Wranglers News and Notes:
Week 8
Mick Cornett
Tuesday June 6, 2000
With no game to discuss, the topic of Lopez’s lingering injuries were common fodder on the local sports-talk radio stations. Was he really hurt as much as he indicated? Or, was he masterminding a PR strategy that had him labeled a hero when the team won, and a wounded martyr when the team loss? You can find insiders that will verbally feed both theories, but the bottom line seems to lead to one conclusion: Yes, he’s really hurt and no, he’s not exaggerating the injuries to make himself look like a hero.
 Pass rushers like Sam Hernandez always want to get their hands on Ron Lopez Image courtesy of Jeff Marshall |
Lopez seems completely healed from the freak back injury that cropped up in week two but he’s suffered a series of high ankle sprains that haven’t healed. The week off should have helped, but as the team prepares for Saturday’s game at New Jersey, it seems obvious that he won’t be 100% for the seventh game in a row.
With pass-rushers smelling blood, Lopez has to start getting rid of the ball sooner and avoiding the hits.
In a sense, the criticism of Lopez actually signals the Wranglers have taken another step toward respectability. The worst thing that can happen to a sports franchise is for the media and the local sports community to ignore or not care what happens on the field.
The higher level of scrutiny illustrates a growing fan-base already filing into the Myriad at a rate of 9,941 per game. That’s slightly above the league average.
This year’s AFL playoff structure basically divides the league into four sections. First of all, there are the four division winners that get a first-round bye. Then there are the four teams with the next-best records and they get to host a first-round playoff game. The next four best records travel for the first round of the playoffs and the bottom five teams miss out completely. At mid season, there are five teams with two wins or less and it would seem that five wins would likely secure a playoff spot. If the season ended today, the Wranglers would be in a tie-breaker with Grand Rapids for the eighth spot, which is the last playoff position that gets to host a first-round game. Ironically, Oklahoma and Grand Rapids close the regular season against each other on July 20 in Oklahoma City. The game will be televised nationally on TNN.
Mick Cornett was a writer for ArenaFan Online from 2000 to 2001.
