Life After the Collapse in Columbus
Rob Hammersmith
Tuesday February 27, 2007
Lots of changes have occurred on the Destroyers roster. Trades, free agent signings, and the new Arena Football League rules that allow free substitution could mean that the Destroyers that take the field in 2007 could be quite different than the one that took the field the season before. But that’s nothing new for Columbus. Only three players that played for the Destroyers in 2005 returned for 2006. It’s becoming tradition to revamp the entire team every year. But does this also mean that it’s also tradition for the team to take half a season to start syncing with each other on the field? Not likely this year. Head coach Doug Kay has excelled in his AFL career by coaching great defense, and his corps of award winning defensive backs, that were arguably the best in the AFL last season, are returning. Expect them to be clicking together from game one.
Add to the coaching mix former Austin Wranglers head coach Skip Foster as offensive coordinator. Foster’s presence should be a major upgrade to an offense that ranked 17th out of 18 AFL teams last year. Foster is a successful head coach, yet was willing to take an assistant coach job with the Destroyers. Why? The Destroyers marketing phrase “We Believe” isn’t just a catch phrase. Two years ago the organization was the joke of the League, and when you find yourself in such a position you have two options: 1) quit; or 2) dedicate yourself to go in the right direction. The organization didn’t quit, and Foster is here because he believes in the direction that the organization is going.
The veteran leadership of DS Cecil Doggette and FB/LB Leroy Thompson will sorely be missed. Thompson was frequently the adrenaline of the team on the field, on the bench, and in the locker room. Likewise, Doggette was brought in for the ’06 season to anchor a defensive backfield full of young and inexperienced players. With Doggette’s presence these young and inexperienced players proved to be one of the most dominating defensive forces in the AFL. Will they continue that defensive dominance without Doggette’s on field presence? One has got to believe so given that Doggette is now the Destroyers’ Defensive Assistant coach.
Replacing the playing time of Doggette and Thompson shouldn’t be too hard. While the two did have significant amount of time on the field in ‘06, Harold Wells played just as much as Thompson did at the FB/LB spot, and effectively at that. And Jerald Brown and Brandon Hefflin played more at the DS positions than Doggette did.
Gone also are OS Carl Bond, OS Henry Douglas and WR/LB Thabiti Davis. While Bond was 2nd on the team in receptions, receiving yards, and in TDs, (Davis was 3rd in the same categories) many people speculate that a full season out of Darcey Levy and/or Henry Douglas would have doubled Bond’s numbers. Douglas was obtained early in the ’06 season from Chicago for defensive back Jeremy Unertl to help bolster the OS position where Bond wasn’t syncing with QB John Kaleo. But Douglas quickly found himself on the injured reserve list and has since been released during the 2007 training camp.
The Destroyers then acquired Marcus Knight off waivers from the Philadelphia Soul, and many speculated that he would battle for the OS position where he played for the Soul. But coach Doug Kay had a different plan in mind. He rotated Knight with WR/DB BJ Barre. Staying within the rules of substitution, Kay used Knight mostly on offense and Barre mostly on defense. This allowed Kay to sign Darcey Levy from the practice squad to be his new OS. The last half of the season saw Bond and Levy rotate on and off the active squad. When Levy played, at times he looked like an all star, pulling in 26 receptions, for 431 yards, and 8 TDs. What his stats don’t reflect are numerous times where Levy had beat his man downfield, but Kaleo due to being a “finesse” and “timing” QB didn’t have the arm to hit him. This is a problem that hopefully new QB Matt Nagy can rectify. The NFL has its eye on Levy because of his great speed, so this is his chance to shine. Let’s see if he takes it. Assuming Levy wins the job, he should be at the top of many AFL fantasy football team owners’ sleeper lists.
But winning that job may be a long shot despite Levy’s impressive showing last year. With the new AFL free substitutions rules, Barre will likely become a full time DB, which means Knight could become an offensive specialist again. Knight (65 receptions, 886 yards, 23 TDs) put up decent offensive numbers in limited playing time as an OS in 2005. It would be interesting to see what he could produce in a full season of playing time strictly on offense.
Columbus also went out and signed three veteran free agent wide outs, as well as four rookies, one of which was pursued by many AFL teams.
A couple of home comings occur with Tony Locke and Damien Groce. Locke played briefly in Columbus in 2004, but went on to big production with the Los Angeles Avengers. In two years with them he caught 157 passes, for 2310 yards, and 43 TDs. Groce was the Destroyers’ primary offensive force in 2005 (116 receptions, 1417 yards, 21 TDs), but left to play with the Arizona Rattlers last year. Despite playing for three different teams in the last three years he’s caught at least 19 TDs in each season.
The Destroyers also signed Josh Bush who has played the last three years for the Grand Rapids Rampage. As a two way player his time on offense was limited compared to an offensive specialist, so his 2006 numbers (64 receptions, 676 yards, 13 TDs) are similar to Knight’s, who played the same role. And like Knight he could wind up in a starting wide out position. If not, he’ll provide depth to the defensive backfield with Doggette gone.
Yet, even with all of these veteran WRs, the Destroyers may find that a rookie wins a starting WR position. Cole Magner played with Columbus QB Josh Harris while at Bowling Green State University, and nearly half of all AFL teams attempted to sign him. He chose Columbus because of Josh Harris. In fact, Columbus offered Magner a multi-year deal, but he would only sign for one year as he believes his goal to make the NFL is quite realistic, a dream that almost came true with the Falcons this past fall. Word from training camp is that Cole catches everything thrown to him and he was hitting the Destroyers veteran DBs like he was an AFL veteran himself. If he can catch on to Skip Fosters’ offensive game plan quickly, he should see plenty of playing time.
And if that weren’t enough, the Destroyers leading receiver in 2006 is returning. David Saunders became QB John Kaleo’s failsafe target last year, likely due their experience playing together in Tampa. That relationship helped Saunders put up career highs with 76 receptions, 835 yards, and 19 TDs.
What is clear is that not all of these guys can make the team. As impressive as Levy was at the end of 2006, it can’t be forgotten that he was cut by the Colorado Crush and only made the Destroyers practice squad at the beginning of last season. As attractive as he is to be a great fantasy football sleeper pick, with all these wide outs trying out for the team, he has just as much potential to be cut. The same can be said for nearly all these wide outs. While the new free substitution rules will allow teams to play more offensive specialists, the 20 man roster limit will likely mean that guys like Saunders, Knight, and Bush have an advantage to make the team over the numerous offensive specialist guys even though they may be better offensive players. Locke and Groce appear to be the favorites to win starting wide out jobs, but at this point it’s anybody’s guess who will win the jobs after training camp.
Just as confusing is who will anchor the lines. While Mike Sutton (traded for QB Matt Nagy) will be hard to replace, the new free substitution rules will likely have the biggest change on the make up of offensive and defensive lines. These positions have never had the benefit of having a specialist before. With this now an option, expect a lot of changes for not only the Destroyers’ lines, but across the Arena Football League in general. Kelvin Kinney, Ken Jones, Howard Duncan, Juan Porter, and Brad Greetis are all back, but will be challenged in camp by new comers Elliot Harris, Will Rabatin, Jason Hilliard, and Shane Jones. Don’t be surprised if some of the vets don’t even make the team.
What should be the same as last year is the defensive backfield. Anchored by the AFL’s Defensive Player of the Year, Jerald Brown will again lineup with Brandon Hefflin and BJ Barre. All three were award winning defensive players in 2006, and there’s no reason to think they won’t retain their starting jobs even with the new free substitution rules. If anything it will mean Barre will get more playing time on defense than he was getting before as a two way player.
Linebacker starting positions should be won by Harold Wells and David Saunders, but because they are both two way players, new comers Brian Thornbug, Adrian Mayes, Jemaine Petty and Michael Spicer not only have a good shot at making the team, but also gain significant playing time. Given Wells was a linebacker in college and learned to play FB to play in the AFL, he may become a fulltime linebacker. Don’t be surprised to see OL Brad Greetis make the team as a FB. With the 20 man roster limit, Greetis would also give more depth at the OL position.
Peter Martinez will try to fill Mark Lewis’ shoes as the place kicker. That won’t be easy. Lewis was pretty valuable to the Destroyers last year, even so much that he won player of the game honors in the Austin win. Not only was his accuracy and distance important, but his kickoffs were frequently difficult to return, producing a lot of automatic spots at the five yard line.
Now to the one position that hasn’t been discussed yet… QB. The Destroyers are making a big deal about the acquisition of Matt Nagy. While it makes great headlines for the media, there are a lot of “ho hum” opinions about it. Fact is Nagy is a veteran QB who has put up some great passing numbers and he’s led a team to the Arena Bowl. Well, where have we heard that before? Oh that’s right. Before the 2006 season the Destroyers acquired a veteran QB who has put up some great numbers and he led a team to an Arena Bowl victory… John Kaleo. That’s not to say that I’m disappointed about the acquisition of Nagy. It just seems like we’ve recently been there and done that.
In fact Nagy and Kaleo seem very similar to me. Not in the way they play the QB position, but in their apparent ability to have moments of greatness one week and then have moments of complete failure another week. Kaleo was a roller coaster ride in 2006. What he did at New York, at Philadelphia, and at Austin was Joe Montana like. But what he did against Orlando and New York at home was down right pathetic, and it’s hard to argue that he wasn’t the sole reason we lost those games and missed the playoffs.
But Kaleo should not be remembered as the reason Columbus didn’t make the playoffs. He should be remembered as the QB that revitalized the Destroyers organization. Not many QBs are lining up to join a club that went 2-14 the year before. Kaleo took the challenge. And despite playing the AFL’s toughest schedule in 2006, he made the city of Columbus believe in the team again. In 2006, Columbus played 13 games against teams that finished .500 or better. That alone should have produced a disaster win/loss record for a team that only won 2 games the year before. But Kaleo led the Destroyers to their most wins in franchise history, and more impressive is that 6 of those wins were against teams with records of .500 or better. Playing only 3 teams with losing records, the 2006 team showed that it could compete with any given team on the field last year, and a lot of the thanks for that should go to Kaleo.
But now Kaleo is out and Nagy is in. Ultimately it’s a good swap. Not because it improves the team. Arguably the case can be made that it’s both good and bad for the team on the field. What’s significant about it is that Kaleo is likely to retire after the 2007 season. The Destroyers don’t need that to happen to their QB. Nagy is in his prime and has got a good 6 to 8 years left to play, and it doesn’t appear that he’s so great that the NFL’s going to come calling for him soon. The Destroyers are still building. I’d say rebuilding, but in their 8 years they’ve never hit a mark of success that they could rebuild to. Nagy is exactly the kind of QB they can build around. A guy who’s good enough to win with, but not great enough that there’s a high risk of losing him, even perhaps to a free agent bidding war. Kaleo is a guaranteed loss, if not after this season, surely the next.
The Destroyers have also signed veteran AFL backup QB Scott Dreisbach. The former Michigan Wolverine may not feel welcomed playing in the city of the Ohio State Buckeyes, but if he’s forced to play, I don’t think he’s going to make anyone miss Billy Dicken. In fact I doubt many fans will even recall that Dicken played in Columbus. Josh Harris will again try to make the team, but if he couldn’t beat out Dicken last year, I think he’ll have a harder time beating Dreisbach. If he does make the team, that would be great news for his development as an AFL QB.
One incredible stat about the Destroyers QB position is that once Matt Nagy starts his first game for the Destroyers, it’s likely that 26% of all starting QBs in the Arena Football League started at one time in their career for the Columbus Destroyers. John Kaleo (Tampa Bay Storm), Matt D’Orazio (Chicago Rush), Chad Salisbury (Grand Rapids Rampage), and Ryan Vena (Georgia Force) are all former Destroyers QBs and likely to start for their respective teams. Let’s just say it’s time to stop blaming all the problems that the Destroyers have experienced in the past primarily on the QB.
The Destroyers will likely take the field vastly different than who they were at the end of the 2006 season. But if the coaching staff knows what’s best for the team, they’ll make sure the newcomers know what it was like to come home from San Jose. The Destroyers fans remember what it felt like after that game. Let’s remember it, so that it can be avoided.
The Destroyers management has been marketing “We Believe” as the 2007 catch phrase. It’s appropriate. How many AFL teams that have gone as bad as 8-24 over two years were still able to average over 12,000 fans a game the next season? Columbus did exactly that. Columbus fans do believe. But I think a more appropriate catch phase exists, especially after the 30 minute collapse in San Jose. In the immortal words of Twisted Sister, “We’re not gonna take it anymore!”
Rob became an Arena Football League enthusiast when the Destroyers moved from Buffalo to Columbus after the 2003 season. Rob and his wife have been season ticket holders for the Destroyers since they arrived. Rob was born and raised in Central Ohio, attended The Ohio State University and has now worked for the past 15 years in the area. Despite attending Buckeye games for decades, Rob has found that Arena Football tops his list of sporting events that he likes to attend.
