By: Drew Moore

Yesterday The Valiance of American Football announced that they were suspending football operations. News followed about how Tom Dundon, Carolina Hurricanes owner and Chairman of the league after a $250 million investment a few weeks prior. Dundon, who was heralded as a hero when he bought the league is in the flipped roll, after news broke that Dundon only bought the league for access to the app technology that the league was developing. While thanks to Dundon the league was short lived, there were many great things about the league that I wanted to take a second to remember.

The Football

Yes the football was not as good as the NFL, but its a minor league. Growing up in a town with only minor league sports I saw no problem with that and my brothers and I quickly attached our selves to teams. The talent was not as good but from watching the games you could tell that this really was just about the love of the game with everyone involved and it translated to the field. The Orlando Apollos were the epitome of this, not only with the best record in the AAF but also with Steve Spurrier miked up.

While the Apollos had the best offense the Express had the best defense in the league. Led by fiery head coach Mike Singletary. Their defense swarmed to the football and hit hard. Though much like his time in the NFL Singletary struggled to field a good offense making his team the brunt of many memes after getting shut out in the opening week.

Safety

In recent years the NFL has made measly attempts to make the game safer for those who play it, leaving some including myself to question if they care about the people playing the game or are just exploiting them for profits. I have frequently said that the NFL’s goal is offensive player safety as they generate more revenue than defenders.

The AAF took steps to make the game safer for all. The most notable addition was the elimination of kickoffs. It has been debated in the NFL for some years now as they are the most dangerous play in the game but owners did not want to sacrifice the excitement that comes with a big return for the long term health of all 22 people that are on the field for those plays. The NFL has changed some of the rules such as eliminating running starts and the wedge formation but at the end of the day it is still the most dangerous play in the game.

Community

Rivalries are some of the best part of football, however there was something just pure about the community of the AAF. None of the teams fan basses hated the other, partly because of the lack of establishment, partly because of who the people were that followed the league, or those who just love football. The reddit page was an incredible amount of fun as everyone just loved that the league existed and even brought rivals from other leagues together.

The NFL and CFB have a lot of dirty politics that come with them and all of that seemed missing from the AAF. Even when my brothers and my teams were facing each other there wasn’t the usual grudging that comes with the outcome it was “how fun was that to watch.” I know I enjoyed writing my game picks every week, even though the last two weeks my academics got in the way of writing them.

In its short existence this league had made a special place in my heart as football in its purest form. It will be missed by me and many others. We can only hope that the passion this league brought in such a short time will translate to the NFL and CFB as this league did many of the things they do wrong now right.