Burmy87 wrote:

Dan O'Mac wrote:

Per this post, it'll be 18 owners, so I assume 18 teams.

It only says there are 18 AltHL owners...I don't know if there'll be more, fewer or about the same number of AltFL ones (given the high demand, there may be the same or more)

I'm thinking 24, if I had to guess. Even number, easily divisible for use with divisions, can probably fit the demand.

And there's nothing saying that expansion won't be on the table in the future.

Time to check out the new AltFL! As you can see we are proceeding with 24 AltFL franchises.  We have had a great demand to be an owner in our new endeavor. I am officially closing the application process. I have a few strategies ready to go in order to accommodate that many franchises in one league. 

An interesting final day of voting jostled the final list.  Cities like Baltimore and Atlanta were knocked out in favor of a few late comers. I Hope you like the state of Texas.  Texas leads the way with three franchises.  They are followed by California, Florida and New York.  We are please to welcome an international franchise in Toronto.  Charlotte and Minneapolis made heroic last minute pushes to join the group.  9 of our cities do not currently play host to an NFL team.  10 of our cities are also home to AltHL teams.

The layout of our league leaves interesting possibilities for alignments.  If you would like to propose an alignment for our league please email the account - althockeyleague2020@gmail.com   We don't want to crowd up the board with proposals because we will be using it for other things.  Once we have a few proposals, I'll send them out to the group.  If there are a few submissions that are similar I will fold them together and give credit all of the creators.  

Next we begin the NAME THE TEAM process.  Like the AltHL I have broken the 24 cities down into four groups of 6.  We will go one group at a time with nominations.  Group A below will be open to nominations until Sunday.  At that point I will put all of the noms in our traditional polls.  I will also release the Group B cities and we will continue the process until we have names for all 24 teams.  

The Guidelines:
The rules for the naming process will be the same as for the AltHL.  But just in case you are new to this process here are some of the highlights.
1. No names of any teams in the NFL or CFL.  
2. No names of any teams within that market.  No football teams named the Pittsburgh Penguins.  But a team named the Portland Penguins are okay.
3. Same thing goes with college teams in the area of your team.
4. No AltHL team names
5. No IceHL team names in the same market.  Unlike the AltHL, you ARE ALLOWED to use one of their names as long as it is not the same market.  For example, they have a team named the Chicago Hitmen but you could nominate a team the Philadelphia Hitmen.  
6. DO NOT nominate a name that someone already has.  Use it as a blessing that you can nominate a second name.

Some Advice:
After the AltHL experience I noticed that the simpler names won out more often than not.  I know professional teams try to keep it to two or three syllables.  I also LOVE names that have deep meaning behind them but if it's TOO deep people are scared away.  The AltHL also denied all non-S names.  If you look at the NFL you'll notice most of the team names are pretty basic.  Keep in mind that this is football and team names are typically more aggressive than basketball or baseball.  Bears not Cubs for example.  Finally, I would avoid renominating your failed AltHL name unless it was close the first time around.  With all of that said, let your creativity flow.  I just wanted to share a few thoughts after looking back at how the voting shook out.  

So for now here are the six cities that are up for nomination.  Feel free to provide a short explanation for your team name nomination.  I am looking forward to seeing what you all come up with.

Birmingham Vulcans: The God of Industry and Steel for a hardworking town
Boston Masons: The Grand Lodge of Massachusetts is the 3rd oldest lodge of Freemasons in the world behind only England and Ireland
Buffalo Frost: Those Chilly Lake effect blizzards.
Charlotte Swarm: Reference to Charlotte's Nickname as the "Hornets' Nest"
Chicago Outfit: Obligatory Mob Reference, also the name of Al Capone's gang.
Dallas Posse: Old West style for Texas. 

Last edited by Darknes (4/29/2020 8:22 pm)

Darknes wrote:

I literally had Bolts before you posted and I'm a little worried about "Wizards" for Birmingham since that term has a little extra meaning in the Deep South.

Great minds think alike...and that had slipped my mind, so I changed my nomination.

Birmingham Magicians (The Magic City)
Boston Rebels (In reference to the American Revolution)
Buffalo Buffaloes (Buffalo Buffalo Buffalo)
Charlotte Griffins (The first plane flew in Kitty Hawk, NC. What animal is both a Kitty and a Hawk? A griffin!)
Chicago Tigers (A classy name for rust belt football)
Dallas Bandits (Lean into that old west theme a bit)