Let see, where do I begin? The Soul went into Columbus and kicked their asses to the curb. Then they hosted the Dallas Desperadoes and kicked their asses to the curb and rode off with their women. But that win came with a loss, or two losses. First, we lost Mike Brown for 4 weeks with a hamstring or quad injury. I forget which. Secondly, we lost Brian Mance for the year with a broken fibula. This is the one I find puzzling. It's my understanding that most bone breaks take 8 weeks to heal. Meaning, he should be back for Week 18 or the first round of the playoffs. Coach Munsey said he was out for the season but no one clarified if he could be back for the playoffs or not. Way to go there media!!!! Then we go to Cleveland on three days rest and play the Gladiators. This is where the shit hit the fan. First, D'Orozio goes down for 3-4 weeks on a similar play that Graziani went down on in week 4 against the Dragons. Then Graziani aggravates his knee injury and is questionable for next week's game against the Georgia Force in Atlanta, or where ever they play. Then Watts breaks his ankle and Bryan Save gets injured sometime during the game. I did not hear what actually happened to him. Needless to say, we lost that game by 12. Ironically, on the Center-QB exchange with less than a minute to go. In the span of 30 minutes, I went from wondering what our magic number was to clinching a playoff spot to wondering if we would win another game the rest of the season. Soul fans, it's that bad.

Now some news...Jon Bon Jovi was on Mike Missanelli's show on 950AM. Mike Miss asked JBJ about rumors of him trying to sell the team. Not only did he not deny it, but he actually said that he did not like the direction the league is headed. First, what direction is that? All the rule changes or the single entity ownership? I'm guessing the latter. Could this also mean we will have a new ownership group soon? Only time will tell.

Please let me know your thoughts by either using the comments section on this screen or by posting something on the message board.

        

The undefeated Philadelphia Soul head to Columbus to take on division foes, Columbus Destroyers (2-5), on a Monday Night ESPN telecast. The Destroyers have always been a thorn on our sides. Proven by the fact that we have only won in Columbus one time, both teams first seasons. They are led by QB Matt Nagy, who took them to the Arena Bowl last year. His primary receiver is the 6 foot 5 225lb Derek Lee and they have brought back B.J. Barre or was it Jason Shelly? I forget. Anyway, my point is that they are not without weapons.

The Soul, meanwhile, are supposed to have starting QB Tony Graziani. WR Chris Jackson will be going for another recieving record, I think it's 900 TD receptions. The defensive line should give the DBs help in that the Destroyers O'Line is supposed to be Swiss Cheese (according to Destroyer fans).

My prediction, the Soul will remain undefeated.

GO SOUL!!!!!

        

If I told you that the Soul did not have the lead at any point in the game until the last 10 seconds of the game, you would have told me I was nuts. But that is exactly what happened. The SaberCats defense was en fuego in the early goings in the game. (too fuego is you ask me. It was almost as if they knew what was coming before we did, but this is another conversation for another day.) The SaberCats defense was so good that they kept the Soul from scoring any points in the first quarter and held them to just 14 at the half. The QB Matt D'Orazio and DB/KR Mike Brown took over. These two simply will the Soul to victory. Down 33-14 to start the second half, the Soul recieved first crack on offense. Mike Brown returned the kickoff 40+ yards to bring the ball to the SaberCats 17. On the subsequent play D'Orazio threw a touchdown pass to WR Larry Brackins. The Soul go on to score 44 more points from there, while holding the SaberCats to 24.

Some thoughts about this game

- Tony Graziani was supposed to start this game but was a late scratch

- On the 2 point conversion, where the Soul finally took the lead, there was no QB. Mabry had to snap the ball to Clifton Smith, who rumbled for the conversion. They had lined up like that, then the SaberCats called time out and then the Soul just ran the play anyway. I like this mentality. Show the opposing team what you are going to to and basically say "Hey, you can't stop it." Kudos to Munsey/Maynor for the play design.

- The SaberCats cheerleaders are smoking hot

- WR Chris Jackson got away with one when he slapped the boards with his right hand before he scored on a 41yard TD with about a minute to play. SaberCats fans have every right to be pissed on that one.

- Do the refs know what holding his when they see it? Part of the reason the Soul's defense looked so bad in the first half is because Save, Strong, Nyenhuis, and Dunn were getting mugged. It was pretty obvious too.

- DE Derrick Strong could be the other end Munsey has been looking for to compliment Save and Nyenhuis

- Can we please stop having to go to San Jose every year? How about every once and a while they come here? Or maybe we can go to Arizona?

That's about all I have to say about this game. Next up, the team that everyone seems to be overlooking, the Columbus Destroyers.

Oh and Dallas won again. They head into a bye week next week, so they will remain undefeated when they come here.

        

Your undefeated Philadelphia Soul (6-0) will make a cross country trip to San Jose to take on the defending 2007 Arena Bowl Champions Sabercats (3-3) on Saturday 4/12/08. This is what you would call a classic trap game for the Soul. They are headed out west, playing the defending champions who are inferior to them, and the champs are coming off a humiliating lose at the hands of the New Orleans Voodoo where they scored just 43 points.

The Soul have made headlines by making roster moves this week. They signed DE Derrick Strong after releasing DL George Gause and QB Mitch Tanney. By releasing Tanney, this tells me that Graziani will be starting this week against the SaberCats. The only thing we know for sure is that an Italian will be under center for the Soul Saturday night.

Meanwhile, the SaberCats have been messing with everyone by moving the start time of this game. Originally it was supposed to start at 10:30 PM EST, then it was moved to 11:45  PM EST  because SJ was worried about there being an NHL Playoff game that night. Turns out the Sharks play on Friday night not Saturday so the SaberCats moved the starting time back to 10:30 PM EST. This game will be shown live on ComcastSportsNet.

It just occured to me, I have not talked about the game at all. The SaberCats are led by QB Mark Grieb, one of the best the Arena League has to offer, and his go to guy is WR James Roe, again, one of the best the Arena League has to offer. These two are a very formidable duo. The defensive line will have to be at their best to hurry passes, so the DBs will have a chance to defend against their WR corps. This game will be close, to close to call in fact. BUT!!!!! I have said since before the season started that the Soul will go undefeated on their way to winning the Arena Bowl this year. That means, they will have to win this week.


GO SOUL!!!!!!

        

The Philadelphia Soul improved their record to 6-0 as they beat the visiting Utah Blaze 64-56 at the Wachovia Spectrum last night. This was a sloppy performance by the league's best offense and defense as they were flagged with a myriad of penalties. What is a "2nd neutral zone infraction" anyway? For the first time, since we have signed Graziani, the team seemed to weather the storm while Tony was sidelined with an injury. He is expected to be back for the San Jose game this week.

As for the Blaze, all I can say is that this team seems to be snake bitten. They have the worst luck in the league and it doesn't seem to help that veteran players like Dwayne Missouri are constantly taking stupid penalties for late hits. You have got to be better than that if you want to win in this league.

Anyway, I'm looking forward to the San Jose game, this Saturday at 10:00 PM Est. I have no idea if this game is being televised or not. I will let you know when I give you a preview of the game.

Later all


P.S. Dallas won again too, so they are now 6-0 as well.

        

 The winless Utah Blaze (0-5) head to Philadelphia to take on the undefeated Philadelphia Soul (5-0) at the Wachovia Spectrum this Saturday evening at 7:00 PM. That's right sports fans I said Spectrum. The Sixers will be at the Center at that time so the Soul get moved to the Spectrum. In my opinion, this is better than having to move the game to a different time or date all together.

The Blaze will be bringing with them 5 former Soul players;

WR Aaron Boone
DL EJ Burt
DB Reggie Doster
WR JJ McKelvey
DL Dwayne Missouri

I am sure you remember most, if not all of these names. Personally, I can not wait for Doster to take the field. It will not matter who he covers, they will be open for six. However, it will be awfully wierd to see D-Mo in another team's colors.

Go Soul!!!!!

        

The Soul stay perfect at 5-0 as they beat the Tampa Bay Storm 59-51 at the Wachovia Center last Saturday afternoon. The record is a franchise best and QB Matt D'Orazio won Player of the Week Honors as he completed  25 of 35 passes for 296 yards and seven touchdowns. WRs Chris Jackson and Larry Brackins both caught 3 of those TDs each.

The highlight of the game came from the second to the last play of the game when a nun (her name escapes my memory right now, although Sister Delores comes to mind) caught a pass from Storm QB Brett Dietz. The fans at the Wachovia Center gave her a standing ovation.

        

The 2-1 Tampa Bay Storm will travel to 4-0 Philadelphia Soul this Saturday afternoon 2 PM at the Wachovia Center. Unfortunately, yours truly will not be in attendence and will have to TiVo the game as I promised Mom I would take her to the Phillies exhibition game against Toronto. At least I will get to boo Scott Rolen, no wait, he's on the DL already...big shock there.

Anyway, the Soul, while having an unbelievable offense is quietly having a stand out defensive year. Consider this, they have the league leader in sacks, Gabe Nyenhuis with 5, Mike Brown is third best in interceptions with 3, and Brian Mance is 4th best in the league with 29.5 tackles with 28 of them being solo. The Soul's team defense, as a whole, are doing very well.

Tampa Bay will be without star WR Terrill Shaw, who was placed on IR on 3/17. They still have Lawerence Samuels and Brett Dietz is an up and coming QB for the Storm.

This game is not as easy as it would seem. This team will always be dangerous as long as Tim Marcum continues to coach them. With that said, I have to continue taking the Soul as I do believe that they will go 19-0.

Go Soul!!!!!!!

Oh this game will be nationally broadcasted on ESPN2 and ESPN2HD.

        

Yes, that is correct. That have won twice. I apologize for not posting after the Dragons game. I was having issues with YouTube. Turns out, my files were too big. It is fixed now and the video highlights are not posted.

The Dragons game.

    The big news coming out of the New York Dragons game was that Tony Graziani was hurt and is out 3-4 weeks. The injury occurred after John Nix, a defensive lineman for the Dragons, decided that he was going to dive into Tony's knee. This injury could have been a career ender had Tony not been wearing a knee brace. Nix's behavior after the hit was somehow far more reprehensible then him taking aim at Graziani. After he hits Tony, he spit on OL Justin Cleveland, who then went after Nix. The Dragon coaches then removed Nix from the game only to put him back in after a couple of series. Nix was  also overheard saying to his teammates, while on the bench, "I don't care. That's not my team."  Upon returning to the game, Nix then spit on QB Matt D'orazio and was finally ejected from the game. As he was being escorted to the locker room, he flashed a gang symbol and cursed out the fans. The league's reaction to this... a 1 game suspension and a $1,000 fine.

 The two things that this league prides itself on, players safety and fan friendliness, John Nix chose to wipe his ass on. To which, I decided to express my frustration and emailed Jerry Trice of the league's front office. Normally, I would not post private communication between myself and someone from the league but his response was so ambivalent to what I had said that I need to show you this...

Mr. Trice,

      I just read that John Nix was suspended for one game and received a $1,000 fine. I have to ask, is this joke? Before you answer, let’s review what happened that day. First Nix propels himself into an opposing player’s knee (a franchise QB, mind you) and causes an injury where the player is out for 3-4 weeks. Keep in mind that this was well after the ball was thrown and there was no turnover, so there was no reason to hit the QB. Then after the play was over, he hits another opposing player and spits on him. The situation becomes so heated that his own coaches felt the need to remove him from the game. After a little while, when things seemed to have calmed down, the New York coaches allowed him back in (if you wanted to suspend them for one game for this, I would be fine with that), he proceeds to act in pretty much the same manner. Hitting players after the whistle and spitting on them. At this point, the referees throw him out. On his way out of the game, he is flashing gang symbols (make no mistake. That was a gang symbol he was flashing), that and cursing and spitting on fans (I do believe your league’s Fan’s Bill of Rights do not allow such behavior but I maybe wrong on that).

      After the game is over things start to leak out that this is not the first time the Soul has had these issues with Nix. If you are not aware please watch this http://sports.espn.go.com/broadband/video/videopage?videoId=3300241 . It’s ESPN’s Last Man Standing. Several Soul players and coaches point out that he has acted like this before in the scrimmages. But I am sure this was uncovered in the league’s investigation into Nix’s behavior. Why else did it take so long to come up with a punishment?

      The main thing that attracted me, and many others, to this league is the fact that you seem to get it, that the fans and player’s safety are 1 and 1a on the league’s priority list. Now after I have explained the situation, does a 1 game suspension seem fair to you? I hope it does not because if something more is not done, I may not re-new my season tickets next year.

His response....

Sorry you are dissapointed
Thank you for your opinion
Jerry Trice

With a league dying for attention, for him to be ambivalent about my not renewing my season tickets is just plain wrong. How about explaining to me that the fine and suspension that Nix received is the highest that the league can impose based on the collective bargain agreement? Is that too much to ask? Even the NFL, where there are fans lining up to get season tickets to their games, is not that arrogant to blow me off like that.

And how can the league allow this man to have email when he has no idea how spell check works?

This is all I am going to post about this incident because it's over and done with. I am moving on now.

The Avengers Game

With Matt D'Orazio leading the charge, the Philadelpia Soul flew out west to play the LA Avengers for a Thursday night game. I don't know how, because I did not think the Soul looked particularly crisp under D'Orazio, but somehow they won 71-34. WR Chris Jackson had 6 touchdowns in his homecoming and caught his 900th pass in his AFL career, so congratulations to Chris. This game was the wierdest game I ever saw. Through the first 2 and a half quarters there were no defensive stops. The two teams exchanged touchdowns for 37 minutes. Then all of a sudden the Soul's defensive line took over scoring 30 unanswered points, en route to the blow out. It was amazing.

Download | Duration: 00:02:24

        

The Philadelphia Soul (2-0) will host the New York Dragons (1-1) at the Wachovia Center tomorrow afternoon. This will not be a total home field advantage as Joe Krausey posted on the Soul message boards that anywhere from 500-1000 New York Dragon fans will be coming down to root for their team. The reason for this is that there is some sort of bet between the 2 franchises. I like this mentality. It helps promote the league. And it could be worse, it could be Dallas fans.

Now about the game. I fully admit, I have not seen any Dragons games other the when they came here last year in about 2 years. As you might have guessed, being that this is phillysoulfan.com, that I am a huge Soul fan. I also predicted before the season started that the Soul will go 19-0. With all that said, I don't see how the Dragons will have any chance at beating the Soul. Who is going to cover Jackson? Who is going to cover Brackins? Who is going to step up and hit Graziani? I can't honestly tell you. Normally, I would say that this is going to be a blow out and come the fourth quarter we will be wondering if we will break the Soul record in points scored in a game (78 I think is the new record). But this is a division rivalry. The Soul and Dragons have a lot of bad blood between them. I think this is going to be a very physical game but in the end the Soul will prevail.