Draft:Arena Football League (2024)

The Arena Football League (AFL) is a professional indoor American football league founded in 2023 with their first season beginning in 2024. The current AFL is not directly connected to the previous two iterations of the league but claiming their histories and trademarks.

On February 1, 2023, G6 Sports Group (based in Toronto, Ontario), a new ownership group that had acquired the league's trademarks and social media accounts, announced another revival of the league which began play in 2024.

History
A year after its second shutdown, the Arena Football League trademarks and logo were bought out by Darren Arbet in 2020. Arbet is a former San Jose SaberCats head coach and was the head coach of the Indoor Football League's Bay Area Panthers. The trademark remained inactive until 2022, when a new website was set up. The website was first noticed on December 12, 2022. Two days later, a tweet from the league account was posted under a post from Tim Capper about the death of John Gregory (head coach of the Iowa Barnstormers), reading "Our thoughts and prayers have gone out to John's family." This tweet was later deleted, along with all the other tweets the Arena Football League Twitter account had up to that point. The new management assumed control of the Instagram account on around December 27 and deleted all posts on around January 6, and then took control of the Facebook account on January 16. On January 16, 2023, after a month of the first tweet, the Twitter account posted a picture of the leagues 2003–18 logo, with the caption #NewProfilePic.

On February 1, 2023, the Arena Football League confirmed its plans to return in 2024, over a year after the rights to the league were purchased by an investment group called F1 Sports & Entertainment. The relaunched league, led by chairman Chris Chetty, president Anthony Rossi, president of operations Shan Singh, and commissioner Lee A. Hutton III, will feature 16 teams playing a 10-game season over the course of the summer months, followed by a postseason format that has yet to be determined. The league returned its logo to the one used from 2003 to 2018. The new iteration of the league will feature "streaming, betting, technology, (and) virtual reality" elements, per Rossi. In a February 2023 interview with ArenaFan.com, the commissioner mentioned that the league would have a salary cap of $700,000, but the league will allows additional salary spending for "franchise players".

On July 18, 2023, TMZ Sports initially reported that the AFL had selected the following cities that would be receiving new teams: Austin, Texas; Boise, Idaho; Bakersfield, California; Chicago, Illinois; Denver, Colorado; St. Paul, Minnesota; Lake Charles, Louisiana; Cincinnati, Ohio; Orlando, Florida; Salem, Oregon; Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; St. Louis, Missouri; Tallahassee, Florida; Nashville, Tennessee; Everett, Washington and Odessa, Texas. The league made the statement official on their Twitter page.

After several supposed expansion teams were announced in late 2023, league commissioner Hutton released a statement regarding addition of these new team names. He states on his Twitter account: "Any information that concerns the Arena Football League must be endorsed by me or our CEO otherwise it is not reliable. AFL team name announcements will be coming soon for all locations. It is an exciting time as we make our mark to be bigger and better."

On August 29, 2023, the league officially announced that the Billings Outlaws, formerly of Champions Indoor Football, would be the inaugural members of the new version of the league. On August 31, the West Texas Desert Hawks (formerly the Warbirds) were the second team confirmed. The Orlando Predators were the third team announced on September 25; with the announcement of the Predators, the league announced its intent to instead have 20 teams in its 2024 season, as it planned on absorbing three additional teams from Champions Indoor Football. On October 5, 2023, Hutton appeared with the owners of three remaining CIF teams—the ICT Regulators of the Wichita metropolitan area, Salina Liberty and Southwest Kansas Storm in Dodge City— and CIF commissioner Mike McCoy as they announced the remainder of that league was merging into the AFL, with McCoy being named AFL deputy commissioner three weeks later.

On November 16, 2023, at the AFL relaunch event, Hutton revealed the 16 teams set play in the 2024 season, while he mentioned the league might expand in the future to 24 teams, as the Chicago Rush and Arizona Bandits are expected to join in 2025 along with other possible teams in markets that were part of the league's original market announcement. Hutton also declared that the league game "will be broadcast, streamed and will also be available in VR". He also referred to the original list of cities and revealed that other "leagues and individuals" (none specified) were trying to cancel teams contracts with the arenas and participated in "anti-competitive practices" to try disturb the league progress, which caused a move to different locations. Hutton also mentioned he's in preliminary talks about conducting international exhibitions games, and with that in mind they changed the official website from "TheAFL.com" to "ArenaFootballUSA.com", as they plan to globalize the game.

Following the inaugural week of competition in 2024, numerous problems began to emerge with the league's teams. The Philadelphia Soul coach and roster all departed abruptly before their contest (forcing an American Arena League team from Dallas to don the Soul's uniforms for the game) against the Louisiana VooDoo, who themselves were forced to move their home schedule from Lake Charles to Lafayette days before the game after the manager of Lake Charles's arena accused the VooDoo of failing to cover rent or insurance expenses. The Oregon Blackbears' home arena in Salem, Oregon was deemed unsafe, forcing a slew of schedule changes. The Iowa Rampage folded after its inaugural contest, accusing Hutton of reneging on promises to cover increased expenses, while the Rapid City Marshals granted six players their release and renegotiated lower salaries for their remaining players after they also did not receive the promised compensation from the league. Their final game was on May 4, 2024, on the road at Southwest Kansas, losing 34–18. Rossi disowned any connection to league operations in the wake of the controversy, instead stating that his company had licensed the Arena Football League trademarks to Hutton's company for a fee that Hutton did not pay. These problems have prompted calls for Hutton to resign, including from Billings Outlaws owner Steven Titus. Marshals owner Wes Johnson noted that the league structure centered all power in the commissioner, whom the owners had no leverage to fire. On May 9, 2024, it was announced that the Georgia Force had abruptly folded and the Soul had suspended operations for the remainder of the 2024 season with hopes of returning in 2025.

On May 12, 2024, kicker Melissa Strother made an extra point while playing for the Washington Wolfpack, making her the first female player to score a point in the Arena Football League.

Change in leadership
On May 13, 2024, in an email from owner Diana Hutton, the Minnesota Myth became the fourth team to suspend operations, blaming it on an inability to raise necessary sponsorships because of "negative publicity" and accusing the owners of "sabotage" in order to force her husband Lee Hutton to resign as commissioner; Hutton confirmed the team's closure publicly a day later. Hours later, the same Arena Insider reported that sources with the AFL stated that, in a unanimous vote among the remaining owners, Lee Hutton was ousted as league commissioner and that Nashville Kats president (and former NFL and USFL head coach) Jeff Fisher was appointed interim commissioner. The official announcement was made May 14. This is despite a league bylaw that was believed to have granted Hutton total immunity from ouster by league owners; the ouster was made with the full cooperation of G6 Sports Group (owners of the trademarks and connected to the original F1 group that had founded the revival), who had suggested Fisher for the position.

Former teams

 * Georgia Force - Folded two games into the 2024 season.
 * Iowa Rampage - Folded after one game in the 2024 season in protest of league nonpayment.
 * Minnesota Myth - Folded two games into the 2024 season in a maneuver tied to the owner's husband being ousted as commissioner.
 * Louisiana VooDoo - Left out of the league in the 2024 reorganization.
 * Oregon Blackbears - Left out of the league in the initial 2024 reorganization, however could play the remainder of the season.
 * Philadelphia Soul – Suspended operations two games into the 2024 season after playing with replacement players.

Season structure
The 2024 season will have a 10-week season, with teams playing six of their ten games within the division. When the season ends, the top eight teams will make the ArenaBowl playoffs, and the top-seed will host the eighth-seed; the runner-up hosts the seventh; the third hosts the sixth and the fourth hosts the fifth in the quarterfinals. The 1-8 winner then plays the 4-5 winner and the 2-7 winner plays the 3-6 winner in the semifinals. The winners advance to the ArenaBowl.

Media
For the 2024 return, the AFL signed a national television deal with the NFL Network for broadcast over 30 AFL regular season games (games will also be streamed on NFL+); this never materalized, as NFL Network dropped plans to carry the games before they were played. The league announced on March 29 that much of the league's schedule will be carried on Gray Television owned-and-operated stations in each team's home market and in regional syndication.

American 7s Football League (A7FL)
January 16, 2024, the league announced a partnership with American 7s Football League (A7FL) for player development, as players can transfer between leagues, with the A7FL functioning as its de facto minor league. As part of the partnership, both leagues "will collectively align on marketing efforts that will elevate the visibility of leagues athletes".