AIFA

The American Indoor Football Association was an organization promoting indoor football worldwide. It was a present to the fans who couldn’t wait for their favourite sport during the NFL interseasonal period.

The first AIFL was truly Atlantic. It collected six franchises from the East Coast in 2005. This idea had a great fail, that’s why these teams jumped into the new AIFA launched next year. This league had dealt with splits, mergers, and calendar changes. Nine franchises left the league in 2006. Four teams split off to create the World Indoor Football League, but it existed for a short time. It changed its name to the American Indoor Football Association the same year.

The 2007 season was successful for the league. Its schedule contained 112 games, this tournament had widespread nationwide. However, eight teams left it, including the season champion Lakeland Thunderbolts. However, the league continued to increase its nationwide footprint. Wassila from Alaska was the smallest town in the US with a professional indoor football team and the farthest one.

The league tournaments ended in 2016 thanks to a couple of foldings and a relaunch as American Indoor Football. It absorbed some teams from the defunct leagues. Twenty-eight teams planned to participate in the season, but most had at least one cancelled or rescheduled game. That factor forced them to create the Arena Development League. AIF owners ceased their operations immediately and decided to support the new league. There was a project to relaunch the AIFA as an alliance on March 26, 2022, but the website goaifa.com isn’t operational now.

The league season started in February or March and ended in May. Sometimes the teams were divided into divisions or conferences. However, the number of games sometimes wasn’t equal. The leader could play eight matches simultaneously while the outsider participated in three or four matchups. The regular season winner qualified for the final immediately in some seasons, while it had to take part in the conference championship with semi-finals or wild card winners the other times.

There were some rule differences compared with traditional football and other indoor leagues. AIF didn’t use the rebound nets and allowed the linebacker to move flat to flat. However, it should stay in the drop zone. The franchises should exploit nine or more players originating from their local 120-mile radius. Two offensive players had the right to move at the moment of snap. The league used the ball with red, white, and blue panels like the American Basketball Association analogues.