Professional Football Researchers Association Forum

Obviously arena football is far from the glory days of Hunkie Cooper, Barry Wagner, Stevie Thomas and Zubaz, but it's pretty bad when a team that went 2-10 in the regular season AND lost their first playoff game just won the Arena Bowl.

Congrats to the Washington Valor, I guess.

So beyond-sick! Just four teams now and all four make playoffs?? Even with three of the teams finishing with winning records (8-4, 7-5, and 7-5 respectively) and Wash finishing...2-10?? And a two-game aggregate score for the semifinal round?? Is this fantasy football? This playoff-qualifying set-up makes the CFL look like pre-1969 MLB!

If “every team” makes it, they’d be better off making the entire season a septuple-elimination tournament.

74_75_78_79_ wrote:So beyond-sick! Just four teams now and all four make playoffs?? Even with three of the teams finishing with winning records (8-4, 7-5, and 7-5 respectively) and Wash finishing...2-10?? And a two-game aggregate score for the semifinal round?? Is this fantasy football? This playoff-qualifying set-up makes the CFL look like pre-1969 MLB!

If “every team” makes it, they’d be better off making the entire season a septuple-elimination tournament.

It's ridiculous. At one point they were 1-10, after the first playoff game they were 2-11, counting all games they finished 4-11 meaning they won 4 of 15 games and that was enough to be called champion.

They also had a losing record against EVERY other team in the league.

Reaser wrote:Obviously arena football is far from the glory days of Hunkie Cooper, Barry Wagner, Stevie Thomas and Zubaz, but it's pretty bad when a team that went 2-10 in the regular season AND lost their first playoff game just won the Arena Bowl.

Congrats to the Washington Valor, I guess.

The Arena League is a good example of mismanagement, because the game experience itself is fun. From too much expansion, to marketing failures, it's been a missed opportunity.

Reaser wrote:

74_75_78_79_ wrote:So beyond-sick! Just four teams now and all four make playoffs?? Even with three of the teams finishing with winning records (8-4, 7-5, and 7-5 respectively) and Wash finishing...2-10?? And a two-game aggregate score for the semifinal round?? Is this fantasy football? This playoff-qualifying set-up makes the CFL look like pre-1969 MLB!

If “every team” makes it, they’d be better off making the entire season a septuple-elimination tournament.

It's ridiculous. At one point they were 1-10, after the first playoff game they were 2-11, counting all games they finished 4-11 meaning they won 4 of 15 games and that was enough to be called champion.

They also had a losing record against EVERY other team in the league.

I'm expecting some changes will be made to their postseason system for next season.

Didn't even realize Arena football was still a thing.

This reminds me of something that happened some years back. A local high school, George Mason High, had a football team that went 0-10 and still manage to be awarded a playoff berth. I'd have to look up the particulars to see the logic behind that one, if there was any.

Todd Pence wrote:This reminds me of something that happened some years back. A local high school, George Mason High, had a football team that went 0-10 and still manage to be awarded a playoff berth. I'd have to look up the particulars to see the logic behind that one, if there was any.

Actually in my state in the top 2 high school classes all the teams get into the playoffs. They however aren't playing anymore games than they did before though. They simply dropped a game from the regular season schedule and had everyone's game 9 be the first playoff game. They didn't do that rule to make sure everyone gets a trophy though. They did it to make sure all the deserving teams still got in. Highschool sports are generally so uneven that some of the worst teams from one league will be just as good (if not better) than some of the best teams from another league.