The Shock logo shakedown

The crazy went to bizarre.

That’s what arena league football is all about anyway, but generally during the season.

On Oct. 19 it was officially announced that after 10 years, the Spokane Shock would no longer be known as the Shock.

It’s got nothing to do with the need to totally rebrand the team that has sought asylum in the Indoor Football League for the 2016 season.

Just what the crumbling Arena Football League will gain by playing hardball with the Shock by putting its name and logo in storage with those of a half dozen other defunct franchises is as clear as the many baffling calls made by AFL referees.

It may simply be a poke in the eye to one of the more successful AFL franchises that opted for greener turf as Shock management watched the league slowly disintegrate.

Spokane’s exit from the AFL, which initially had 15 teams in its reconstituted look in 2010, came as the league shrunk to 12 teams at the start of the 2015 season, but then lost franchises in New Orleans and Las Vegas before the season was over.

The future did not look good to Shock majority owner Nader Naini so he chose to join the IFL, a level of play below the AFL, but in his estimation the only plausible option to keep arena football in Spokane.

The loss of Spokane left the league with nine teams and according to Ryan Eucker, director of operations for the Spokane Whatchamacallits, the Los Angeles KISS are ”questioning their participation in 2016.”

“A few other teams I think are analyzing their future if the league isn’t able to sustain it’s membership and provide growth opportunities in the near future,” Eucker added, making this power play by the AFL truly strange.

Eucker said “We knew that the league owned the trademark rights to the name and logo prior to the new ownership coming on board.” And while it’s not entirely a new concept, it is limited these days compared to the past.

The Spokane Chiefs own both the name and logos, according to a team official and he presumed the same was true with the Indians who are under the same ownership of Brett Sports and Entertainment.

A request for clarification sent by email to AFL headquarters has so far gone unanswered.

The Shock continued to do business under and were led to believe “that so long as we left in good financial standing and paid off our bills that we could attain those trademark rights.” That was the case, Eucker said with former AFL team, the Iowa Barnstormers, who joined the IFL in 2015.

The idea of being on the AFL’s fiscal A-list included Spokane helping fund the operations of the New Orleans and ‘Vegas teams that were taken over by the league.

But even that gesture was apparently not enough of a ransom payment for the Shock.

“After our initial talks with the (AFL) commissioner (Scott Butera), then the board of directors decided they were going to need more (in terms of financial compensation and a few other internal workings),” Eucker said.

The team reluctantly agreed and though it was done. Then just a few weeks ago they came back with another revision on their asks and wanted a significant amount of compensation tied into some unforeseen bills they had come up with over the process of our closing out of 2015 operations.

Enough of the shakedown from AFL headquarters in Des Plaines, Ill. The Shock said.

One just has to remember the league offices are in Cook County the place where voting once is never enough and money tries to buy what it can at the ballot box. (see Gov. Rod Blagojevich).

For the Shock, Eucker said, “It really just got to the breaking point of being far and away from what we felt was a fair deal.”

And when looking at what it cost to re-brand the team it would be a fraction of the cost. Plus, there was another benefit, according to Eucker, that being an “Additional opportunity to separate ourselves from that league even more.”

“It’s disappointing that the conversation ended the way it did as the Spokane Shock name, in my mind, was not one created, developed, or enhanced by the teams membership of the AFL,” Eucker said.

The Shock name was built by the community, the fans and the team’s success over the past 10 years, Eucker said.

One thing appears pretty certain as the Shock nickname fades away, held hostage near Lake Michigan.

It will die in the company of nicknames like the Vipers, Vigilantes, Blaze, Rush, Power, Mustangs, VooDoo, Command, Outlaws and the rest of what is likely to be the last chapter in the history of the Arena Football League.

Paul Delaney can be reached at pdelaney@cheneyfreepress.com.