WideRight

@maxwasson If you go back to the first page you will see the criteria for cities to be eligible for the AAFL.  I am trying to strike a balance between TV markets and stadiums of appropriate size, so in order to be permitted to be in the running for a team, a city must:

• Be in the Top 50 MSA metro areas (Wichita is not)
• Have a football or football/soccer stadium that has a capacity between 20,000-50,000, not too small and not huge NFL stadiums either.  Neither OKC nor Omaha have viable stadiums.
• The stadiums cannot be baseball stadiums used for baseball in the Spring/Summer.

Those criteria eliminated nearly all Great Plains cities other than Dallas and Tulsa for being too small, or not having a "right-sized" stadium option. 

3 minutes ago, Blindsay said:

You think we can go international with this league?

Not really planning on it.  There are more than enough markets within the USA to reach 16 teams, which is when I will stop. 

Orlando 8

NY/NJ  5

Columbus 4

This is not over yet.  But Orlando is on the cusp. 

On 1/31/2024 at 1:01 AM, heavybass said:

Team #36... is a 2000s special.

NEW ORLEANS VOODOO

The Voodoo that we knew is combined with the colors with the new Voodoo... the styles of Purple, Bone, Red with the forced inclusions of Green and Yellow.

intersting color choice with the non-white pants/jersey.  This has always been one of my favorite Arena logos. 

The count as of this morning, with 17 votes in.  

6   Orlando

4   NY/NJ

3   Columbus

2  Miami

1  Atlanta

1 Hartford

We are above the threshold of votes, so if Orlando gets 2 more votes without an NY/NJ vote, then they would be declared the winner, but there is time for NY/NJ, Columbus, or others to catch up.  Here is what I can tell you about the teams near the front:

Orlando:  I have 4 designs ready to go, including one very Florida color scheme, two repurposed logos, and one from another league I did a series on a while back. 

NY/NJ:  No repurposed logos, 4 totally new ones. 

Columbus:  I had a version of the Apollos logo for CBS to celebrate John Glenn, but with Houston being the Apollos, that has been replaced.  1 logo is repurposed, 1 using OSU colors, and 1 with a possible first black helmet in the league.

Miami:  2 repurposed, another black helmet and yet anotherpossible teal helmet (what is with  me and teal helmets this time around?)

OK, here is the early count, with 11 votes in:

3   Orlando, Columbus

1   NY/NJ, Atlanta, Miami, Hartford, Boston 

It seems clear that the battle between "We need big TV markets" and "We should put teams in cities that don't have NFL football" is in full effect. 

And, since it has been a minute, here is the current 2028, Inaugural Season roster of clubs, 7 of 8 represented. 

So far no purple in the league, and no helmets which are black, white, yellow, gold, purple, or green.  Will that change with team #8? 

We have a winner as one name rose to a 10-5-3-2 lead of 5 votes.  That cuts short the voting with 20 votes in the pot. 

Congratulations to the Salt Lake Pioneers!  The Pioneers will complete the Western Division with 4 clubs in 4 states and will be the only team in the West not to have navy blue as one of their colors.  The club will feature a predominantly red uniform with black and "tanned leather" as their secondary colors.  A pretty traditional look with two red or white stripes (on pants and sleeves) outlined in black.  On the jersey sleeves the secondary logo, featuring an "SL" monogram in an arrowhead will interrupt the striping.  The uniform also uses a "twin notch" motif using the tanned leather color.  This can be seen on the pant stripes but also in the numbers, appearing on the upper right vertical of each number.  

This vote also means that seven of eight teams have been selected for Season 1 (Let’s say 2028).  Who will emerge from the East as the 8^th and final franchise?  We are in a true Wild Card position here, so once again both eligible NFL cities and non-NFL markets will be included in the poll.  Here are your options, again with Market Size listed as well.

NFL MARKETS

• NEW YORK/NEW JERSEY (1) – A tough media market to crack, but 19 million potential fans.
• CHICAGO (3) – Weather is a factor, as is poor past performance in non-NFL leagues
• ATLANTA (8) – Humidity is a factor, but a large market option in the South.
• MIAMI (9) – Not as humid as Atlanta, but hot, oh so hot.
• BOSTON (11) – Could Boston add a 2^nd Northeastern team without NY being in the league?
• DETROIT (14) – Well, Ypsalanti really.  That seems a bit of an issue.

NON NFL MARKETS

• ORLANDO (22)— Perhaps a better Florida option than sports-packed Miami.
• COLUMBUS (32)— A huge football hotbed and a possible regional draw.
• NASHVILLE (35)— A southern city but not as hot/humid as Atlanta or Miami.
• TIDEWATER (37)— A new market with no track record outside of 1 season of UFL.
• PROVIDENCE (39)— Would people really pick Providence over Boston?
• CAROLINA TRIANGLE (41)— Good finances, good stadium options, but not a huge market.
• RICHMOND (45)— Unlikely to overtake Tidewater and very close to DC
• BIRMINGHAM (47)— Is it really a spring football league if you don’t include B’Ham?
• HARTFORD (50)—A third New England option, but the best stadium of all 3 cities.

Same rules as before.  We will keep the voting open for 2 days or until one team gets a 4-vote lead with at least 15 total votes cast in the balloting.  This one is intriguing to me because we already have 3 decent sized Eastern markets in DC, St. Louis and New Orleans.  Will folks vote to add a mega-city like NY or Chicago, go for a spring league stalwart like Birmingham or Atlanta, or maybe throw a curveball with a Tidewater, Triangle, or Hartford vote.  It really is hard to predict.

Let’s see what the sports logo & uniform community thinks?   Voting is open, and feel free to give your rationale as well. 

@raz  I live in Colorado and Bigfoot is a huge part of the culture here.  Every gift shop is loaded with Bigfoot stuff. Pretty sure the same is true throughout the Rockies, not just Oregon and Washington, so I feel OK about Salt Lake going with a Sasquatch theme.

@JH42XCC  I decided not to go with San Marcos because it is literally not in Austin or San Antonio, and since both cities did have a theoretically viable stadium, they would use that as their primary.  I also think the Alamodome could come into play, but just did not want to use San Marcos if I did not have to. 

Only 9 votes in so far, but we have a tight one. 

3   Sasquatch

2   Pioneers

2   Spikes

1   Swarm

And, yes, I will drop "City" from all of them.  Seems a good idea, I just was not sure if that was something that folks in the region/city did. 

With With 17 votes in, we have an 8-4-3-1 split, which is a 4-vote gap.  

Congratulations to Salt Lake City, Utah!  The Beehive State will have a franchise in the AAFL.  Salt Lake City will join San Diego, Portland, and Houston in the inaugural season of the AAFL.  Sacramento put up a good fight, but San Jose pulled off some of the California votes, leaving them too far behind to catch the SLC.  

So, now the tough part, what should a franchise in Salt Lake City be called. We are going to try for something a bit more region-specific than the comically misplaced Jazz (I know they started in N'awlins, so I get it, but really?).   We have four contenders for an SLC identity, ranging from the historical frontier to a mysterious mountain creature to the state's signature bee obsession.  So, let's take a look and see who joins the Destroyers, Apollos, and Chinook in the Western Division. 

SALT LAKE CITY PIONEERS

The rugged Rocky Mountain region has never been a place for the faint of heart.  Pioneers captures the spirit of the frontier and the never say die quality of this AAFL football club.  The logo depicts a frontiersman, complete with a coonskin cap, framed by an arrowhead, which also pays tribute to Utah's 5 national parks.  The colors are bold: bright red, black, silver, and tanned leather.  

SALT LAKE CITY SPIKES

The West was opened up by the railroads and one of the most historic rail moments in the West was the joining of the Pacific to the Plains with the historic golden spike, symbolizing the joining of the two coasts and everywhere in between.  The Salt Lake City Spikes pay honor to that bold spirit, their wordmark logo contains the image of the famed golden spike that joined the two railways in Utah.  Set against a vivid green background with black as a bonding color.  This club is ready to strike out in the frontier of spring football. 

SALT LAKE CITY SWARM

Bees have long been a symbol of the state of Utah.  Industrious, single-minded, and always working as a team to defeat even much larger foes, the symbol of the swarm is one of unity, purpose, and hard work.  The Swarm design features a bold black S made up of hundreds of individual bees, all set egainst 3 honeycombs, all against a blue-green background.  The living monogram of bees is combined with a honeycomb motif which instantly connects the team to the rich symbolism used in the Utah flag and throughout the state. 

SALT LAKE CITY SASQUATCH

A true legend of the Rockies, the Sasquatch is mysterious, powerful, and a fierce defender of its territory.  The SLC Sasquatch will bring that same spirit to defending their home turf.  While the main logo features a full figure Squatch, ready to wreak havok, the helmet shows the face of the enigmatic beast set in silver and white against the deep "mountain purple" helmet.  The team will feature the deep purple and silver combo, with only occasional pops of bright yellow.  

There you have it, four unique takes on Utah and the Salt Lake City area.  Will it be the legend of the Squatch, the history of pioneers, the golden spike that helped Utah grow, or the bees which symbolize the energy and sticktoitiveness of Utah's residents?

Polls are open now, as always we are going to go with the 2-day or 4-vote lead rule to determine a winner.  And, look, no navy blue anywhere to be seen.  

9 votes in (very early) and the numbers are:

4  Salt Lake City

3  Sacramento

1 San Jose & San Antonio

Will the California votes consolidate around 1 city or split the vote?  Will Utah prevail over two big population states?  Will San Antonio, Dallas, or Austin make a late push for the Lone Star State?  

This one could be another close race with several cities emerging as contenders.   So far, the vote seems to be to avoid a 2nd NFL city in the West, but it is still early.   

And just to prime the pump, some hints as to possible identities for a few of the cities:

LA:  Hollywood theme,  a team with a bit of a biker gang vibe, a "sunny, local easy going" themed team.

DAL: a couple of repeats from Houston, but also a weather-related team and a Hispanic-related theme.

SJ-SAC: These two share several identities, including a gold-mining one, a legendary bird of prey, and a NorCal nature theme.  But, SJE also has a colonial theme and SAC a feline one. 

SLC: You have railroad history, frontier history, and a legendary cryptobeast

SAN: Air Force theme, A variation of an XFL theme, and the return of 2 unused identities from past votegetters

37 minutes ago, MJWalker45 said:

San Antonio should always be an option, but we have an updated indoor stadium, as well as that dumpy, outdoor stadium. 

Yes, and I could see the Alamo Dome being their 2nd season home if San Antonio gets a team and does very well with tickets. It is too big for the initial year due to the cap at 50k for any stadium, but if they get a team, and attendance is near capacity at Alamo Stadium, then I would absolutely expect them to move into the dome the next year. 

i am going to call it.  @Seadragon76 put it over the top (sorry @JH42XCC)

Welcome to the AAFL the Washington Wolves!  Maroon and grey will be the first red-dominant team in the league.  And while I am sure that the folks up at Washington State U. will be a bit suspicious, the Wolves will definitely be going with a very basic two color design.  The motif of the squared stripe outlined by two tapered stripes is consistent throughout the look, on the helmet, pants, and jerseys.  Very litle white is used on the home maroons, with the exception of the 3 stars at the collar.  The team also debuts a secondary logo, a wolve's paw print with a W imprint in it.    So there you have it, after one of the most contentious votes yet, we have a winner. 

Now, for those of you who are fans of the Warbirds, there are plenty of cities across the nation with strong Air Force or aviation history, so we may not have seen the last of the Warbirds yet. As we get to teams 7-16 there absolutely will be repeats of some designs in relevant cities. 

So now we are down to the last club to join the Western Division.  What city will join San Diego, Houston, and Portland in the AAFL’s inaugural season?  Will the huge population states of California or Texas get a second team or will we add a 4^th state to the AAFL Western roster. 

The choice is yours.  Here are the cities at play in this 2^nd Wild Card round for the West.  One thing to consider, so far the West has teams in the country’s 5^th largest city (Houston), its 18^th (San Diego), and its 25^th (Portland).  That is not a bad profile, so the decision now comes down to whether or not you believe that the league needs to maximize its TV market share with another big city, possibly an NFL city, or do you want to explore a location that may draw well as a non-NFL, non-MLB city.  There aer a lot of choices.  Here is the list you can choose from, divided by NFL/Non-NFL and ranked by population size.

NFL Cities Still On the Table (Market Size)

•       Los Angeles  (2)  -- Is LA to close to SD to make this viable?
•       Dallas (4) – Do we want 2 NFL cities in Texas when there are large non-NFL cities in the state?
•       Las Vegas (29) – A destination city for sure, but brutally hot during later weeks of the season.

Non-NFL Cities (Market Size)

•    San Antonio (24) – Great sports town, dumpy outdoor stadium.
•    Austin (27) – An untested market in a football-crazed state.
•    Sacramento (28) – Certainly far enough from SD, but must compete with San Jose if it wants a club.
•    San Jose (36) – Could potentially draw from the northern Bay Area as well (Can Sacramento?)
•    Salt Lake City(46) – A smallish market, but one with little competition for attention and a good stadium.
•    Honolulu (55) – Great stadium, great weather, but a cost and competitiveness issue with travel.

So, where will the AAFL set up shop for their final inaugural season club?   Will they add NorCal, or a 2^nd Texas club, will they make use of Las Vegas’s destination status, or explore a locale with no MLB or NFL competition like Sacramento, San Jose, or Salt Lake? 

Voting starts now and will go for 2 days or, if we have 15 or more total votes and a team has a 4 vote lead, whichever happens first.

Remember also that after the inaugural season, with a successful first year, the league will add 1 Western and 1 Eastern team, and then more beyond that.  Not that this should influence your vote now. 

Wolves 12   Warbirds 9

Still in range, but the Wolves have held a lead of 2-3 for a while.  I am not calling it yet, but it is looking very furry right now. 

Wolves is up 3 votes on Warbirds.  If the next time I check back it is up 1 more, then it is the winner.  Can Warbirds creep closer or will the Wolves snatch up this one? 

Current vote tally:

Wolves         8

Warbirds     7

Power           3

Commandoes  2

Still too close to call. 

11 votes in and we have a dead heat.

Warbirds   5

Wolves      5

Commandos   1

Power   0

Looks like it is going to be a count noun, but will it be WW2 aviation or ravenous murder puppies?  We have nearly 45 hours left, or until we hit 15 total votes or higher with one name up by 4 or more votes.   

The votes are in, and after a very nip & tuck battle, we have our third USFL Eastern Division City.  Welcome our nation's capital, Washington D.C. to the league.  The club will play at Audi Field in D.C. proper, taking over for the XFL Defenders from 2020 and 2023.  But, with Defenders still owned by the defunct UFL, the new AAFL team will need a new identity.  They have released 4 choices and left it up to you, the fans, to decide.  So, here you go, the 4 AAFL options for the Washington D. C. franchise. 

WASHINGTON WARBIRDS

Celebrating the heroism of the Greatest Generation, and all of our veterans, this design focuses on imagery taken from the Army Air Corps of WW2.  The term Warbirds refers to the fighters that flew over Europe and the Pacific in the war.  The design in flag blue, red, white, and only a hint of blue, uses a variation of the markings found on the fuselage of U.S. fighters.  Additionally, every player will start with three stickers and then earn more two-color bomb stickers for each season they play with the team.  These are placed behind and beneath the main logo. 

D.C. POWER

Washington D.C. is nothing if not the hub of power in the USA, political and economic power to be sure, but that does not work on a helmet, so we go for the double meaning of power by having D.C. use a lightning bolt, a charge of energy, as its symbol. While the main logo will be the initials DC with a small spark between the letters, the helmet will feature a full lightning bolt in white and gold on a purple shell.  Unlike the Chargers, this bolt starts at the facemask and extends back, showing only one point. The team uses black as a secondary color to help add depth to the images and design, including a black facemask. 

WASHINGTON COMMANDOS

We could not pass up the chance to again honor our military, in this case the Special Forces, with a full camo look.  The Commandos will sport a camoflaged helmet pattern in dark and light olive green, with a gold W and three stars taken from the District's flag.  The Commandos also have a "C" centric logo with a gold star at the center.  Again black is used as a secondary color to help tie the entire look together. 

WASHINGTON WOLVES

Finally we have a team name that tries to capture the spirit of stealth, power, teamwork, and agility.   The grey wolf is the symbol of this apex predator squad.  Grey and white on a deep maroon W, again with the 3 stars of the DC flag, this design actually uses two tones of maroon and three versions of the silvery grey of the wolf's pelt.  The wolves hunt together, work as a team, and watch each other's back,  a perfect metaphor for a well-functioning football team. The helmet features a single maroon stripe on the grey shell, with two tapered stripes at both the front and the back. 

There we have it,  voting starts now and will go for 2 days or, if we have 15 or more total votes and a team has a 4 vote lead, whichever happens first.  Once we have DC in the fold, I will publish a new AAFL map with its 6 teams and we will then select the final inaugural Western Squad.  But first, let's get this club an identity. 

Sorry for the delay.  It is coming right now. 

Man, this one is gonna be close.  Here is the count as of 8:49am MT, with the polls closing at 5pm MT.

DC            7 

CHI          6

NY/NJ    5

MIA         4

It is still anyone's race.  If you have not voted yet, you have another 8 hours to let your thoughts be known.   I have finished my 4 identity options for all 4 of these cities so I am ready to go with whatever the voting decides. 

And here is what I can tell you about Navy Blue.   It is not happening.   Here are the color combos for all 4 identities for each city. 

DC

1. Purple, black & metallic gold

2. Royal blue, red, & silver.

3. Maroon, dark grey & black

4. Olive green, metallic gold, black.

CHICAGO

1. Black, silver, royal blue

2. Black, orange, dark grey

3. Kelly green, black

4. Charcoal, sky blue, silver

NY/NJ

1. Bright royal blue, black, silver

2. Black, red, silver

3. Forest green, grass green, silver

4. Dark kelly green, orange

Miami

1. Dark Kelly green, orange, grass green

2. Purple, red, silver

3. Black, neon sky, neon pink

4. Aqua, purple, athletic gold

So, it will be a navy-free 6th club. 

Early voting has Chicago in the lead, but a precarious lead to be sure. 

CHI         5

NY/NJ   4

DC          4

MIA        2

ATL         0

DET        0

If we were in a caucus, we would drop ATL and DET right now.  Focus on the 4 viable options.   But, still plenty of time to decide.  Keep those votes coming.    And just for fun, here are some hints about my favorites of the nicknames so far for these cities. 

NY/NJ  -- Either harkening back to a minor league team of the past in the Garden State or a nod to the bossest local product NJ has. 

DC -- By air or by land, a tough choice, or you could go with what DC wields most often.

CHI -- I have struggled with Chi-Town, but I had to have at least one "one syllabie" animal to go with the Bulls, Bears, Cubs, Wolves, etc. 

MIA -- Two pretty popular concepts return from earlier votes, although may cause an in-state war. 

I see Steve Kornacki up at the big board, which can only mean one thing, we are ready to call this race, and it looks like a landslide. 

Congratulations to the Portland Chinook!  Football returns to the PDX as the Chinook bring their combination of NW native culture, local fauna, and Seattle Seahawk influence to the AAFL.  It's Cascade blue, Navy, and salmon pink on display as the Chinook reveal their full uniforms.  In addition to the helmet stripe inspired by Chinook art, which reappears on the pants, Portland also introduces a secondary logo which depicts the team's namesake in the same PNW native art style.  And while there will be a Cascade blue jersey and a white jersey, the team has opted not to have a white pant option, going with a navy set to pair with their home jersey and a Cascade blue set for their aways.  Ombre effects are used on the numbers and sleeves of the white jersey and in the collar of the home jersey.  The tertiary mark, a "C" in colors that replicate the salmon coloration, will not appear on the uniform, but we expect it will be used as a frequent identifier of the team.  So, welcome the newest, and most aquatic, of the AAFL franchises. The Chinook. 

And now we move back to the East, and I am going to do something a little different.  We are going to delay the wide open “Wildcard” choice until the 8^th team, because after New Orleans, the 57^th largest MSA in the country, won our supposed “big market NFL city” vote, the AAFL panics a bit because they know that their TV partners expect something a bit more Top 15 than the Big Easy.  So, this next vote will be very limited.  I picked the 7 biggest viable markets east of the Mississippi that can host a team, and we are picking Eastern team #3 from that pool.  Then, when we pick round 4, we will open it up to smaller markets.

So, here are your choices. Will it be the 1^st NE team or will a team from the Midwest join St. Louis and New Orleans?

NEW  YORK/NEW JERSEY

#1 market, 19.6 million people, playing in Red Bull Arena (25k)

CHICAGO

#3 market, 9.3 million people, playing in Seatgeek Stadium (20k)

WASHINGTON, DC

$6 market, 6.27 million people, playing at Audie Field (20k)

ATLANTA

#8 market, 6.24 million people, playing at Georgia State Stadium (24k)

MIAMI

#9 market, 6.14 million people, playing at FIU Stadium (24k)

BOSTON

#11 market, 4.9 million people, playing at Harvard Stadium (30k)

DETROIT

#14  market, 4.4 million people, playing in Rynearson Stadium in nearby Ypsalanti (30k)

Let’s hear your rationales, and count your votes.  Who will be joining New Orleans and St. Louis in the Eastern Division?

3 hours ago, Blindsay said:

In this Universe, the UFL Died

Yes, this league exists (I picture 2028-2030 range) as TV networks and some money people did an autopsy on the UFL and figured out that with just a few alterations they could make the AAFL work.