New football leagues for 2009

At this time last year, the Arena Football league was just getting their 2008 season kicked off. Now due to the economic crisis, league officials and players decided to take the year off and come back in 2010. Unlike the majority of people in the United States, I'm a big fan of the Arena Football league and I was disappointed to hear that there will be no games played this year.

However, their are a couple of professional football leagues that are slated to start this year. The first organization that I want to mention is the United National Gridiron League which will kick their season off on May 3 with eight teams. The UNGL is more of a developmental league which will consists players from the arena league, college players and players from the NFL that were on practice squads. They held their inaugural draft in early January and former Kentucky quarterback Shane Boyd was selected first to the Georgia Stallions. Now before I go any further, Georgia is one of the eight teams that will play, but the UNGL will not officially release the team name and the rosters until mid-April. So I'm not sure what city they will play their home games but rumor has it that they will play in Columbus. Other than Boyd, the list of former college and NFL stars that will play in the UNGL is limited but I think it will be successful because they are not competing with the NFL. In fact it's slogan is "Developing tomorrow's stars of the game".

The other league that will start in the fall but will play their games on Fridays is the United Football league. This league has gotten more media attention because of the NFL ties that will go along with the UFL. For example, in their inaugural season, four teams will play and the four head coaches have coached in the NFL. Dennis Green will coach the San Fransisco team, Jim Fassel will coach the Las Vegas team, Jim Hasslet will be the head man for the Orlando team and the New York team will be coached by Ted Cottrell. They will start play in October and the games will be aired on the Versus Network they haven't had their draft yet so players and rosters should be announced within the next couple of months.

Honestly, as a fan of football, I love this. It's give young players and opportunity to hone their skills and prepare them for the NFL. The thing that I don't want to happen is the AFL getting lost in the shuffle which could happen. Arena football has been around for over 20 years and is the only professional football league that is not the NFL has thrived. But with the UNGL, the UFL and the All-American Football league which will start play in 2010 will more likley take players from the AFL which will leave the AFL scrambling for players. But the one thing I will say is this, because of the new leagues, the NFL draft, mini camp and training camp, football season is all year long and that's the way it should be.

Podcast No. 8

It's been over a month, but I'm bringing back the podcast. I promise, I will do more podcasting, I'm going to set a schedule for that and blogging as well. Anyway this podcast is about the Braves and the Falcons. Enjoy!

Back in the fold

Okay. It's been over three weeks since I've posted a blog or podcast. My laptop has been out of commission for the last two weeks so that's one of the few reasons that I haven't posted anything. Anyway, I'm back at it and I just wanted to make a few bullet points.

• I've been watching the NCAA Tournament and I think that Villanova has as a very good shot winning the championship.
• The Braves are having a good season, but I do have some concerns with the pitching, in particular Kenshin Kawakami, and the bullpen.
• The Hawks need to find a way to win against the Lakers but I don't see that happening.
• The Falcons are having a solid off season because they are doing what they said they were going to do and that is not be major players in the free agency market. However, the New Orleans Saints are making a lot of moves on defense and if everything pans out for them, they could be the favorite to win the NFC South.
• The Thrashers are playing great hockey down the stretch but an they build on this next year? Probably not.

I just wanted to get those points out there. In my next blog I'll take a closer look at the Falcons and who are the possible players the Falcons could pick in the first round of the draft.

Former college football star blogging from prision

Maurice Clarett looked to have a bright future ahead of him after leading the Ohio State Buckeyes to a National Championship in 2002. But things went downhill after that and now he is in prison due to armed robbery and gun possession charges and has been incarcerated since 2006. Recently, he started his own blog from prison and he talks about how he is becoming a better man and going back to school at Ohio University. It's really interesting so check it out by clicking here.

ATL Sports Guy on 790 the Zone

Hey Guys. I want to let you know that I am on Sports Radio 790 the Zone on Sundays from 10 a.m. - 3 p.m. The five hour block is split into two shows. The first is Score Atlanta Sports Sunday with I.J. Rosenberg, Scott Janovitz, Fletcher Proctor and myself which runs from 10 a.m. - 1 p.m. The second show is called Score Atlanta's Offical Visit which has the same cast of characters plus Alex Ewalt which goes from 1 p.m. - 3 p.m. Today was my first time on the Offical Visit show and I should be on there a few more times if not from now on. So check us out on 790 AM on the radio dial or you can listen on the 790 the Zone website.