Page 86 - Fl Stats News Today

On Tuesday, March 6th, Tim Cappers and Adam Markowitz sat down with the Vice President of the newly formed Arena Football League Player's Union (AFLPU) to discuss the prospects of a strike for the upcoming 2012 season. Below is the transcript from the interview.

The Tampa Bay Storm waited for just the right time to pull off not only their first win of the 2016 season, but one of the biggest wins in years, a 63-56 final over the Arizona Rattlers.

Maurice Purify's 8-yard TD reception from QB Nick Davila proved to be the difference in a wild, record-setting game on Saturday night. The Arizona Rattlers are on their way to ArenaBowl XXV to face the Philadelphia Soul after beating the Utah Blaze 75-69 on Saturday night in what proved to be a record-setting National Conference Championship Game.

Remember last week when I said that a 17-point loss was a good as a win for the Predators? They sure celebrated like that when Mark Lewis' field goal went through the uprights with just 0:05 left to play last Monday night. Kevin Guy didn't really like it all that much, but Orlando did what it had to do to set itself up for its Week 18 showdown with Philly for the conference title. It'll go down as a loss for the Predators, but let's face the facts here. That loss was as good ...

With the team's playoff fate well in hand, I decided to do something at last week's Utah Blaze home game that I hadn't done in years. Just go. I wasn't going to worry about the team's standing, I wasn't going to worry about the arena contract, and I wasn't going to think about Tommy Grady's interception rate. I was just going to go to an AFL game. I was going to grab a ticket, sit in a normal seat, and be with my brothers, my Dad and my nephew.

There isn't a person involved in the Arena Football League that thinks that the league is easier now than it was circa 2008. Players are coming and going on a regular basis, and the talent level in the league clearly isn't as strong as it was back in the day before the brutal end to the 2008 season.

Trust me. I've already done plenty of bellyaching about the 2016 playoff format the AFL put in place on Thursday. Theoretically, the AFL should be a more competitively balanced league this year. We've removed teams from both the top (San Jose) and the bottom of the league (Las Vegas, New Orleans and Spokane), and what should be left is a bunch of teams who should all finish between 4-12 and 12-4.

The Philadelphia Soul went through changes on the defensive side late this offseason when Defensive Coordinator Derek Stingley left for personal reasons, and long time low level indoor football coach Bernie Nowotarski now has control of the defense.

The San Jose SaberCats can wrap up a playoff berth this weekend with a win over the Utah Blaze and some help (Arizona, Colorado and Kansas City must lose as well). This despite the fact that San Jose would earn just its seventh win while seven teams in the National Conference could have at least seven wins without any possible way to notch a playoff berth.

With apologies to the War on I-4, the Arena Football League's best rivalry will be renewed this Sunday and the stakes could not be much higher. When the Arizona Rattlers (16-3) host the San Jose SaberCats (14-5) in the National Conference Championship Game, the longtime foes will battle it out for a berth in ArenaBowl XXVII.