DawgTalkers.net Forums DawgTalk Tailgate Forum AAF - what are your thoughts?

Wow, 1 and done. Talk about not even putting in a good effort.

I think the league had potential. It started out rough, which I think was more to do with continuity and players still learning to gel with each other.

It has definitely improved over the weeks.

Wonder if McMahon and the XFL are still going to run next year?

I was thinking maybe in a couple years there might be an AAF vs XFL championship

I don't think it's 1 and done just yet... they are only suspending operations, not folding. I would imagine they'd want to get this rectified very very soon to keep viewership. It may fold, it may not, but it sounds like they need an investor.

OK, that is funny.

If they had only signed Kaep.

j/c:

They better get it resolved quickly.

Who is going to want to invest any interest if they stay suspended for any length of time?

Sounds like things were planned very poorly from the get-go. Were they expecting to sell out all stadiums from Week 1 on? They weren't meeting payrolls and needed a major investor just two weeks into the season, and now they are talking about folding unless the NFL makes some major concessions towards practice squad players. Those are usually the kinds of things you want sorted BEFORE you start the season.

Their total team payroll could not have exceeded $31 million. Coaches maybe $20 million total. (a guess on my part) They had a $75 million influx of investment money, and they also has a TV contract. There has to be more to the story, because the dollars don't add up.

Another ugly attempt at professional football.

The only way this works is if the NFL takes control of it and operates it as a farm league.

I thought that the football aspect was getting pretty good. Not NFL good, but at least college+ good. They had solid ratings, and in fact, TNT actually added games because of the solid viewership.

There has to be something we don't know.

They're probably just tanking for a couple of years so they can build for the future.

[img]https://goo.gl/images/hBjFpy[/img]

LOL.. you're rich.

Probably average income. Only 1 house, ya know?

Well, gee, I heard there was an Atl team, and my ears perked up. And now its over. I guess I will go back to watching AU lose.

I would think anyone involved with the XFL should be questioning their plan. With high school, college and the NFL, I think Americans get their fill of football (plus with having the NFL lead headlines during the offseason too). I don't think enough people need/want spring football. How many leagues has it been now? USFL, World League, XFL, AAAAAF and then the XFL again?

The AAF was drawing eyeballs.

Absolutely.

This was predictably doomed from the start.

The lowest rated NCAA Women's b-ball tourney game drew a larger audience than the AAF recently.

Trending down since week one.

XFL will fail as well.

Yeah, I think the articles and such I've been reading had false information. I feel like this won't resolve. A shame.

Based on what Milk Man posted, it was "drawing eyeballs", but the total eyeballs were quite low. If an AAAAAAF game couldn't beat a women's college basketball game, not mocking the women's game, but that's bad for a new league trying to create buzz.

This is anecdotal but I don't know anyone outside of this board that watched a single second, and I know a lot of diehard sports fans.

If they had lots of eyes watching on TV and butts in the seats, I think the league wouldn't care if they could access NFL practice squad players. I think that's an excuse for them folding (errr..."suspending operations"). I don't believe the comments that viewership was ever promising (or promising enough to sustain the league going forward).

I don't take joy in the league folding. Lots of "regular people" lost jobs and that sucks. The rich folk will write their losses off and move on, they'll be fine.

Bear in mind that the NFL Network does not have full "clearance" across all cable/satellite providers. This limits their available viewers.

NFL Network draws big on their NFL games, but much of their programming is rerun/stock type programming.

I went looking for viewers per channel, but it's hard to find solid numbers. The site below says that the NFL Network is the 55th rated network, and averaged only 287K viewers in 2018.

Top-Rated Channels of 2018: TV Network Winners & Losers | IndieWire
https://www.indiewire.com/2018/12/networ...abc-1202030597/

TNT adds March 9 and March 23 AAF games after AAF ratings beat some NHL and MLS broadcasts
https://awfulannouncing.com/turner/tnt-adds-more-aaf-broadcasts-br-live-skycam.html

It appears that the week 7 numbers were down, probably to be expected when going up against the NCAA Tournament.

This league was never going to work.

The first problem is that football is boring. Sorry but that's just the truth. An NFL game has what, 10-12 minutes where the ball is in live play during a 3+ hour game? They fill that in with massive amounts of commercials, replays, shots of players huddling around, coaches, etc.

A new league can improve on that ratio but still has to compete with all the other forms of stimulus available, from Facebook to Fortnite. It was obvious that a new league, made up of purely replacement-level or below players, with no team loyalty involved, was going to flop.

About that, the NFL has team loyalty baked in. We all love our Browns. Many of us have been hooked on the NFL product.. our team, the other teams, the gameplay, transactions, and drama in the league for decades. So the NFL is still going strong and surely will continue to do so for the foreseeable future... but even it is subjected to what is written above.

How many people do you know that watch football just to watch football? Ok for the handful of you diehards out there, fine. But most people I know in real life get together socially. They drink and chat and play on their smartphones during the game. Almost nobody actually watches these 3 straight hours without any other form of stimulation. That might not be the most popular opinion on a forum centered on NFL football but that's what I see in real life.

When a new league comes around, and it's full of mediocre football (or I assume so.. I didn't watch any), not knowing any players or teams, what again is the reason I'd turn on and watch? From what I read, the football itself was even tinkered with... for example, the defense had some very peculiar restrictions on how many and where players could blitz from. Meh.

If the XFL has any hope of surviving, it has to give us something different and something exciting-- a reason for us to turn on. If it's just a worse version of the NFL product then I don't care.

Vince McMahon will certainly provide you with a freak show.

Football is boring? Have you ever tried baseball?

Aside from on the NFL network, how much advertising did anyone see?

Truth is, I think I didn't even heard of it until shortly before they began their season. I know a lot of folks that didn't even know what it was.

I think that may have had a lot to do with it also. They didn't do a very good job of marketing the product in advance. I know I spoke to quite a few people just before their season started that had no clue it even existed.

Football is boring?

I'm more likely to watch a freak show than whatever AAF was putting out there. And it seems like a lot of people agree with me, since the AAF is closing up shop before the end of its first season.

If football (in and of itself) is so exciting, why is the AAF shutting down so soon? The football machine is so huge in this country yet there are comparatively so few NFL roster spots, so the players in the AAF were actually quite good. It was run by former NFL coaches and executives. There's no other football on right now to compete against for viewers. Yet nobody watched. Why?

And yeah, I played baseball. I also find it boring to watch (moreso than football), but we've been over this before. I predicted the MLB ratings drop long before it happened.. too slow, too boring for younger audiences who were raised in a world of constant change, novelty, and excitement.

j/c:

I record one game, last week, and watched a little bit of it. It was just so-so. Well, now no more AAF... That was quick. "Here today, gone later today."

You must have missed the fact that the freak show known as the XFL has already failed once. Good luck with that.

Let's see, they went up against March Madness for one. Then baseball was starting their preseason/spring training. You crack me up. NCAA and NFL football are the top two watched sports in the nation.

Let's do a fair comparison here. How do the ratings stack up with NCAA baseball against NCAA football?

The AAF has suspended its operation (for now), but that doesn’t mean some players didn’t benefit from playing the eight weeks of games. For a precious few, the league’s platform could lead to another shot at the NFL, which was the idea behind this to begin.

After talking to a mix of evaluators mining the AAF for talent, and those working on the scouting side in the league itself, here are a few players to keep an eye on …

QB Garrett Gilbert, Orlando: A former high-profile high-school recruit, Gilbert has always had tools, but has never realized his potential. He led the AAF with 2,152 passing yards, and posted an impressive 13–3 TD–INT ratio.

QB John Wolford, Arizona: The scheme will have to be right, but Wolford showed potential as a shifty, if small, quarterback, in throwing for 1,400 yards and 13 touchdowns. He was in camp with the Jets last summer.

RB Zac Stacy, Memphis: Stacy was picked in the fifth round of the 2013 draft by the Rams, and the former Vanderbilt player looked promising as a rookie before injuries torpedoed his career and led to an early retirement. He showed flashes of his NFL self at the beginning of the AAF season, but got hurt again.

WR Charles Johnson, Orlando: Johnson’s speed has always tantalized NFL teams, and he put together a respectable 2014 season for Minnesota (31 catches, 475 yards). His 687 receiving yards led the AAF.

WR Rashad Ross, Arizona: This 29-year-old has spent the last nine years bouncing on and off NFL practice squads and camp rosters. He led the AAF with seven touchdowns catches as part of a 36-catch season, but his age is his enemy.

WR Jalin Marshall, Orlando: Talent hasn’t been the primary issue with Marshall over the years—after declaring for the draft early, he was drafted by the Jets in 2016, but was suspended to start the ’17 season and cut thereafter. Marshall finished with 26 catches in the AAF.

DE Karter Schult, Salt Lake: Schult had outrageous sack production in college at Northern Iowa (31 over his last two years) but he washed out of the NFL after shots with the Browns and Panthers. But that collegiate production did carry over to the AAF, where he had seven sacks.

DE Damontre Moore, San Diego: This former Texas A&M star was once seen as a first-round draft prospect, but character flags caused a fall to the third round in 2013. The 26-year-old bounced around the NFL for six years before landing in the AAF, where he had seven sacks.

NT Mike Purcell, Salt Lake: Purcell, a 328-pound run-plugger who actually started eight NFL games for the Niners over three years, showed his ability against the run in the AFF and actually flashed some pass rush (3 sacks) too.

OLB Jayrone Elliott, San Antonio: The 27-year-old former Packer and Cowboy, who showed promise early in his NFL career, led the AAF in sacks (7.5). That’s should land him somewhere in the NFL in the coming weeks.

CB Keith Reaser, Orlando: A fifth-round pick in 2014, Reaser made it through three coaching changes in San Francisco before getting cut in September 2017. An injury short-circuited the 2018 season for him in KC, and he was stellar in the AAF.

FS Derron Smith, San Antonio: This 2015 sixth-rounder spent two-and-a-half years with the Bengals, before hooking on with the Browns in mid-2017. He didn’t make it out of camp last year, but his three-pick AAF season could earn him another shot.

https://www.si.com/nfl/2019/04/03/aaf-al...ampaign=themmqb

I knew Gilbert was having success in the AAF. I was thinking he could make a nice backup QB for us.

I didn't see a minute of the AAF and now it's gone, I missed it. Sad!

I've got new ideas.

Two FG tries if the try is over 60 yards long.

For still the 13 men allowed on defense, but yesterday, I thought of even a more exciting idea.

TWo Footballs, and Two Qb's on the field, if it's a guaranteed pass play, where running plays are outlawed, for the length of a drive!

And, maybe even better,

3 footballs and 3 RB's on the field where it's a guaranteed run play and the forward pass is outlawed for the length of a drive!

Oh, and a caveat, I decided, QB's could be tackled in the 2 Qbs per play deal, Qb's tackled with one hand touch contact, at least behind the line of scrimmage.

oh, and if both field goals are good, that's a 6 point field goal, but we are talking 70 yard tries here.

The more Crazy rules I come up with, the more I actually want to see somebody try and make a league of it.

I've Figured it out! The only way financially that a start up league is going to work, is keep it as small scale as possible.

Newest idea, don't even have a season... per year, just start up a "road to a championship" where each game, ... not necessarily in weekly format, becomes it's own event,

kind of like the MMA does, and teams? hmm 4 teams or less, or! maybe think outside the box, I mean you don't see the same MMA fighters each time? right?

Throwing out all the rules, and trying to make a watchable spectacle of a football event? Sure is fun.

Good riddance. I watched about eight minutes, saw JFF was back, and swore off of AAF altogether.

This was a dumb idea from its start. Lousy outing.

I wanted a Memphis Johnny jersey, but they're sold out.