Post by Banana Cat on Mar 12, 2011 21:14:46 GMT -5
www.crainsdetroit.com/article/20101220/STAFFBLOG13/101229980/new-pro-football-league-plans-franchise-at-pontiac-silverdome
New pro football league plans franchise at Pontiac Silverdome
December 20, 2010
Bill Shea
Having trouble coming up with just the right gift for that special would-be sports tycoon in your family? The Michigan Coyotes pro football team can be had for just $1.5 million.
The franchise — which does not yet have an owner, coaches or players — is one of the six that make up the new Detroit-based Stars Football League LLC that aims to begin play in April at the Pontiac Silverdome and at stadiums in four Southern states.
The SFL is the brainchild of former player agent-turned-real estate investor Peter Huthwaite. His wife, Laura, is CEO of Giant Janitorial Service Inc. on Mack Avenue, a business they own together.
Huthwaite said he's investing his own money in the football league, along with cash from several co-investors he declined to name.
He also declined to say how much money is being fronted to launch the league, which also has an office in Fort Lauderdale, other than it's "several million."
Acknowledging that the landscape is littered with unsuccessful attempts to create pro football leagues — the All American Football League in 2007, with its Team Detroit at Ford Field, comes to mind as a $30 million failure that never played a game — Huthwaite and his lieutenants plan to keep costs in check.
"We have spent a lot of time on the business end of this venture, watching budgets," he said.
There will be a salary cap, but he declined to say what that number will be. Player salaries will range between the Arena Football League's $1.5 million salary cap ($400 per game for players) and the United Football League's $16 million to $20 million (base pay of $35,000 per season for players).
The league is selling five franchises for $1.5 million each, with the sixth to be run by the league. Unsold teams also will be operated by the league.
As an incentive, the SFL will cover all payroll and stadium lease costs for the first two years for any franchises that are sold.
Also for sale are 40 shares, or units, in the league at $100,000 each
"If we sell four franchises, we're fine. If we sell 40 units, we're fine from a financial standpoint," said Huthwaite, who said he's in talks with unnamed potential owners and investors.
The SFL's financial model also is based on averaging 10,000 fans over 30 games buying $20 tickets — which would raise $6 million. That doesn't include merchandise, stadium suites, season tickets, tryout fees, any broadcast fees, concessions or parking, Huthwaite said.
SFL players will wear jerseys with up to six sponsorship logo patches, similar to pro soccer or NASCAR gear.
The league has worked out a deal, which is not yet signed, for the Michigan team to play at the 80,300-seat Pontiac Silverdome, former home of the Detroit Lions until 2002 and the Al Taubman-owned Michigan Panthers of the defunct United States Football League in the 1980s.
"We agreed in principal on a pretty good deal, and we elected to put a team there," Huthwaite said. He didn't reveal terms of the deal other than the SFL will not collect any parking or concession revenue.
A message was left for Grant Reeves, general manager of the Silverdome for Toronto-based Triple Properties Inc., which bought the venue for $583,000 at auction in November 2009 and operates it under Triple Sports & Entertainment L.L.C.
Huthwaite points to the USFL's switch from a spring schedule to a fall season, bringing it into competition with the NFL, and over-expansion as financially fatal behavior his league will avoid.
"We're not challenging the NFL; we think they're terrific. We're a spring league," he said. "I've been around pro sports for 40 years, and I've seen them come and go. The mistake they made was they expanded too quickly and they tried to take on the NFL."
The SFL is planning its marketing and is in talks with regional broadcast outlets to air games. The league is online at StarsFootballLeague.com.
It also is hiring coaches and will begin seeking players in early 2011. Tryouts will be scheduled in January and February in Michigan and Florida and will be open to players age 18, meaning they would lose their college eligibility by signing a contract with the SFL.
"We're not telling people to come to our league to forsake college," Huthwaite said.
The NFL requires a player to either be out of high school for three
years or have finished three college football seasons before joining the league.
"If you're old enough to serve our country, you should be allowed to play pro football at 18 or older, if you have the ability to do so," Huthwaite said.
The hope is that talent can be found at tryouts and via a draft of players not taken by other leagues.
"There are thousands of players that go unnoticed. We want to give the underdog the opportunity to perform," Huthwaite said.
Rule-wise, the league will operate mostly like the NFL. Field goals longer than 50 yards are worth four points and can be returned if they're missed, and the league may use a 30-second play clock between plays rather than the NFL's 40-second clock. That's aimed at speeding up the game.
Also, there will be no instantly replay by officials.
Other franchises include:
~ Mobile Gladiators (Alabama), Ladd Peebles Stadium (capacity of 40,000)
~ Ft. Lauderdale Barracudas, Lockhart Stadium (20,000)
~ New Orleans Jazz, Ted Gormley Stadium (29,000)
~ Little Rock Ironmen (Arkansas), War Memorial Stadium (53,000)
~ Daytona Beach Racers, Municipal Stadium (21,000)
Here are some of the other pro football leagues that metro Detroit or Michigan connections:
~ The 16-team Arena Football League, which has a team in Grand Rapids that originally played in Detroit, said on Dec. 12, 2008, it was suspending its 2009 season because of "the current unprecedented economic climate." The league, launched in 1987, included NFL team owners, former NFL players and rock star Jon Bon Jovi among its investors. After the league's minor-league affiliate, af2, bought the assets of it parent, the AFL returned in 2010 with a vastly smaller payroll structure and a new broadcast deal with the NFL Network.
~ The Continental Indoor Football League has had a number of Michigan teams since the league was founded as the Great Lakes Indoor Football League in 2006. The CIFL's teams in Battle Creek, Saginaw, Muskegon, Kalamazoo, Flint and Port Huron all failed, moved or switched leagues since 2006. It is launching a new Port Huron (the Predators) and possibly a Grand Rapids team in 2011. Your narrator was a bench-bound last-string quarterback/George Plimpton scribe in 2006 for the Port Huron Pirates, which won the championship after a 12-0 season but imploded financially by the end of the 2007 season (and a 26-1 winning streak).
~ The six-team All American Football League that was to have a team at Ford Field and spent $30 million on start-up costs called it quits in March because the subprime mortgage crisis evaporated league-founder Marcus Katz's funding. The AAFL's shtick was drafting only players with a college degree, but despite connection to major sports names, it never played a game. Ford Field attempted via lawsuit to enforce a $1 million contract with the league.
~ Others: The American Football League, launched in 1960 as a rival to the NFL, was successful and eventually mergered with its rival to form the league as its known today. Detroit resident Ralph Wilson started the Buffalo Bills as an AFL franchise. The United Football league launched in 2009 and will expand to six teams in 2011. It puts teams in non-NFL markets (insert your own Lions joke here) and may benefit from the NFL's labor uncertainty. The NFL itself tried the World League of American Football in Europe and North America in 1991-92, which was resurrected as just the World League in 1995 then as NFL Europe in 1998. It lasted from 2006 until 2007 as NFL Europa before the plug was finally pulled.
December 20, 2010
Bill Shea
Having trouble coming up with just the right gift for that special would-be sports tycoon in your family? The Michigan Coyotes pro football team can be had for just $1.5 million.
The franchise — which does not yet have an owner, coaches or players — is one of the six that make up the new Detroit-based Stars Football League LLC that aims to begin play in April at the Pontiac Silverdome and at stadiums in four Southern states.
The SFL is the brainchild of former player agent-turned-real estate investor Peter Huthwaite. His wife, Laura, is CEO of Giant Janitorial Service Inc. on Mack Avenue, a business they own together.
Huthwaite said he's investing his own money in the football league, along with cash from several co-investors he declined to name.
He also declined to say how much money is being fronted to launch the league, which also has an office in Fort Lauderdale, other than it's "several million."
Acknowledging that the landscape is littered with unsuccessful attempts to create pro football leagues — the All American Football League in 2007, with its Team Detroit at Ford Field, comes to mind as a $30 million failure that never played a game — Huthwaite and his lieutenants plan to keep costs in check.
"We have spent a lot of time on the business end of this venture, watching budgets," he said.
There will be a salary cap, but he declined to say what that number will be. Player salaries will range between the Arena Football League's $1.5 million salary cap ($400 per game for players) and the United Football League's $16 million to $20 million (base pay of $35,000 per season for players).
The league is selling five franchises for $1.5 million each, with the sixth to be run by the league. Unsold teams also will be operated by the league.
As an incentive, the SFL will cover all payroll and stadium lease costs for the first two years for any franchises that are sold.
Also for sale are 40 shares, or units, in the league at $100,000 each
"If we sell four franchises, we're fine. If we sell 40 units, we're fine from a financial standpoint," said Huthwaite, who said he's in talks with unnamed potential owners and investors.
The SFL's financial model also is based on averaging 10,000 fans over 30 games buying $20 tickets — which would raise $6 million. That doesn't include merchandise, stadium suites, season tickets, tryout fees, any broadcast fees, concessions or parking, Huthwaite said.
SFL players will wear jerseys with up to six sponsorship logo patches, similar to pro soccer or NASCAR gear.
The league has worked out a deal, which is not yet signed, for the Michigan team to play at the 80,300-seat Pontiac Silverdome, former home of the Detroit Lions until 2002 and the Al Taubman-owned Michigan Panthers of the defunct United States Football League in the 1980s.
"We agreed in principal on a pretty good deal, and we elected to put a team there," Huthwaite said. He didn't reveal terms of the deal other than the SFL will not collect any parking or concession revenue.
A message was left for Grant Reeves, general manager of the Silverdome for Toronto-based Triple Properties Inc., which bought the venue for $583,000 at auction in November 2009 and operates it under Triple Sports & Entertainment L.L.C.
Huthwaite points to the USFL's switch from a spring schedule to a fall season, bringing it into competition with the NFL, and over-expansion as financially fatal behavior his league will avoid.
"We're not challenging the NFL; we think they're terrific. We're a spring league," he said. "I've been around pro sports for 40 years, and I've seen them come and go. The mistake they made was they expanded too quickly and they tried to take on the NFL."
The SFL is planning its marketing and is in talks with regional broadcast outlets to air games. The league is online at StarsFootballLeague.com.
It also is hiring coaches and will begin seeking players in early 2011. Tryouts will be scheduled in January and February in Michigan and Florida and will be open to players age 18, meaning they would lose their college eligibility by signing a contract with the SFL.
"We're not telling people to come to our league to forsake college," Huthwaite said.
The NFL requires a player to either be out of high school for three
years or have finished three college football seasons before joining the league.
"If you're old enough to serve our country, you should be allowed to play pro football at 18 or older, if you have the ability to do so," Huthwaite said.
The hope is that talent can be found at tryouts and via a draft of players not taken by other leagues.
"There are thousands of players that go unnoticed. We want to give the underdog the opportunity to perform," Huthwaite said.
Rule-wise, the league will operate mostly like the NFL. Field goals longer than 50 yards are worth four points and can be returned if they're missed, and the league may use a 30-second play clock between plays rather than the NFL's 40-second clock. That's aimed at speeding up the game.
Also, there will be no instantly replay by officials.
Other franchises include:
~ Mobile Gladiators (Alabama), Ladd Peebles Stadium (capacity of 40,000)
~ Ft. Lauderdale Barracudas, Lockhart Stadium (20,000)
~ New Orleans Jazz, Ted Gormley Stadium (29,000)
~ Little Rock Ironmen (Arkansas), War Memorial Stadium (53,000)
~ Daytona Beach Racers, Municipal Stadium (21,000)
Here are some of the other pro football leagues that metro Detroit or Michigan connections:
~ The 16-team Arena Football League, which has a team in Grand Rapids that originally played in Detroit, said on Dec. 12, 2008, it was suspending its 2009 season because of "the current unprecedented economic climate." The league, launched in 1987, included NFL team owners, former NFL players and rock star Jon Bon Jovi among its investors. After the league's minor-league affiliate, af2, bought the assets of it parent, the AFL returned in 2010 with a vastly smaller payroll structure and a new broadcast deal with the NFL Network.
~ The Continental Indoor Football League has had a number of Michigan teams since the league was founded as the Great Lakes Indoor Football League in 2006. The CIFL's teams in Battle Creek, Saginaw, Muskegon, Kalamazoo, Flint and Port Huron all failed, moved or switched leagues since 2006. It is launching a new Port Huron (the Predators) and possibly a Grand Rapids team in 2011. Your narrator was a bench-bound last-string quarterback/George Plimpton scribe in 2006 for the Port Huron Pirates, which won the championship after a 12-0 season but imploded financially by the end of the 2007 season (and a 26-1 winning streak).
~ The six-team All American Football League that was to have a team at Ford Field and spent $30 million on start-up costs called it quits in March because the subprime mortgage crisis evaporated league-founder Marcus Katz's funding. The AAFL's shtick was drafting only players with a college degree, but despite connection to major sports names, it never played a game. Ford Field attempted via lawsuit to enforce a $1 million contract with the league.
~ Others: The American Football League, launched in 1960 as a rival to the NFL, was successful and eventually mergered with its rival to form the league as its known today. Detroit resident Ralph Wilson started the Buffalo Bills as an AFL franchise. The United Football league launched in 2009 and will expand to six teams in 2011. It puts teams in non-NFL markets (insert your own Lions joke here) and may benefit from the NFL's labor uncertainty. The NFL itself tried the World League of American Football in Europe and North America in 1991-92, which was resurrected as just the World League in 1995 then as NFL Europe in 1998. It lasted from 2006 until 2007 as NFL Europa before the plug was finally pulled.