Fall Experimental Football League (2015)
Tombstone
Born: August 6, 2015 – FXFL expansion franchise
Folded: September 2, 2016
First Game:
Last Game:
FXFL Championships: None
Stadium
Dutchess Stadium
Opened: 1994
Marketing
Team Colors:
Ownership
Owner: FXFL
Background
Ramshackle minor league football outfit that existed for all of three games during the fall of 2015. The Fort were members of the Fall Experimental Football League for the second and final season of that doomed venture. The league-owned franchise leased a 4,500-seat minor league baseball stadium in Fiskhill, New York and borrowed the front office staff of the New York-Penn League’s popular Hudson Valley Renegades baseball team for promotion and operations.
The FXFL was already a wreck by the time Hudson Valley entered for season two. The Fort’s scheduled debut on October 3, 2015 was cancelled when their Pennsylvania-based opponents, the Mahoning Valley Scrappers, abruptly folded. Hudson Valley opened at home on October 10, 2015 with a 45-23 loss to the Brooklyn Bolts before an announced crowd of just 1,776 fans. The quarterback for Brooklyn that night was former NFL 1st round pick Josh Freeman, a 4,000-yard passed with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers just three years earlier.
Demise
The Fort played just two more games – both losses – before the FXFL scrapped the final game of the season in early November.
After an offseason of silence, FXFL founder Brian Woods confirmed what anyone who cared already knew on September 2, 2016. The league was finished.
##
One Response
“The quarterback for Brooklyn that night was former NFL 1st round pick Josh Freeman, a 4,000-yard passed with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers just three years earlier.” – how the mighty sometimes fall!