# Alliance of American Football: What went wrong?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/alliance-of-american-football-what-went-wrong/847027>\
**Category:** The Game Room\
**Created:** [January 27, 2020, 12:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/alliance-of-american-football-what-went-wrong/847027 "2020-01-27T00:02:09Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Showing post:** 7

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![kenobi\_65](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kenobi_65/32/13178_2.png) [@kenobi\_65](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kenobi_65)\
**Post date:** [January 27, 2020, 12:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/alliance-of-american-football-what-went-wrong/847027/7 "2020-01-27T00:46:11Z")

</div>

Found the old thread:

[https://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=870490](https://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=870490)

Go to page 3 of the thread for posts that related to the league’s sudden shutdown.

What I didn’t remember until re-reading the thread was that one of their big selling points at the time was an app that let fans make real-time bets on player performance, which apparently never was really completed.

Also, I’d linked to an [SI.com](http://SI.com) story in that thread about the shutdown. Quoting myself:

> [@AAF 1 (football)](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/aaf-1-football/829272/180):
>
> While walking to the train from my office today, I saw a woman wearing a San Diego Fleet sweatshirt, and I thought to myself, "I have to believe that there’ll be some behind-the-scenes journalism going on, about what went wrong with the AAF.
> 
> And, in fact, there’s [a long-form article on SI.com](https://www.si.com/nfl/2019/04/30/alliance-american-football-aaf-collapse-charlie-ebersol-tom-dundon) this week, by Conor Orr, on it. A few key bits:
> 
> - Tom Dundon apparently had no interest at all in the tracking / wagering smartphone app (which turned out to not have lived up to its initial promises before the plug was pulled).
> - The AAF was forced to bring in Dundon when one of their initial investors, Reggie Fowler, wound up having his bank accounts frozen, when he was charged with bank fraud.
> - When Dundon came on board, he forced Charlie Ebserol off of the league’s board of directors.
> - The league filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy, “claiming some $11 million in assets against $48 million in liabilities. Cash on hand: $536,160.68.”

---

_[View the full topic](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/alliance-of-american-football-what-went-wrong/847027)._