The Turbulent Revival of the Arena Football League (Ep. 1) - 2024 return after five-year hiatus

X1 Media/X1 Investigates and Arena Insider dives into the historic return of the Arena Football League. In this series we break down the league starting under a new company, tension between owners and players, claims of unfulfilled promises, a change in leadership and more all over the span of 10 weeks.

Part one highlights the AFL in 2019 and the difficulties starting back up in cities and arenas for 2024. 

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Episode Transcript

(00:00):
New tonight the Arena Football has suspendedoperations. It was very depressing to know
that this happened for the simple factthat they cut out what you love to
do. Well. Now league isback under new ownership. Hi, Lee
Hutton, AFL Commissioner. The AFLis back, Baby. There's some questions
tonight surrounding the newest version of theArena Football League. It was a scammed

(00:22):
again with the bat spot very bad. There will be a lawsuitcoming. Some
goods or stuck here and our headcoach was not there. Unfortunately, I
have to retire slash quick. Thereto day. Lee needs to answer his
phone, Lee Hutton, there's nowhereto be found right now. Lee Hunton,
the third ousted as commissioner of theArena Football League. The team is
voted and they don't have any money. That is your group aware of those

(00:48):
claims and are you planning to addressthem? I'd like to extend the formal
apology to the Arena Football League community. Getting from season one to season two
is going to be a significant jumpfor us. Let the celebration begin in
Albany, the Albany Empire, theCity of Champions for the first time in

(01:12):
twenty years their second ANFL tond TommyGrady are Transfinder, player of the Game,
embraced Buyer's teammates, and by theSoul Jimfetti ranged down at the Times
Union Center. In a statement today, the Arena Football League announcing that they

(01:34):
filed for bankruptcy and they are fullyceasing operations. This means we won't be
seeing any more al many Empire gamesat the Times Union Center and a big
loss today for fans of the PhiladelphiaSoul and the Atlantic City Blackjacks. The
Arena Football League is no more Tonightthe Communion Tonight, the Arena Football has

(01:55):
suspended operations for its six member franchises, the Columbus Destroyers. The Destroyers just
returned to Columbus this year after morethan a decade out of business. Sports
director Jared Smalley here now with whatwe've learned about why they're shutting down for
now. It's very simple comes downthe money, and the Arena League operators

(02:15):
say they are facing significant financial troublesrelated depending multimillion dollar lawsuits filed by a
former insurance provider for the league.Was that a difficult time when the league
folded and there was just uncertainty foryears. Yes, it did, it
was. It was. It wasvery depressing to know that this happened for

(02:38):
the simple fact that, you know, when it cut out what you love
to do, you know what Imean. It's very disheartening. But the
main thing is what it did tothe fans too, you know, I
know, I know the fans werevery upset about it. Let the celebration
begin. The Philadelphia So are thetwenty sixteen read the Bowl champions? I

(03:02):
meant they cardon. I'm the founderof Arena Insider and an ex one media
based out of Philadelphia. I startedin May twenty fourteen, originally as Philadelphia's
sole Insider, before expanding to coverthe entire Arena Football League later that year.
From twenty fourteen to twenty nineteen,we were fortunate to have several photographers
and riders or insiders as we callthem, covering teams from the East to

(03:25):
the West coast. When the leagueseized operations in twenty nineteen, I shut
down the site and had no plansto keep it running. Then, on
February first, twenty twenty three,I just randomly saw the league trending on
line, so the league sent outa short press release with two words quote,

(04:10):
we're back now. The announcement wassignificant at the time because not only
is it the return of a historicleague, but also Lee Hutton third was
labeled as the first black commissioner ofa pro sports league. And it's an
amazing responsibility, a responsibility that Itake very seriously. But when somebody kind
of you know, tugged my coach, I didn't know it was true.

(04:31):
Because there's so many wonderful people ofcolor who've done amazing things in the c
suite, executive Kevin Warren, who'snow the president of Chicago Bears, and
just to be just among these pioneersin the discussion is just a wonderful humbling
feet within itself. So Hutton isan attorney based out of Minnesota. His

(04:57):
wife, Deanna is also an attorney, any owner of the now defunct Minnesota
Myth, one of the expansion teams. According to Lee, she was also
the first Latino woman to be ownerof a professional sports team. I remember
years ago when I was dating mynow husband, we were we were watching
football, we were watching the Patriots, and he was like, if you

(05:18):
were to play football, what positionwould you play? And now immediately without
even thinking. I was like owner. He's like, that's not a position.
No, that is a key position. If you don't have a good
leadership. If you don't have agood leadership, you don't have anything.
So when this opportunity presented, Iwas like, Yeah, why not,

(05:42):
I can do this. Oh.A few months later, the league released
this video revealing sixteen teams listed,but the twenty twenty four season then include
eight of them Austin, Texas,Tallahassee, Florida, San Antonio, Cincinnati,

(06:05):
Denver's, Chicago, Bakersfield, California, and Boise. Instead, the
league announced a merger with the ChampionsIndoor Football League and acquired the south West
Kansas Storm which it's our Regulators,Rapid City, Marshall's, and Salona Liberty.
The other four teams were the AlbanyFirebirds formerly known as the Empire,
Iowa Rampage, Georgia Force, andBillings Outlaws. We purchased the Billings Outlaws

(06:30):
in late twenty twenty two when itwas in distressed, worked hard in twenty
twenty three to turn the organization around. Had the opportunity to join the AFL
for the twenty twenty four season andthought it was a great opportunity to bring
the Billings Outlaws onto a national stage. And you know, the Outlaws are
a historic franchise in the indoor inarena football industry. They've been around for

(06:54):
nearly on and off for nearly twentyfive years, and we're the first two
IFL champions. So it was anopportunity to bring the arena game to Billings.
And at the time I thought itwas an amazing opportunity to showcase arena
football to Billings, montag to theother leagues were kind of infant. What
I want to do as we moveforward, and I can't do this without

(07:15):
your help and your guidance is toreally make indoor football one of the top
three I watched sports here in thiscountry. Leading up to the beginning of
the season, this started to bemany early red flags that I kept a
close eye out on from a journalist'sstandpoint. Many team websites and social media

(07:39):
accounts weren't set up home venues,weren't listing games, and I reached out
to league officials for interview request andnever heard back. But what truly got
my attention was when the league heldthe media day in Albany without any media
present. Hey, guys, weare out here at twenty twenty four AFL
Media Day and you can't wait toseek you and how became New York for

(08:01):
the first game of the season onApril twenty seven. Usually, if you
have a media day, you invitejournalists ahead of time, maybe some season
ticket holders whoever, and you allowthem to ask questions, get to know
the team in the league, especiallywith their being new management. But the

(08:22):
people I talked to that was atthe event told me there was barely anyone
there. Another red flag was theschedule release. Some teams had more road
games than home or vice versa.The Louisiana Voodoo had to change cities and
venues at the last minute. Thenthere's the Georgia Force, who had all
ten games scheduled to be on theroad. Initially, when I first signed,

(08:43):
we had five home games. Mymoam works for Georgia State University.
We were being told at one point, we're gonna use Georgia State's new basketball
convocation center for the arena, andso I'm asking her, like, hey,
do you have any connections to knowI for really playing there, and
she wasn't really hearing anything about it. And so I'm like, okay,
well it's it's a little weird,but we're we're we're fine, We're gonna

(09:05):
have home games whatever. And thenmaybe a week after I'd signed, right
before training camp had started, wherethe league is posting saying we're going to
be a travel team only, andthat's right after the Philadelphia Soul was announced
to be a travel team, andthen they kind of reversed that and said
they found a home arena in NewJersey or something like that. So Philadelphia,
you know, they have this arenaand a location where it's it's there's

(09:28):
not many arenas out there, andthey have a lot of a lot of
people tugging at that arena and that'sbeen a tough situation. Now listening to
the fans, that's one team I'mbringing back. Me and Trevelle said,
we are bringing back for the PhiladelphiaSoul. We don't care what we have
to do. And I think weaccomplished that. Uh. And so you
know, navigating them having home gamesand doing some away games has been a

(09:54):
challenge, you know, with theschedule, and that's been kind of the
delay. But well far, that'sa number one place that Philadelphia Soul has
always been known to play, andbut there's also that issue that they're having
as far as finances, like it'sthey're trying to charge an awful lot of
money for the philadelph Your Soul toeven play. It's not they're not saying

(10:16):
that they didn't want us to.It's just that it's they're trying to make
us pay a substantial amount of moneyto do so. And not only that,
it's not just because of past thingsthat happened. A lot of it
is due to they're doing a lotof new construction in there, and of
course they got to be able topay for those things, and of course
inflation they're putting those prices up therenow, so you know, and their

(10:41):
main thing is you got to paythe play. And thereafter I haven't heard
from the man since that's that's misterHutton. I haven't heard from and having
spoken to him, and you know, and then everything was just left in
the air. Questions is There's amillion questions that's left in the air as
far as the team is concerned.So it's very frustrating. Next on part

(11:01):
two, I don't think anyone wasprepared for the domino effect that started that
week. I got to the airport, I got to the gates. There
was maybe one or two players theretelling him that he's going to open an
investigation on the team. The AFLhad failed to pay their rent or providing
an insurance certificate. Coach got veryfrustrated with players on the team and said,
I'm done with y'all. I'm noteven buying any else food. It's

(11:22):
on y'all for the night. Thisinjunction was never supposed to take plays.
There has been some issues as faras just getting people to talk together,
and they took that money and ranwith it. HI, this is Anthony
Carter with Arena Inside It. Thankyou so much for tuning in to Part

(11:43):
one of the turbulent revival of theArena Football League. Remember you can follow
us on all social media platforms atArena Insider. You can also like and
subscribe to us on our YouTube channels, and of course, for all the
latest news and other developments around theArena Football League, just visit our website
area insider dot com. Stay tunedfor Part two.