Asia Pacific Football League

[CrimsonBull9584]

I might have discussed this before, but years ago I was really intrigued by the Asia Pacific Football League. It was a proposed professional American football league that would have teams in China, South Korea, Japan, Taiwan, Thailand, Hong Kong, the Philippines, and Hawaii. The league had the backing of investors in Hong Kong and former Dallas Cowboys player Preston Person as a "consultant". The league was to launch in 1999, the pushed back to 2000. After that.... well nothing. All there is are a few logos and a dead website that can be found on Wayback Machine. I've tried to find news articles from that time, but no luck, even though I do remember at least one article. Regardless, enjoy the logos that I found from their website.

 

And if your curious the teams were:

 

Sharks, Dragons, Express, Pandas, Stallions, Dolphins, Warriors, Typhoon, Fighting Cocks, and Elephants.

 

More info here:https://web.archive.org/web/20000410212325/http://apfl.com:80/teams.html

 

[AgentColon2]

Fighting Cocks FTW

[Sykotyk]

I remembered this league back then. Just disappeared. Just no news came out but it just stopped.

[BigDmo]

Pandas/Express would have been a great rivalry

[CrimsonBull9584]

When you look at how big football is in Japan, up and coming college football in Korea, and what the CAFL is doing in China, I don't see any reason why you could't have a league today. The NFL wants to put a team in London, play more games in Mexico City, and possibly head out to Asia one day. Not to mention that Stanford is trying to get games in China in the next few years for academic recruiting purposes. So it's within the realm of possibility for a league like this to exist. I'd love to see it.

[NYC Cosmos]

The league would never work on any level. Firstly, consider the following:

1. The elephant is revered in Thailand. The government has lese majest laws. I am not sure if they extend to animals but those laws are extremely strict. For example, if you should drop a baht on the floor and step on it by mistake, you go to jail. Why? It has the King's picture on it. Secondly, unless you are an ex-pat, they don't know the game, don't play it and could care less about it (they play flag football in the sand in Phuket usually in December), Thirdly, Bangkok has one stadium and a practice field. The stadium was built for soccer. It is disrepair. Sports is just not big in Thailand except for the Brits, Germans and Aussies who watch soccer matches at American bars. There is too much else to do in BKK anyway. How do I know this? I've been there 4 times and I am going to retire part of the year there. And if you have never been there, go. Thai are polite, friendly. The women are gorgeous. They like us farangs (foreigners) but they are extremely proud of their culture and they are the only country in SE Asia not to be conquered by a Western power.  Sports just isn't their thing unless you talk about Muy Thai – Thai boxing. It is a swift and deadly sport. And...yellow and red would never be permitted in team colors. They are the colors of opposition parties and unless you want to start a fight, you do not wear those colors.

2. Manila Fighting Cocks? Talega? Seryoso? Opo?  Noooooo. No way. You would call them the Manila Datu. Not Datus, but Datu. Or the Tabaco. The Datu was the leader of the tribe. His sword was called the Tabaco for the sound it made when spun in the air and used to um, well you know...Filipinos are proud people. Very proud. They have been playing there for a long time, but it is in the grass roots stages. Because the islands are so spread apart, Manila has a league, Cebu City has a league. Davao has a league. Getting players to and from their homes is expensive. They would have a  home field advantage – the heat. I've seen the Manila Wolves play in 95 degree heat + 90% humidity like it was nothing. There is also a great deal of poverty in southeast asia – Thailand, Philippines, etc. As for the Philippines, you know of President Détente's war on drugs right? He has given the police, military police, gangs and hoodlums the right to shoot on sight anyone suspected of selling and/or using drugs. 4000+ have lost their lives so far. The economy and exchange rates are out of control. My first trip to Thailand, it was 39 baht to the Dollar. Now it is 32. When I was in Manilla, it was 50 peso to the dollar. Now it is 52. That makes a huge difference.

3. Typhoon for Tokyo? Bad taste. Same for the Philippines. The Bicol region, Alby, Tabaco City, Legazpi, have been hit by typhoons and volcanic eruptions all the time. Typhoon? Think the nuclear disaster a couple of years ago.

4. China? Wait until the NFL gets there.

5. Hong Kong? Where would they play?

6. The costs of Hawai'i going to Asia are prohibitive.

7. Not of interest: Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia, Myanmar, Cambodia. Laos. Malaysia and Singapore are cricket countries. Penang in Malaysia is a true international city, but soccer is the thing among expats there. Indonesia doesn't do much in sports. Do not go to Myanmar no matter how nice the beaches are. They arrest people for no reason all the time. Indonesia has the largest muslim population in the world and some parts are allowed to use strict sharia law. I am not sure how sports would fit in to such a culture. Cambodia is once again under a dictatorship. They have no sport. I heard the beaches are great, Phenom Pehn is beautiful and a must see in Angkor Watt. But they are still coming to grips with the killing fields era, and Americans are not always welcome. Laos has no interest in sport.

8. Vietnam is possibly a future place. It is upbeat and modern.

 

Once China finishes with its Silk Road strategy – as they are building high speed rail from Bejing and Shanghai to the Middle East and throughout Southeast Asia, travel costs are enormous.

 

The names and colors don't even come close to understanding each culture's rich heritage. As with NFL Europe, we screwed it up again. 

 

Quick: name the 7 or so NFL players (active and retired) with Fil/Am roots.

 

They are:

Roman Gabriel

Tedy Bruschi

Scott Norwood

Steve Slaton

Doug Baldwin

Chris Gocong

Eugene Amano

 

 

[Sec19Row53]

On 2/3/2018 at 2:38 PM, CrimsonBull9584 said:

When you look at how big football is in Japan, up and coming college football in Korea, and what the CAFL is doing in China, I don't see any reason why you could't have a league today. The NFL wants to put a team in London, play more games in Mexico City, and possibly head out to Asia one day. Not to mention that Stanford is trying to get games in China in the next few years for academic recruiting purposes. So it's within the realm of possibility for a league like this to exist. I'd love to see it.

eh - I'd argue that the NFL wants to threaten to put a team in London to leverage better stadia here.

[Sykotyk]

8 hours ago, Sec19Row53 said:

eh - I'd argue that the NFL wants to threaten to put a team in London to leverage better stadia here.

London is the new Los Angeles.

[CrimsonBull9584]

On 2/14/2018 at 3:13 PM, NYC Cosmos said:

 

3. Typhoon for Tokyo? Bad taste. Same for the Philippines. The Bicol region, Alby, Tabaco City, Legazpi, have been hit by typhoons and volcanic eruptions all the time. Typhoon? Think the nuclear disaster a couple of years ago.

 

5. Hong Kong? Where would they play?

 

 

I want to engage in these two points:

 

First, I don't see Tokyo Typhoon as being distasteful. What makes Tokyo Typhoon any different from Miami Hurricanes? Or Carolina Hurricanes? Or any team named after a natural disaster? 

 

Where would Hong Kong play? They have stadiums right? Hong Kong Stadium comes to mind.

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hong_Kong_Stadium

 

From the little I've been able to gain about the APFL, they had a chance, they had the money, but it just never happened. It would have been interesting to see, even if it only lasted a season. Again, I think it can be done, there is interest in Asia for American football.

 

[Ferdinand Cesarano]

On 2/16/2018 at 8:51 PM, CrimsonBull9584 said:

On 2/14/2018 at 3:13 PM, NYC Cosmos said:

3. Typhoon for Tokyo? Bad taste. Same for the Philippines. The Bicol region, Alby, Tabaco City, Legazpi, have been hit by typhoons and volcanic eruptions all the time. Typhoon? Think the nuclear disaster a couple of years ago.

 

I don't see Tokyo Typhoon as being distasteful. What makes Tokyo Typhoon any different from Miami Hurricanes? Or Carolina Hurricanes? Or any team named after a natural disaster? 

 

I have mentioned this before in other threads; but I will bring it up again here, because the story tickled me so much.

I was once talking to an English sports fan who expressed shock at the existence of team names such as San Jose Earthquakes and Chicago Fire.  He wondered what would happen if that trend of disaster naming came to England, and imagined a team called the London Plague.

Anyway, just because American fans accept a name such as Carolina Hurricanes, we cannot rule out the possiblity that that sort of name would be considered to be in poor taste by people in other cultures.