Baltimore Brigade

The Baltimore Brigade was a professional arena football team based in Baltimore, Maryland, that played in the Arena Football League (AFL) from 2017 to 2019. The team's home arena was the Royal Farms Arena. The franchise was owned by Ted Leonsis through Monumental Sports & Entertainment. After the 2019 season, the entire league ceased operations.

History

The Arena Football League and Monumental Sports & Entertainment both announced on November 14, 2016, that it had granted an expansion franchise to begin play for the 2017 season in Baltimore. Monumental Sports & Entertainment is operated by Ted Leonsis, the majority owner, who had also previously been granted an expansion team in the Washington Valor to begin play the same season. Leonsis purchased the franchise rights from the Baltimore Lightning, an established semi-pro team that had intended to join the AFL.

Although other indoor football leagues have hosted teams in Baltimore in the past (such as the Baltimore Blackbirds and Baltimore Mariners), this is the first Arena Football League franchise to be located in Baltimore, and the first in the state of Maryland since the Washington/Maryland Commandos, a charter league franchise that played in the DC suburb of Landover for its first season.

On December 14, 2016, former Los Angeles KISS coach Omarr Smith was named the team's first head coach.

On January 25, 2017, the team was officially announced as the Baltimore Brigade, named for the military history and in reference to the War of 1812 and the inspiration for the penning of the poem that would later become known as "The Star-Spangled Banner", the U.S.A.'s national anthem.

Number 19 was never issued to any player out of respect to their late Baltimore Colts great Johnny Unitas.

On July 20, 2018, the Brigade reached their first ArenaBowl championship game, ArenaBowl XXXI, after defeating the Philadelphia Soul in the second leg of a two-game aggregate playoff series. They won the first game 57–45 and the second 53–41. In ArenaBowl XXXI, they hosted against the Washington Valor, who scored a 69–55 upset victory.

In a January 2019 interview with ''Forbes'', Leonsis noted that the Brigade was not particularly successful in regard to finances, and that he mainly used the team and its Washington counterpart to experiment with ideas to later use with his more prominent sports properties such as the Wizards, Mystics and Capitals.NBA London 2019: Wizards owner Ted Leonsis on why the NBA is the most valuable league
''Forbes'' (January 17, 2019). Retrieved January 18, 2019. After the 2019 season, the league initially announced it was ending all local team operations and looking into becoming a traveling league. However, the entire league ceased operations after the AFL filed for bankruptcy in November 2019.

As of 2022, the Brigade's field was being used by the San Diego Strike Force of the Indoor Football League, but has since been replaced. Also, the owners of the Baltimore Lightning International Football Alliance football team ''claimed'' to own the intellectual property of the Brigade. However, according to the United States Patent and Trademark Office, the Brigade intellectual property is actually owned by Mike Kwarta, owner of Arena Football One's Albany Firebirds.

Players

Individual awards

Coaches and personnel

Head coaches

Staff

Season-by-season results

References

External links

Official website

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{{Monumental Sports & Entertainment

American football teams in Baltimore

2016 establishments in Maryland
2019 disestablishments in Maryland
American football teams established in 2016
American football teams disestablished in 2019
Monumental Sports & Entertainment