Arena Football League (1995-2000)
Arena Football 2 (2001)
Tombstone
Born: August 17, 1994 – AFL expansion franchise1Schmitz, Tony. “D.M. enters Arena”. The Register (Des Moines, IA). August 18, 1994
Moved: November 1, 2000 (New York Dragons)
Re-Born: November 20, 2000 – AF2 expansion franchise22001 Iowa Barnstormers Media Guide[/mfn
Folded: November 16, 20012STAFF AND WIRE REPORTS. “af2 Iowa Barnstormers won’t play next season”. The Quad-City Times (Davenport, IA). November 17, 2001
First Game (AFL): May 12, 1995 (W 69-61 @ Milwaukee Mustangs)
Last Game (AFL): August 6, 2000 (L 63-56 vs. Nashville Kats)
First Game (AF2): April 7, 2001 (L 50-45 @ Lincoln Lightning)
Last Game (AF2): July 21, 2001 (W 49-38 @ Lafayette Roughnecks)
Arena Bowl Championships: None
Arena
Veterans Memorial Auditorium (11,411)31997 Arena Football League Record & Fact Book
Opened: 1955
Branding
Team Colors: Metallic Gold, Black & Cardinal Red41997 Arena Football League Record & Fact Book
Ownership
Owners: Jim Foster, et al.
Background
The remarkable story of Kurt Warner, who rose from supermarket stock boy to Super Bowl Champion and NFL Most Valuable Player over the course of five years, is one of the great legacies of the now-defunct Arena Football League. Warner, undrafted out of college and later released in training camp by the Green Bay Packers in 1994, famously signed on with the Arena League’s Iowa Barnstormers in 1995. He led the Barnstormers into back-to-back Arena Bowl title games in 1996 and 1997, before finally earning his shot at the NFL with the St. Louis Rams. By 1999, he was the NFL’s MVP and quarterback of a Super Bowl championship team in his first season as a starter. Warner’s fame briefly made the Iowa Barnstormers an object of cult fascination, if not quite a household brand name.
So what became of the Barnstormers?
The Barn
The Barnstormers started out as an Arena Football expansion franchise in the spring of 1995. Jim Foster, founder of the Arena Football League in 1987, owned the club. Foster’s club set up shop at the 11,400-seat Veterans Memorial Auditorium in Des Moines, dubbed “The Barn”.
Head Coach John Gregory was a long-time Canadian Football League coach. Gregory brought in fellow CFL vet Willis Jacox to play the role of Iowa’s “offensive specialist”. Most AFL players played Ironman football in this era, meaning they played both offense and defense. The offensive specialist was akin to the DH in baseball, playing offense only and returning kicks. Gregory also plucked Warner out of the Hy-Vee grocery store aisle prior to the Barnstormers’ first season in 1995.
The team was competitive in 1995, advancing as far as the playoff semi-finals. Warner (43 touchdown passes) established himself firmly as the starter under center from Week 1. Jacox (2,432 total yards, 31 touchdowns) accounted for just over 50% of the Barnstormers’ total offensive output.
Gregory earned AFL Coach-of-the-Year honors (he would repeat in 1996) and the team drew enthusiastic, cowbell-clanging crowds to The Barn. The ‘Stormers sold out their final three home games and averaged more than 90% of capacity for the 1995 season.
Arena Bowl X & XI
The Barnstormers glory years came in 1996 and 1997, when Warner and Jacox led the Barnstormers to back-to-back Arena Bowls. In 1996, the Barnstomers hosted Arena Bowl X before a national cable TV audience but lost to the Tampa Bay Storm 42-38. The following year, the Barnstormers fell to the Arizona Rattlers 55-33 in Arena Bowl XI in Phoenix, in what would prove to be Warner’s last AFL game.
Warner headed the Rams and Jacox retired after the 1997 season. But Gregory and the Barnstormers uncovered more great indoor players in WR-DB Carlos James, offensive specialist Mike Horacek and, especially, quarterback Aaron Garcia. Garcia would go on the set every major career passing record in Arena Football over the course of the next decade plus.
Move To Long Island
On November 1st, 2000, after the conclusion of the Barnstormers’ sixth season in Des Moines and nine months after Warner’s historic Super Bowl performance, Jim Foster sold the team to New York Islanders owners Charles Wang and Sanjay Kumar. The franchise relocated to Long Island’s Nassau Coliseum as the New York Dragons for the 2001 Arena Football League season.
The move to New York was in keeping with Arena Football’s growing ambition to become a “5th Major League”, as the league began favoring major markets over cities like Des Moines and Grand Rapids, Michigan. In the course of a decade, Arena Football franchise valuations ballooned from $125,000 in 1990 to $7 million – the reported price paid by Wang & Kumar for the Barnstormers.5Sandomir, Richard. “Arena Football; Islanders’ Owners Purchase New Franchise For Coliseum.” The New York Times. November 2, 2000
Epilogue
After the Barnstormers left town in the fall of 2000, Des Moines swiftly received an expansion team in Arena Football 2 (AF2), a lower-budget, small market offshoot of the AFL that began play in 2000. Jim Foster once again owned the team and revived the Barnstormers name and logo.
Local interest cooled considerably. Attendance dropped from 8,199 per game for the Barnstormers’ final season in 2000 to 3,018 for the AF2 ‘Stormers in 2001. This second edition of the Barnstormers went “on hiatus” later in November 2001 and never returned to competition.
The new $117 million Wells Fargo Arena opened in Des Moines in 2005. Three years later a third edition of the Barnstormers began play in AF2. This latter day incarnation of the Barnstormers still exists today in Des Moines in the obscure Indoor Football League. The team’s 2020 season was cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Kurt Warned earned induction to the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 2017.
Iowa Barnstormers Shop
Barnstormers Video
The Barnstormers host the Tampa Bay Storm in Arena Bowl X at The Barn. Highlights from August 26th, 1996. Kurt Warner at the helm for the Barnstormers. Jay Gruden at quarterback for Tampa Bay.
Downloads
8-25-1997 Iowa Barnstormers vs. Arizona Rattlers Arena Bowl XI Roster. Kurt Warner’s final game as an Arena Football League player.
8-25-1997 Iowa Barnstormers Arena Bowl XI Roster
Links
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