Russell Athletic signs multi-year title sponsorship with ESPN for Arena Football
February 26, 2007 - Arena Football League (1987-2008) (AFL I) News Release
Russell Athletic and ESPN announced today Russell Athletic will sponsor Arena Football for the next 5 years starting this season on all regular and post season telecasts on ESPN networks and ABC. The official title of the telecast will be Russell Athletic ESPN Arena Football, which debuts with a pair of ABC regional telecasts on Sunday, March 4 at 12:30 p.m. ET -- Dallas Desperados at New York Dragons and Chicago Rush at Kansas City Brigade.
"Not only will you hear the Russell name during AFL telecasts, you'll see this exciting league's talented players wearing our uniforms," said Doug Kelly, President of Russell Athletic. "This unique 5-year naming rights entitlement agreement with ESPN is a natural extension of our strong commitment to the AFL."
Russell Athletic will be exclusive uniform provider for the league and will debut its innovative performance technology, the Xtreme Compression (XC) jersey, during the March 4th season openers for the Los Angeles Avengers and Dallas Desperados. The state-of-the-art XC jersey includes compression fit material that is difficult to grab, ventilator technology to accelerate body cooling, Dri-Power(r) technology to wick moisture away from the body, and Anti-Microbial technology to help eliminate odor.
Russell Athletic will be the exclusive athletic apparel retailer and will also entitle a special one-hour AFL season preview show on ESPN2 Tuesday, February 27 at 7 p.m., as well as a playoff preview show on ESPN2 Friday, June 29 at 7 p.m. .
The Russell Athletic ESPN Arena Football Preview Show will feature ESPN's AFL commentators Mike Greenberg, Mike Golic and Merril Hoge with guest appearances by Philadelphia Soul President Ron Jaworski and team owners Jon Bon Jovi (Philadelphia), Mike Ditka (Chicago) and John Elway (Colorado). The program will take a look back at ArenaBowl XX and some of the top plays in league history and breakdown the upcoming season.
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Arena Football League (1987-2008) Stories from February 26, 2007
- Dragons announce 2007 roster - New York Dragons
- Storm Announce 2007 Roster - Tampa Bay Storm
- Rattlers announce 2007 opening day roster - Arizona Rattlers
- Rampage Set Roster for Historic 10th Anniversary Season - Grand Rapids Rampage
- VooDoo set roster for 2007 - New Orleans VooDoo
- Crush make final roster moves - Colorado Crush
- Saturday's game to be broadcast on KJZZ - Utah Blaze
- Desperados finalize 2007 roster - Dallas Desperados
- Gladiators confirm 2007 roster - Las Vegas Gladiators
- Avengers trim roster below regular-season limit - Los Angeles Avengers
- Wranglers set roster for 2007 - Austin Wranglers
- Carmen Rasmusen to perform National Anthem - Utah Blaze
- Preds finalize roster for opening week - Orlando Predators
- Philadelphia Soul announce final roster for 2007 - Philadelphia Soul
- Brigade sets 2007 opening day roster - Kansas City Brigade
- Russell Athletic signs multi-year title sponsorship with ESPN for Arena Football - AFL I
- Rush signs QB D'Orazio to contract extension through 2009 - Chicago Rush
- Former SaberCat QB Ron Lopez Faces Life-Threatening Opponent - OSC Original by John Hahn
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