Despite some late game heroics, new-look Talons fall short to Georgia, 53-47

At the end of last season Mitch Allner had one thing on mind. Improved size and talent. While last season's team was definitely talented, they lacked the size defensively to truly compete against improved opponents. Allner went on to sign a team with only three individuals with previous arena football experience. However, the team had loads of size and talented individuals. It was known the Talons would experience troubles in their first few games as players began to adjust. That is what we saw today.

From the opening kickoff, QB Brett Elliot had all kinds of time to work with. Elliot was able to be patient and wait for his receivers to get open, then pick apart the Talons secondary. After a seven minute drive to start the game, and a valiant goal line stand by the Talons, Georgia went ahead 7-0.

The Talons offense came out rather strong to start the game. Rookie QB Bobby Reid was sharp most of the day. On the Talons first drive Reid went 2-3 before Reid scrambled for one of his multiple rushing touchdowns of the day. Kicker Juan Bongarra failed his first arena football extra point to leave the Talons behind 7-6.

After a quick score by Georgia, Tulsa began to drive again with some great underneath passes. However, before the Talons could complete the drive, Reid broke a long scramble down to the 14 before being stripped with Georgia recovering. Georgia was then able to capitalize on busted coverage to extend their lead to 20-6, which they never lost.

The nail in the coffin was the start of the second half. After back-to-back sacks by the Talons defense to keep Georgia scoring for the half, the Talons offense makes mental mistakes to back the team up and then Bongarra's field goal attempt was blocked. Georgia took a shot and caught the Talons secondary off guard, increasing their lead to 33-17.

All day the Talons secondary was unable to maintain coverage and Elliot made them pay every time. This was compounded by the Defensive line's inability to get to the quarterback. For the Talons to be competitive, they will need to improve in both areas as the season continues.

Simply put, Reid was fantastic for the most part. His ability to pull the ball down and run is something that no team in the league could do last year (at least to the ability Reid brings). Combined with his feet, Reid's arm was sharp. He was making the right decisions and throwing the ball away when he needed too. The only problem was that it seemed that Reid had a receiver picked out when he left the huddle. Better defenses will be able to read that and make him pay.

However, if the team can grow and adjust to the indoor game, their talent should make them a strong team. At this point though, things may be rough for awhile. Next week the Talons travel to Dallas to take on the Vigilantes at noon CST on Saturday March 19.

What will the AFL look like next year?

Well the ArenaBowl is over, and congratulations to the Spokane Shock; even if I did pick against you. Now comes the offseason, a horrible 7-8 month wait till the next kickoff. At least in the mean time I have NFL, NCAA, and NBA to keep my busy. But also, we have AFL speculation to keep us busy as well. As of this morning there are a lot of rumors for shakeups for AFL franchises.

First off, we know the announced expansion teams will be around:

Philadelphia Soul
San Jose Sabercats
Kansas City Brigade
and as of last night, the Pittsburgh Power

But where does that leave the other 15 franchises? For some it may mean relocation.

The Alabama Vipers:
Late last night it was announced that the Georgia Force may be returning. But they may not be an expansion team. Instead it has been rumored that the Alabama Vipers will be relocating and rebranding as the Force. This season Alabama played in the smallest arena in the AFL. They could only max out at around 7,000 fans. That heavily limited the amount of income the team could bring in, both is tickets and in sponsorship. That combined with higher costs could be too much for the owners to handle.

The Bossier-Shreveport BattleWings:
It has been rumored for weeks, since their owner registered aflvoodoo.com, that the BattleWings could be relocating to New Orleans and rebranding as the VooDoo. The BattleWings never pulled a large crowd, even in their time in the af2. The difference was that in the af2 the loss on the owners was acceptable, in the AFL its much larger. This could spell doom for the BattleWings.

The Oklahoma City Yard Dawgz:
The Yard Dawgz were a decent team this year. They pulled decent crowds as well. However, they still were loosing money, and have been since at least the time the Thunder came to town. That combined with the new AHL Hockey Team (Barons), could mean the owners aren't willing to try to compete with other sports in town. Instead they could take their team elsewhere and try to turn a profit. The rumored location? Seattle. Yeah, another Seattle/OKC team swap. Very Ironic, but could happen.

As for the rest of the league nothing seems likely to change. The only team with light rumors is the Milwaukee Iron. The Iron have had issues with an ownership group and attendance. However, for the foreseeable future they will probably remain in the league.