AFL Announces new Washington D.C. franchise

[DiamondThief]

March 16, 2016 -- Regardless of what the 2016 Arena Football League season turns out to be, there will be a new face in the league beginning in 2017.

At a press conference in Washington D.C. today, the AFL introduced "Washington AFL." The team is slated to begin play in 2017 and will spend the time until them laying its infrastructure for the team including, obviously, selecting a team name.

The team will be run by Monumental Sports and Entertainment which is headed by Ted Leonsis, the majority owner of the National Basketball Association's Washington Wizards, the National Hockey League's Washington Capitals and the Women's National Basketball Association's Washington Mystics.

Bringing in NBA and/or NHL owners is the market plan for second-year AFL commissioner Scott C. Butera. The commissioner has already seen the league shrink from 12 teams last season to eight this season. The league took over operations of the New Orleans VooDoo and Las Vegas Outlaws with a month left in the 2015 season. The Spokane Shock moved to the Indoor Football league and, since the AFL owns the Shock trademark, rebranded itself as the Spokane Empire. They are 2-1 on the young IFL season. The defending champion San Jose Sabercats folded; its owners citing financial hardships.

In early January, the team took over the Portland Thunder and rebranded them into the Portland Steel. The rebrand was necessary because, unlike the Shock, former Thunder owner Terry Emmert retained the trademark rights to the Thunder.

"We're extremely excited to acquire an AFL team for Washingtonl adding arena football to the mix of the best sports teams in town," Leonsis said at the press conference. "D.C. is a `Super City' with a fan base that spans across the DMV region, and being able to provide another family-centric sports option to our community is an important endeavor."

In November 20, Philadelphia Soul co-owner Craig Spencer announced that the AFL was in discussion with three teams with NBA or NHL ownership about joining the league. Washington was later confirmed as one of those cities. The remaining two have yet to be confirmed. Spencer also announced that the league was looking at a television deal with a mexican network which would bring three more teams into the league from that country.

Shortly thereafter, another Soul co-owner, Ron Jaworski announced that the mexican network deal would bring in just two teams. Though unconfirmed, it is widely suspected the network possibly in play is Univision.

To date, the Washington franchise is the only team which has been confirmed.

Jaworski, Tampa Bay Storm team president Derrick Brooks and Los Angeles KISS co-owner Gene Simmons were among those on hand at the press conference to welcome Washington into the league.

Washington AFL will play its games at the Verizon Center, which also is home to the Wizards, Capitals, Mystics and Georgetown men's basketball team.

- ANM


Photo Credit: AFL commissioner Scott C. Butera at today's press conference courtesy ArenaFan on facebook.

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[David]

I was disappointed they didn't have a team name up and ready for the announcement today. I'm curious if they're going to revive the Commandos brand or if they're going to go for something like the Monuments or the Senators.

[Kasey]

i can see why Butera is so happy about Washington joining the league. Leonsis seems solid. i don't really see this happening with other markets, except maybe San Antonio. the Mexico thing is still such a wild card that i personally can't buy into it. if the league thinks they can get two or three teams out of Univision, then there are parity issues which need to be precisely defined. will the network own all of those teams? if so, that would be a major conflict of interest.

if the network were to bring in new owners, those questions will remain, but there will also be major issues between each team and the league. i would think that the league would want to have complete say in approval. i would if I were Butera. the problem is that if the network is bringing in the team's and owners, it will want a say as well. in looking at this pro-actively, i cannot see anything but a legal mess in two countries.

whatever happens, and i agree with the DiamondThief on this, Butera has to be up front and make the league's intentions transparent.