Owners, coaches, players and front-office staff deal with the decision to suspend the Arena Football League. For those out on the street, it won’t be a very merry Christmas.
Owners, coaches, players and front-office staff deal with the decision to suspend the Arena Football League. For those out on the street, it won’t be a very merry Christmas.
Take, for example, the plans for the future announced by the Grand Rapids Rampage, owned by entrepreneur Dan DeVos. It’s long been regarded as one of the more successful AFL outfits, averaging 7,200 fans a game and combining with the AHL’s Grand Rapids Griffins to form a decent marketing combination. For DeVos, the financial decisions were hard, and he’s opting to lay off everyone but a promotions/PR person and GM Scott Woodruff; the other nine members of the front-office staff will be laid off (though some may catch on the Griffins), although coaching contracts will remain in place.
“We had strong support from franchise owners as we set a plan in place to suspend the 2009 season and spend time to reconfigure the economic structure of the league," DeVos said. "It is the best strategy to work toward long-term financial stability, and it also makes sense in the current economy. I continue to believe that whatever is best for the AFL is best for the Rampage, and I look forward to continuing to work with the other owners over the coming months."
It’s hard to say what will happen. The AFL was always a lean operation; no one, including players and owners, were getting rich. So when operations are evaluated, there’s probably not a lot of fat to be cut: sure, you can squeeze players, but in the long run the league’s fixed costs — arena rent — and prime revenue sources — ticket sales, media rights — aren’t likely to change.
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