SportsFullCircle

The Arena Football League has been dead now for six months. Its counterpart, the independent af2, died one month later. This might have been the end of arena football as we knew it, but a great surprise came in the end of September. In Tulsa, Oklahoma, home of the af2 Tulsa Talons, it was announced that a group of the former af2 teams would form a new arena league, called Arena Football One. Since then, the league has grown by huge lengths and may become the dominant arena league in the country.

On September 29, 2009, the owners of eleven af2 teams united to form Arena Football One, which would be headquartered in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Soon after, two former Arena Football League  teams, the Arizona Rattlers and the Orlando Predators defected to the AF1. Then, the Utah Thunder of the AIFA defected to the AF1.  The fledgling new league had built a stock of respectable teams and set its sights on twenty teams.

The new league, now one month old, then ran into trouble with keeping teams with the league. One of the first eleven teams, the Kentucky Horsemen, went bankrupt. Then, two of its initial teams, the Arkansas Twisters and Tri-Cities Fever, left for the Indoor Football League, while another, the Central Valley Coyotes, became noncommittal. Key in this decision making was the rumor that the new league would be divided into two divisions, one for the more marquee markets such as the Milwaukee Iron and Orlando Predators, and one for the smaller markets such as the Tulsa Talons and Spokane Shock.

Luckily, though, the league would bounce back. Two more former AFL teams would join the new league, being the Tampa Bay Storm and Cleveland Gladiators. Also, the league announced the creation of three new teams in large cities, being Chicago, Dallas, and Jacksonville. Then, with the AFL’s assets being put up on the auction block after filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection, Arena Football 1 was considered a stalking horse to these assets. In the end, Arena Football 1 won these assets with a bid of $6.1 million, a small portion of what the AFL was worth. This also allowed for AF1 teams to adopt or keep AFL logos or team names. This was the case for Cleveland, Dallas, Tampa Bay, Arizona, Orlando, and Chicago.

Since then, the new league has established itself as an effective league for next year, setting a schedule for their teams next year as well as divisions for the teams. It is possible for new teams to join before the season kicks off on April 2, but highly unlikely. Among the teams rumored to join the league next season include the former af2’s Albany Firebirds and Toronto Bullfrogs, as well as the AFL’s Kansas City Brigade, New York Dragons, and San Jose SaberCats.

The AF1 appears ready to become the new dominant arena league in the United States, with a plethora of talent and a firm plan set for their inaugural season.