Crush Expect to Pull Trigger in 2003
Patrick Daly
Friday January 24, 2003
As a part owner of the expansion Colorado Crush, that same confidence has been placed upon head coach Bob Beers, whose skills as a talent evaluator have been called upon to build a new team in the Arena Football League’s toughest division. Beers spent the last seven years as a college scout for the Broncos and served as head coach at Western Montana from 1993 to 1995, but, more than anything, it’s the scouting experience that made Beers the team’s first head coach.
“I think one of the hardest things to do in this league is pinpoint where the talent is,” Elway said. “There’s a lot of football players out there, but finding them is the toughest thing. Without a draft and the way the league is right now it’s tough finding them. Bob Beers has been with the Broncos in the scouting department for seven years. I knew that he’d seen a lot. He worked the west for the Broncos for seven years and so he knew where the players were and he knows the Broncos’ system.”
Over the past two seasons, AFL expansion teams have made an impact in their first year. Dallas made the playoffs in their inaugural 2002 season, while both Chicago and Detroit qualified for the postseason in their first seasons in 2001. With that precedent, the Crush have similar expectations, although they’ll get a baptism by fire in the league’s toughest division.
“We want to win right away even though we’re an expansion team. To have San Jose, Arizona and Los Angeles and walk into that division, who last year with Dallas that division only lost two games outside the division, tells you how strong it is. There’s no question that it’s a disadvantage for us, but if we can compete with our division we should be able to compete with the rest of the league.”
In order to build for early success, Colorado has worked first on building a solid foundation, starting with a capable, experienced quarterback. It’s not often an expansion team can grab a quarterback that earned the MVP in the previous year’s championship game, but that’s exactly what the Crush were able to do. After leading San Jose to the 2002 ArenaBowl title in place of an injured Mark Grieb, John Dutton was released since the team could not keep both players.
“Our number one goal was to go get a quarterback,” Elway said. “We knew we wanted a quarterback, because we knew if we had a quarterback we could build around that. I knew we needed a trigger guy, so we were very fortunate when San Jose had two good quarterbacks and had to let one of them go. So when they let John (Dutton) go we jumped all over it.
“Since then, we’ve just built around him and tried to get some people that will help him be successful. You need a trigger guy that’s got some experience in this league and I think we’ve got him.”
With Dutton in place, the Crush have added a mix of AFL veterans and rookies. Colorado benefited from the dispersal of former Toronto Phantoms players, as Damian Harrell and Charlie Davidson should make an immediate impact with the Crush. If Joe Douglass returns to his 2001 form, Colorado will have a dangerous weapon.
In addition to the skill positions, the Crush added some good experience on the line in the form of Otis Moore. Moore got his start with the Charlotte Rage in 1994. Other players to keep an eye on include wide receiver/defensive back Adrian Lunsford and fullback/linebacker Marrio Grier, as well as the young group of lineman that will have the task of protecting Dutton.
As more NFL teams jump on the AFL bandwagon, expect more relationships like the one developing in Colorado between the Broncos and Crush. As in Dallas, the strong influence of the Denver Broncos and shared personnel should create a solid relationship between the two teams in Colorado. Additionally, Broncos owner Pat Bowlen, along with Elway and Stan Kroenke, is a part owner of the Crush. Kroenke owns the NHL Colorado Avalanche, NBA Denver Nuggets and the Pepsi Center, the arena that the Crush will call home.
“Mr. Bowlen is part owner in the team, too,” Elway said. “There are resources that they’ve given us that have really helped us. An ongoing relationship with the Broncos is going to be huge for us and hopefully we can get them some players.”
With some early success in Colorado, the Crush might just be able to do that.
Patrick Daly has been an Arena Football League enthusiast since he first stumbled across the late-night ESPN broadcasts and has followed the Arizona Rattlers since their inaugural season in 1992. He graduated from Arizona State University with an engineering degree and is currently a member of a web development team for Direct Alliance in Tempe. Patrick currently resides in the Phoenix suburb of Chandler, Arizona with his beautiful wife, son and a very large football helmet collection.
