Dave’s Football Blog

Yes, I know, NFL training camp is in full swing, and I shouldn’t be wasting this precious blog space on dirty indoor football news, but I just thought you should know about this, and besides, it’s got local implications here in NC…

Five teams from the American Indoor Football League announced today that they’re telling the fledgling league to piss off and forming their own league. The World Indoor Football League — which is appropriately named if you think “World” means “that area of land between West Virginia and Florida” — begins play in 2007 with the following teams (former league in parens):

Augusta Spartans (AIFL)
Charleston (S.C.) Sand Sharks (NIFL)
Daytona Beach Thunder (AIFL)
Huntington (W.V.) Heroes (AIFL)
Osceola Outlaws (NIFL)
Raleigh Rebels (AIFL)
Rome (Ga.) Renegades (AIFL)

Let’s get this out of the way now. WIFL? What marketing genius came up with that? Do you really want your football league’s acronym to remind people of cheesy plastic baseball-like toys? Look at the geography of the teams. Was “Southern Indoor Football League” such a terrible name? Isn’t that the point of this new league?

Anyway, the league itself will be operated as a collective of the owners, rather than by a single president. Harry Pierce, who co-owns both the Renegades and Rebels, was instrumental in forming the league in this fashion after dealing with two different league presidents — NIFL president Carolyn Shiver and AIFL president Andrew Haines — who proved to be about as good at running football leagues as Maurice Clarett is at staying out of trouble. Having a stake in two teams, though, makes Pierce the head honcho of this new league for now.

Conspicuously absent from this list, though, is the Richmond Bandits, the 2005 AIFL champion whose game tape feud with the Rebels earlier this year resulted in their exile from the league. Somehow, I don’t think Pierce’s group is interested in rebuilding that bridge, even though it would be good for building those regional rivalries that help minor leagues grow.

Pierce says more teams are expected to join the WIFL in the coming weeks. I suspect one of them will be the Fayetteville Guard, which is competing the NIFL championship tonight in that football hotbed of Billings, Montana. That team probably doesn’t want to announce it’s switching leagues before competing for a championship — especially after the team attempted to move that game to Fayetteville on a technicality and has openly talked about switching leagues. I’d also like to see the Greensboro Revolution join this league, though it seems that team’s owner isn’t such a nice guy. Having someone say they “would rather pass a kidney stone than ever deal with him again” isn’t what you would call a quality reference.

Still, Raleigh v. Fayetteville and Raleigh v. Greensboro are marketable matchups here in NC, and this new league desperately needs to flex a little marketing muscle if it wants to succeed next spring. Local media in Raleigh literally had no clue that the Rebels even existed this year. The WIFL needs to work something out with local sports bars and radio stations in these markets, or it’s going to be just as invisible as every other indoor football league that doesn’t have “Arena” in its name.

Here’s the WIFL’s temporary web site. I’ll keep an eye on this story, because once the NFL season is done, we have to have something to fill the void…

UPDATE (7/31): Dan Ryan wrote in to say that he was misquoted by Yes Weekly with regard to Greensboro Revolution owner Anthony Pewonski. The actual quote?

The fact that I would delight in Tony Pewonski passing a kidney stone the size of a grapefruit probably says as much about my flawed character than his business practices.

Certainly wouldn’t want to get that wrong. Dan also says that the WIFL considered calling itself the Continental States Football Union, or CSFU — which, of course, isn’t any sort of commentary on NIFL owner Carolyn Shiver. Not at all.

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