Anyone watching the AAF?
 

I've been intrigued by the league. Taken a fancy to both Orlando and San Diego. I love Orlando's style of play and The Fleet are a reminder of my Naval days and I really do like the uniforms.


As for the overall quality, its rough. Given time I think things will develop but its hard to watch at times.


Thoughts?

Nope . By this time of the year I am burned out on sports and my wife's patience:-)

I'm "trying to". By that I mean I'd like to regularly watch but it's not part of my routine yet and I keep forgetting to search out when it's on.

Yeah, it's certainly AAA-level play. I was watching Logan Woodside, I think, and he was lobbing passed in there that would NEVER be complete in the NFL. Still, it's more football at a time of year where there isn't much else on.

Yeah its a step down from the NFL, but its still football I guess. Glad it gives some "lesser lights" the chance to play. I'm paying attention to it mostly because the backup QB on the San Diego squad is former Coastal Carolina QB Alex Ross. Hope he gets a chance to play a little. SD has already benched their first starting QB and his replacement not looking that much better so far, and the O-lines on most teams have looked very vulnerable. See if you can find the pass the SD QB threw when he was in danger of getting sacked, pretty funny.

League is already in need of a cash bail out. Will be interesting to see if it makes it through the opening season.

If anybody can pull it off financially, the need for a developmental/second chance league is there. Given some of the QB play, perhaps a higher developmental ceiling on their QBs should be sought. But Spurrier seems to be putting together an offense down in Orlando. Receiver drops seem to be pretty bad too, which isn't helping the QB play out. Christian Hackenberg was an interesting name coming into it, but he's shown nothing so far (and most aren't surprised!). But I think the point of this league can be to prove that guys like Christian Hackenberg suck and maybe guys like Charles Johnson need another shot at the next level. Then maybe a guy like Garrett Gilbert plays himself into a solid backup job or we get some better developed backup QBs in the NFL.

Do they stream online anywhere for free? I generally watch football only if it's over the air or streaming.

I've been relatively impressed by the level of play in the highlights I have watched, I hope they hold on. The NFL could really use a minor league to give bottom roster guys playing time, especially if they want to eventually eliminate most of the preseason.

I've been watching. I like it. It's not NFL but that is expected. It has been very hit or miss in terms of quality. The Orlando/San Antonio game this past weekend was entertaining but that first game of the weekend was dreadful.

QB play has not been very good. Good lord does Hackenberg suck.

Offensive line play has led to the poor QB play, good thing they limit rushers.

The receivers have had mixed results.

Can't tell if there has been good defensive line play or just bad offensive line play.

Okay with the start at the 25 approach for this league and the 4th and 12 "onside kick" but not for NFL.

Okay with the mandatory 2 point conversion for this league but also not for NFL.

The limit on rushers took a few to get used to but with the offensive line issues that is probably a good thing.

Apparently they weren't even going to make payroll without the bailout. After 2 weeks. I guess they're not making money from all the TV deals

The production looks good but there's no financial plan.

dola:

I guess they don't have away uniforms as that Atlanta/San Diego game was amusing because both teams seemed to be wearing the same color. That had to be rough on the quarterbacks.

This is starting to sounds like the football version of MoviePass.

-Hey guys let's start a league with no teams in the northeast

-Hold my beer!

And yeah wtf those teams both had almost identical uniforms.

Yeah, I've watched parts of 4 or 5 games.....some pretty good and entertaining some not so much.

Let's be real here for a second: it ALWAYS sounded like the football version of MoviePass.

It's a lot better than 2001 XFL... that was atrocious. Maybe not on the level of the World League way back in the 1990s.

I always wondered why there hasn't been a farm system in the NFL. (Yeah, yeah, I know, college football and what not.) Especially with quarterbacks. A team like Buffalo could send a guy like Nathan Peterman down to AAA to get a bunch of reps, and maybe he wouldn't suck as much in the big show.

I gave one or two games a peek the first weekend, but was out of town last weekend.* I may try to put it on in the background some this weekend. Though...if it's on at the same time as the Overwatch League...I'll probably just stream that instead. So, yeah. (OWL on Twitch gives a token per map towards league skins, so hey why not.)



* Got to go to the NW/Purdue women's game Sunday night, which was absolutely more exciting than watching the AAF would have been.

I think for stuff like this to work it needs to have direct investment from the parent league and not be independent.

I think in time, this is the objective. To ge the NFL to see it as a viable AAA system and perhaps begin allocating "prep" players to the league as needed.

Good Lord, Hackenberg sucks.

Would this be something that would be a replacement for college football?

Football does not strike me as a sport where a AAA system would work. Seems like the last thing teams want for any of their assigned players to do is play college football and then play extra football outside of the parent's team 16 game regular season.

What am I missing?

I think it could be a league for further development of players -- especially quarterbacks, as well as a chance to get an extended look at guys -- particularly guys who didn't get a lot of reps in college and/or didn't get reps against top competition.

Pretty sure Steve Mariucci has loved every play call in this Orlando-Memphis game.

How long has Memphis had Mettenberger? I can't think of any reason why he wouldn't play over Hackenberg from the get go, Hackenberg is absolutely one of the worst QBs I've ever seen. He's been absolutely awful in a league full of nobodies, and shouldn't see an NFL roster ever again IMO. I question the brainpower of any NFL team who has him around for any reason next season.

The SD QB got hurt in the game today and Alex Ross replaced him-threw a TD on his second pass. :) Then threw an INT in his next series but we won't talk about that.

Been there the whole time apparently. Was #3 on the depth chart until the backup got hurt.

AAF: Zach Mettenberger told he was 'outperformed' at training camp

With the locker room access at halftime, have they caught Mike Singeltary dropping his pants yet?

Johnny Manziel has signed with the AAF

I completely forgot about this league. I guess that is bad that I have heard no one anywhere mention it. What network are the games even on?

I can usually find them officially streaming online on Youtube.

I usually have the games on in the background on my Saturdays and Sundays.

Spurrier's team has been somewhat entertaining to watch. I see they lost tonight, I missed it. Most of the other games have been background noise. Johnny Manziel would definitely get me to actively tune in.

NFL Network, CBS Sports network and Turner I believe.

Didn't just lose, lost in a pretty bizarre sequence

45 seconds left down by 5 or 6 in their own half, Gilbert buys some time and finds a guy wide open downfield for a 30 yard gain.
WR inexplicably doesn't go out of bounds but stays in and gets tackled, clock running. Takes way too long to spike the ball.
Next play inbound completion again, takes way too much time to get to the line again, false start penalty, 10 second run off, game over.

Highly polished multi billion dollar league it is not, but I find it entertaining whenever I run across a game to watch. Also is Rick Neuheisel really the best head coaching talent we could find for one of these teams? I guess any good coach who isn't actively coaching is making 5x the salary doing color commentary somewhere.

Riley, Singletary, Erickson.

I mean, the pickings were clearly incredibly slim.

It felt like they were going for "celebrity coaches" to increase the draw. I don't know if that helps or hurts the league...

Right now I just wish AAF had a regional team I could root for, someone in the Michigan/Ohio/Indiana area.

Right now I have to root for San Antonio because of Toledo alum Logan Woodside

Haters gonna hate, but I for one never doubted Manziel was an AAF-level talent.

I was curious about that false start penalty after seeing it today. Looked like the lineman was bumped by the defensive player that was trying to get back onside. Shouldn't that have been a defensive penalty?

Same. I end up rooting for teams with former Ohio State players.

Yeah they made strange choices for where they put teams which doesn't help interest, I think. Or they should've gone the Arena league route (when it first started) and simply had teams without cities. I don't think the tv markets matter much with football, so you could've sold out a stadium in a lot of cities besides the ones they went to.

Thanks. I don't have any of those anymore.

Most I've seen felt like the choices were solid. They avoided NFL markets, they went to some football hotbeds, they avoided seasonal weather issues.

And at least one factor that we don't know is what stadiums were / weren't willing to work with them (all 8 teams are playing in college stadiums).

Yeah that makes sense.

:D

Well color me shocked

AAF in jeopardy of folding, says majority owner

Shit, we gave him Manziel and Hackenberg, and now he wants Peterman too?

That's unpossible!

Shocking, lol.