departure broke, Foggie, a local hero since his college days quarterbacking the Minnesota Gophers, reposted a tweet tagging Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison and saying, “You need to look into this fraud immediately.” Neither of the Huttons commented publicly on the Foggie matter.
On May 11, Philadelphia Soul general manager Kelly Logan announced his team—which is actually based in Trenton, N.J.—was done for the season. The club had fired all its players before the season opener against the VooDoo, after they demanded promised pay. The fired players were also kicked out of the Super 8 motel where they’d been staying, because the team hadn’t paid the hotel either. The Soul played the VooDoo using the roster of the Dallas Falcons, a team from a rival confederation called the American Arena League 2.
Also on the 11th, the Albany Firebirds announced that Monday’s scheduled home game against the Myth, the Huttons’ team, had been canceled because the would-be visitors "can not [sic] make the trip” to New York.
Which brings us to Saturday night’s events in Rapid City: Marshals players refusing to come out of the locker room to face the visiting Billings Outlaws unless they were paid back salaries, and the game being canceled one hour before kickoff, with the Outlaws already warming up on the field.
None of the injunctions or cancellations or foldings were mentioned on the homepage of the AFL’s website (or, for that matter, under the “News” tab). Hutton did not directly respond to Defector’s requests for comment. Blackbears president Johnson, himself an NFL veteran and childhood friend of Hutton, said Hutton had told him multiple times he was going to call this reporter to discuss the debacle. Hutton did not follow through.
2 Likes
Now this is more confusing following the leavers and joiners.
On one hand it’s good to have ownership figured out but how to they rebuild relations with sponsors and fans but folding and restarting on the fly?
Why not start the groundwork for 2025 with the league under new management?
2 Likes
Sponsors might be tricky but if the owners have business dealings with them outside of football it would be easier. You would have to do a deep dive on what business the owners were in and who the sponsors were and most won’t bother for Arena football.
As for the fans, I can only go by CFL fans in Vancouver. If they are similar in any way, then most of the fans wouldn’t even know the team had folded in the first place.
Before my fellow Lions fans object to what I’m saying, I’ll remind them that when Rourke was injured, a huge amount of fans went to the next game expecting to see Rourke playing that night. They had no idea he was injured.
2 Likes
A great expose` of the league’s failure via the perspective in Georgia is at hand here. In my opinion, this smells like FRAUD, though generally speaking, criminal fraud requires the element of intent in court.
Can you imagine reporting to work anywhere yourself for any given job and being told the following?
‘Your Money Should Be Here Today’
The first team meeting was held April 14 at a Savannah Suites hotel near the airport. No motivational speeches were given; no playbooks were distributed nor overarching football philosophies outlined. Roquemore spoke in broad terms, talking about overcoming obstacles and promising, “We’re going to be fine. It is what it is,” is how Camay remembers the talk. The overall tone was one of nonchalance. “It wasn’t setting us up for success,” Camay said.
Before the team meeting, players received an email instructing them to have a doctor conduct a full physical, Arth said. The Force would not cover the costs. Without insurance, it could run between $500 and $600, so he and some teammates went to a local Walgreens. That Monday, April 15, the first practice was held. The team didn’t provide pads, helmets, or uniforms; no one brought a ball, except for Arth, who always carried a few footballs with him and began throwing to receivers. On Tuesday, their equipment arrived, but not the footballs, which took until Wednesday. Even then, they ran only about three or four plays. Coach [Durwood] Roquemore remained sanguine.
Once again, Roquemore swore they’d be made right. “Just got off the phone with the commissioner. Your money should get here today,” Spann said the coach promised. There was one positive development: Force players were asked to submit their banking info before the Oregon game, which felt like progress.
The money never landed in their accounts. Monday’s practice was canceled at the last minute. The same went for Tuesday and Wednesday. No one knew whether they were going to take the field that weekend. On Thursday, May 9 at 8:55 p.m. ET, the hammer fell.
3 Likes
About 30 or more years ago, I became interested in the history of defunct sports leagues and I tried to get my hands on anything related to the ‘70s World Football League. (The early ‘90s were devoid of the internet so the pickings were slim.)
I finally found this documentary from NFL films this year.
While there are differences between that and the Arena League (the WFL thought they could compete with the NFL and signed stars like Larry Csonka,) there are a lot of similarities that we’re seeing happen in real time.
3 Likes
Awesome - If you and I ever crossed paths - I could see this conversation spiraling out of control and us getting booted from the bar at closing time still discussing why the various leagues failed.
4 Likes
For sure, that would be me walking into that bar and conversation to join you both and for the drinks too.
/Receives text from whomever who is late to contact me anyway
//Responds
“Hey get back to you to tomorrow evening, at work and in business meetings now and all day tomorrow”
Cheers.
3 Likes
The dumpster fire continues to burn. It’s a wonder who will show up on US Memorial Day weekend, plus there’s that part where bills have to be paid with money.
It does appear though that all 10 remaining teams did play since Thursday night.
Or is it 11 damn teams? Somehow Rapid City are still listed, yet they have only played two games this season.
https://www.theafl.com/stats#/1999/standings?season_id=4976&render=division
Since the signing of Jeff Fisher as Commissioner as a Hail Mary to save the league, there has been NO NEWS released on the Arena Football League site.
Take it from the UFL and their craptastic marketing and promotion in the preseason, SILENCE is not golden as a pro sports league guys!
Fix your damn sports league or just forget it!
2 Likes
Oh well, so I ventured last night to watch something different on YouTube, and I went at it with this documentary on the World Football League.
Here are a few thoughts:
- Wow do I definitely not miss old cable TV. There were many moments when I wanted to change the channel in this one.
- I thought the documentary glamorized the league when in reality it just looked crappy and scrappy overall.
Now on a positive front, I did take interest in the comments of the three star players of the Miami Dolphins, who essentially jumped to the league because the owner was being rather cheap relative to their success there.
Akin to the USFL a decade later, when the NFL owners are not operating on the level with regards to players compensation and treatment, a competitor and all the more grief that came with it via the litigation with the USFL emerges.
In the end the NFL won that battle with the USFL as well and learned some hard lessons, and now the owners know well to engage to influence or control any given football upstart early given the disruption to NFL success that any such success can cause at the very least.
As via the current UFL that was no doubt put together with heavy engineering and influence of the NFL from the start via its proxy and major media partner most especially Fox, now the owners and coaches see the upside of all these other leagues with regards to another source of player development beyond the mounting stranglehold that is at hand now with the current battle between football players supposedly attending a university for education and the NCAA.
2 Likes
2 Likes
As the slow-burn continues, apparently some OTHER arena league is adding a team in … Eau Claire, Wisconsin!
If you like folksy articles such as in small-town newspapers as if in the year 1998, check out this homer article, for it is written in a style as if from a time portal to 1998.
Who knew there were so many arena leagues, and what the heck are they doing!?
The Arena League launched this year with four teams: Duluth, Minnesota; Waterloo, Iowa; Kansas City, Missouri; and Springfield, Missouri. Eau Claire and Hot Springs, Arkansas will join next year.
No, none of these look like new markets for the UFL.
I figure that the UFL would be in Kansas City already if that were a true option, for otherwise it would make sense geographically and seasonally.
1 Like
I think they meant that an old timer said, “Oh Claire, ya wanna catch that new-fangled arena football thingy they got down at the county fairgrounds?”
2 Likes
This must be a different Arena League. They said, “ The Arena Football League (AFL) is probably the best known. It shut down in 2019, but plans to relaunch this year.” And said there are only four teams in the league.
3 Likes
Well perhaps like me and others, you all do enjoy a good dumpster fire, and well, we certainly do have one for you all right here tonight.
So winless Rapid City is at winless Washington tonight, scheduled it appears for 9PM ET, with Rapid City making a return to play after only two games this season.
The great news is there shall be a new winner!
Sort of like the soup du jour, that sounds good.
Well, at least that’s the plan as indicated on the league’s website:
https://www.theafl.com/stats#/1999/schedule?season_id=4976
Then there are games through Saturday with 10 total teams of 11 playing each week.
Or at least that’s the party line.
One team each week is the cheese standing alone, and well nobody likes to cut out without a big show, for as I heard long ago, there’s no sense going down quietly as opposed to in style. Wait, you mean like that Thelma and Louise or, huh?
It appears that the score for one game scheduled on Saturday is already posted,
Oregon 0, SW Kansas 2
I’m not sure how this advanced result works for a pro sports league unless it’s perhaps two legendary prophets who are playing the game in advance, but wait, gridiron football did not exist at the …oh never mind, let’s move this along.
Hmmm…the league can manage over a holiday weekend without as much scrutiny or fuss, but those bills do have to be paid by the end of the month for all of us right?
Maybe we learn something definitively after this prolonged slow-burn of this league.
Inspired perhaps now by the current action movies thread, I’d just assume that Colonel Braddock and his team would take out the league office at 3AM ET Sunday morning, and definitely the server room, with a barrage of automatic fire plus a strategically-aimed grenade launcher so as to help it out of such misery so as to get to the other side in a more caring and compassionate fashion.
Discuss.
https://forums.cfl.ca/t/what-bothers-you-in-movies/91983/60?u=paolo_x
1 Like
That is from our sports central. I think the one that is the most stable is the IFL - they have been around for at least 15 years.
4 Likes
This discussion of all these leagues, in which there is clearly an interest by many players, reminds me of a prison football team and not the lame remake of that “The Longest Yard” either.
There are a number of NFL Hall of Famers on the Texas State prison team as we can see.
Now can you imagine playing a football team of inmates that they would give a flying leap about penalties?
Anyway, it is a true story that during the NFL strike in 1987, a team of replacements / scabs of the Washington Redskins defeated the actual Dallas Cowboys with eight to ten starters who decided to cross the picket line.
The backup Washington quarterback, Tony Robinson, was on prison release, and he led them to a win!
Behold the power of dreams, folks.
3 Likes
Also Joe Gibbs was a great coach and prepared for the strike by keeping tabbs on players so when the time came he had a good team. I read a story by him that on an NFL roster the top 15 players are heads and shoulders above the rest of the roster. Think Lawrence Taylor.
Gibbs then said from player 16 to player 120 on the roster is not that significant of a talent drop off like there is from the first 15.
3 Likes
So upon further review,
no, really, let’s examine this attempt to salvage the season so far.
So I’ve learned that apparently 2-0 is the forfeit score, so one game this weekend has already been forfeited. How does that sound to you?
This team in Rapid City had apparently forfeited a game on 11 May in the aftermath of the steaming hot dumpster fire at hand.
From 13 to 18 May things appeared somewhat normal given a run of competitive games.
Then the scores in the last two games have been 66-15 and 76-20 in favour of the home team. Does this sound like a pro league at all?
Since the announcement on 14 May that Jeff Fisher is in charge, where has he been? You guessed correctly, NOWHERE, publicly at the very least.
The latest score was the apparent return of Rapid City to play in Washington last night. Do they sound like they are ready to play or give a damn? I wonder if those players were paid before the game or at all?
There is one game tonight and two on Saturday before the league is scheduled to resume on 1 June.
Place your bets now, for the bills are due that day of course.
I would not be surprised if this is the last cash grab on a holiday weekend simply so they can pay the players on a few teams before they pull the plug by 31 May.
2 Likes