Honestly if that’s true I’m impressed. Given his history a contract violation leading to expulsion shows growth. He also apparently doesn’t drink anymore. I’m kind of rooting for him. Assuming it’s not another domestic violence issue.
At least at this point that’s not who’s playing in the AAF. 81 percent of AAF players have been under contract to NFL teams
The league skews towards those looking for a second chance. It’s mostly not players the scouts ignored.
Reading between the lines of what the CFL commissioner and the Montreal GM said, I think Manziel was drinking or something.
I don’t think we disagree. Yes, the teams that previously cut these guys already know them and mostly won’t re-sign them. But their scouts are certainly looking for *other *guys who could maybe help on the scout team or kickoff coverage or something. This league is sort of like the Combine in that regard - which reminds me, they’re missing something by playing when the Combine is going on, taking scouts away from their games.
Which is made somewhat harder, as the AAF doesn’t have kickoffs to cover.
Latest report is that he was booted for missing mandatory meetings (doctor appointments and therapy). It sounds like this was a “get out of contract free” card that he chose to play.
He has already been invited to workouts with the AAF.
Filed under: We can’t have nice things…
AAF moved/negotiated next week’s Orlando/Birmingham game to TBS next week because they’re arguably the two best teams in the league and would be a match-up of undefeateds.
…Then the Iron proceed to lose :rolleyes:
They’re still the two best teams, but you can’t market it as a battle of the unbeatens anymore.
Manziel has, in fact, signed with the AAF, and he’s been assigned to the Memphis Express, after the San Antonio Commanders (who would have had rights to him, since he played at Texas A&M) gave up his rights.
https://www.si.com/nfl/2019/03/16/johnny-manziel-aaf-signs-player-agreement-memphis-express
That said, when I look at SI.com and ESPN.com, other than the Manziel story, I’m not seeing any coverage at all of the AAF. I suppose that I’m not surprised – as I sort-of predicted earlier in the thread, we’re now in mid-March, and other sports news (NCAA basketball tournament, NFL free agency and the upcoming draft) have taken a lot of the oxygen out of the room.
For those of you living in AAF cities – are the teams still getting signfiicant local coverage?
Other than seeing Facebook ads for ticket deals (Buy 2 get 2 free all in a row) I haven’t seen all that particularly much. Which is a bit of a shame given that we’re the best team in the league and Orlando is a bit starved for winning sports.
Although I should say, as a caveat, that they could be getting news local news coverage. Since I got the SirusXM I’ve abandoned ESPN radio and I haven’t watched a newscast since, oh, the 90s. They could be getting some media coverage from that but I wouldn’t know.
I’ve loved watching the games and I routinely tune into the games that DON’T feature Orlando. It’s too bad the season will die at the end of this year.
I was curious, so I went to the Orlando Sentinel’s sports page. Now, granted, the last Apollos game is now 48 hours ago, but the only Apollos story on their entire page is a photo gallery link (to photos from Saturday’s game) fairly far down on the page. They do have a link to Apollos news on the black banner at the top of the Sports page, but it’s buried in the “More” dropdown menu. Following that link, there’s a pretty long story about Saturday’s game (which I imagine did show up on the main sports page yesterday).
Ha.
Sign of the times that I basically forgot the Sentinel existed.
It’s OK, it looks like the Sentinel has come close to forgetting that the AAF exists.
I also went over to AL.com (the news website for the media company which publishes the Birmingham News and the Huntsville Times). Their sports page is filled with stuff about Auburn’s and Alabama’s spring football practices, NCAA basketball, and local high school sports. There’s one Iron story, about yesterday’s game, which is pretty much buried by comparison. The menu for the sports page has lots of links to various teams and sports, including specific links for four Alabama-based minor-league baseball teams, but no link for the Iron. 
I mean, we all knew it would happen…but man this makes me mad. I genuinely enjoy watching the games even outside of my hometown team.
Sigh…
And, interestingly, they’re laying the issue at the feet of the NFLPA, which is apparently refusing to let players who have NFL contracts from playing in the AAF.
Which I think is code for “The NFL won’t give us money to make the league what we intend for it to be”.
AAF needs money that’s for sure and the NFL can give it to them, as well as players, and the league would be fine…but they can’t ask for money.
Frankly, they don’t need the players because they have them even without the help of practice squadders.
I kind of had the impression that they were basically launching the season with the intent of “proving” to the NFL that they could be a viable development league for them, and then hoping the NFL would buy them out, or subsidize them.
I mean, nobody seriously expected the AAF to be an actual profit-making concern, did they?
I’ve seen a little bit of this league, and I’m not impressed. The play looks to be slightly below the level of big time college ball, and the empty stadiums just don’t generate much excitement.
It’s code for “We can’t afford to pay our own players.”
They were expecting the profit to come from their fantasy football app that is constantly advertised during their games’ commercial breaks.