Post by slocoma on May 27, 2007 10:14:15 GMT -5
Article published May 26, 2007
It's almost time to put Freeze back on ice
As we approach the end of the Erie Freeze's third season, I'm reminded of one of my favorite sports quotes, from former baseball commissioner Fay Vincent:
"When you wake up every morning and someone hits you in the head with a two-by-four, eventually you can get used to it," Vincent said of the 1994 baseball strike. "But you certainly notice when it stops."
Today, thankfully, the two-by-four that is the 2007 Freeze stops hitting us in the head.
This season has been an utter washout, from the departure of the team's two signature players - quarterback David Dinkins before the season and linebacker and Erie native Roosevelt Benjamin in a midseason trade - to an 11-game losing streak and a 1-12 record that ended its chances for a third consecutive playoff berth well more than a month ago.
There is no way to sugarcoat the collapse of a franchise that once was considered one of the flagships of the then-AIFL and played for that league's championship only two years ago this summer.
Yes, the Freeze have lost a series of close games.
They lost one last weekend in which they scored 72 points (even the Pistons can score 72 points and have a reasonable chance of winning) and still lost.
As coach Dave Arnold said recently, "We're not into moral victories, we just haven't gotten it done."
Both owner Dave Hodas and Arnold say they are resolved to return next season and field a winner, and both said they believe they are perhaps one or two players away from being a playoff contender.
If you read between the lines, one of those players is probably a quarterback, and Dinkins is on the record as saying he wouldn't mind returning to the team in what might amount, at least by appearances, to a savior role.
Perhaps half a season and a summer apart might mend whatever wounds opened between Benjamin and Arnold. The Freeze could certainly use a playmaker in the middle of their defense.
Perhaps more importantly, Dinkins and Benjamin represent the gate attractions that the Freeze sorely lack.
Hodas has said he is pleased with the crowds at Freeze games this season -- which have averaged around 1,500 -- even if they haven't enabled him to swim in money. A few weeks ago he wrote an open letter that is posted on the team's Web site thanking fans for their support during what "has been perhaps the most adversity this franchise has faced in its relatively short tenure on the Erie sports scene."
"Our fans have been great," Hodas said recently. "Despite all the negative things that happened this year and all the losses, our fans have been extremely loyal. I've always said we have the best fans in the league."
That statement, of course, puts Hodas in the middle of a chorus of small-sport owners who reflexively say such things about their ticket-buying customers.
And it's pretty obvious that when it comes to marketing themselves to fans and the news media, the Freeze lag far behind the Otters, the SeaWolves and several local travel hockey teams. (For example, the team's Web site -- eriefreeze.com -- still includes a photo, bio and questionnaire for Benjamin.)
But without getting into financial details, Hodas insists he heads up a viable franchise that isn't close to disassembling its igloo.
Tonight at Tullio Arena against the Mississippi Midcats, who are 10-3 and tied for the AIFA Southern Division lead, Hodas' and Arnold's team has one last chance to capture our imaginations, to spread some goodwill and to leave a positive mark on a season that has otherwise bludgeoned us into indifference.
JOHN DUDLEY can be reached at 870-1677 or john.dudley@timesnews.com.
It's almost time to put Freeze back on ice
As we approach the end of the Erie Freeze's third season, I'm reminded of one of my favorite sports quotes, from former baseball commissioner Fay Vincent:
"When you wake up every morning and someone hits you in the head with a two-by-four, eventually you can get used to it," Vincent said of the 1994 baseball strike. "But you certainly notice when it stops."
Today, thankfully, the two-by-four that is the 2007 Freeze stops hitting us in the head.
This season has been an utter washout, from the departure of the team's two signature players - quarterback David Dinkins before the season and linebacker and Erie native Roosevelt Benjamin in a midseason trade - to an 11-game losing streak and a 1-12 record that ended its chances for a third consecutive playoff berth well more than a month ago.
There is no way to sugarcoat the collapse of a franchise that once was considered one of the flagships of the then-AIFL and played for that league's championship only two years ago this summer.
Yes, the Freeze have lost a series of close games.
They lost one last weekend in which they scored 72 points (even the Pistons can score 72 points and have a reasonable chance of winning) and still lost.
As coach Dave Arnold said recently, "We're not into moral victories, we just haven't gotten it done."
Both owner Dave Hodas and Arnold say they are resolved to return next season and field a winner, and both said they believe they are perhaps one or two players away from being a playoff contender.
If you read between the lines, one of those players is probably a quarterback, and Dinkins is on the record as saying he wouldn't mind returning to the team in what might amount, at least by appearances, to a savior role.
Perhaps half a season and a summer apart might mend whatever wounds opened between Benjamin and Arnold. The Freeze could certainly use a playmaker in the middle of their defense.
Perhaps more importantly, Dinkins and Benjamin represent the gate attractions that the Freeze sorely lack.
Hodas has said he is pleased with the crowds at Freeze games this season -- which have averaged around 1,500 -- even if they haven't enabled him to swim in money. A few weeks ago he wrote an open letter that is posted on the team's Web site thanking fans for their support during what "has been perhaps the most adversity this franchise has faced in its relatively short tenure on the Erie sports scene."
"Our fans have been great," Hodas said recently. "Despite all the negative things that happened this year and all the losses, our fans have been extremely loyal. I've always said we have the best fans in the league."
That statement, of course, puts Hodas in the middle of a chorus of small-sport owners who reflexively say such things about their ticket-buying customers.
And it's pretty obvious that when it comes to marketing themselves to fans and the news media, the Freeze lag far behind the Otters, the SeaWolves and several local travel hockey teams. (For example, the team's Web site -- eriefreeze.com -- still includes a photo, bio and questionnaire for Benjamin.)
But without getting into financial details, Hodas insists he heads up a viable franchise that isn't close to disassembling its igloo.
Tonight at Tullio Arena against the Mississippi Midcats, who are 10-3 and tied for the AIFA Southern Division lead, Hodas' and Arnold's team has one last chance to capture our imaginations, to spread some goodwill and to leave a positive mark on a season that has otherwise bludgeoned us into indifference.
JOHN DUDLEY can be reached at 870-1677 or john.dudley@timesnews.com.
!!!!! D. Germany did a 
OSC will pretty much put up anything that a team sends them, are they biased against the Freeze as well?