Indoor Football This Week
by Danny Burnham
Published on April 24, 2009 under Southern Indoor Football League (SIFL)
Okay, I'm back after Master's weekend and Spring Break ... two very important annual occurances for us in Georgia.
I get back in the game discussing what you can get away with in the game.
A team owner grabs the facemask of an opposing player during a game. If that happened in the NFL, the incident would completely dominate the airwaves and cyberspace.
Since it happened at an indoor football game, it's like that old question about the tree falling in the forest marking a sound.
It's been reported that Corpus Christi Hammerheads owner Chad Dittman grabbed the facemask of an El Paso General player during a game a few weeks ago. Other than message board posts and a fan poll, there's been scant mention anywhere about the incident.
So is the IFL letting Dittman get away with it, or taking every action possible to squelch the bad publicity?
I'd like to see the IFL do something. Is the commissioner Tommy Benizio, protecting his long-time business partner or is he afraid that Dittman will pull the Hammerheads out of the IFL? Either way, Benizio's not looking good to me right now.
This is a serious offense, folks. If Benizio lets Dittman get away with his action, it definitely shows Benizio doesn't have much of a spine needed to run the "premier" indoor football league. If Benizio's trying to bury the incident, that isn't the approach the ``premier'' indoor football league needs to be taking. We want to know if Dittman has been punished for his actions, and if so, what are the punishments?
Heck, the new Southern Indoor Football League listed two fines on its transaction page after the first week of play. Not exactly earth-shattering, but at least its commissioner, Dan Blum, is trying to enforce the rules.
And then there's the AIFA, where the Ogden Knights usually take 2-3 days to post their stats. The Knights are coached by Michael Mink, who just happens to own the league. Maybe that's why he can get away with it? One would think that the league owner could find better ways to overcome being a bad 0-5 team. ...
GOOD NEWS: Congrats to Columbus Lions coach Jason Gibson, who became a father a couple of weeks ago. Of course, his wife went into labor just as the team was getting ready to road trip to Pennsylvania. The boy came out just in time for Gibson to catch a one-way flight to coach the team to a victory. C'mon coach, you need to plan your family so childbirth doesn't occur during the season (Just kidding) ... My boy Bo Bartik has been around the game so long that he's played in the first game of two leagues; he's now the QB for the Acadiana Mudbugs, who won the first SIFL game last Saturday against the Austin Turfcats. Here's the funny part. His experience in Daytona Beach was terrible at best, and the Turfcats bought the defunct Daytona Beach's game system. Glad to see something positive happened to him on that field for a change ... Austin had a preacher deliver a trash-talking prayer; In a statement, God declared ``Who was that guy and why does he think I would care who wins an indoor football game? â' ... The DC Armor may have set an AIFA low for when it got torched by 70 points by Columbus last week; the team's character was as bad as the score from what I'm hearing ... At least three of the leagues agree on one thing -- this vidswap.com thing is pretty cool if it makes highlight reels for players off of game film - a valuable promotion plus for players' resumes ... I'm at 560 words and haven't mentioned the CIFL yet. Chicago Slaughter's 6-0. Okay, I've met quota.
Southern Indoor Football League Stories from April 24, 2009
- Indoor Football This Week - OSC Original by Danny Burnham
- SIFL Coaches Recall Their NFL Draft Day - SIFL
- Week 2 Too Early For Big Game? - SIFL
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