Final Standings

Results

About

The Alliance of American Football was a AAA (2nd Level) American Football League, which unusually for the time, managed to start the season, although it filed for bankruptcy after 8 of ten weeks, with Orlando Apollos (7-1) and Birmingham Iron (5-3) in the Eastern Conference, and San Antonio Commanders (5-3) and Arizona Hotshots (5-3) in the Western Coference, in Playoff spots.

Its’ place as a AAA Alternative to the National Football League was taken in 2020 by the second incarnation of the XFL. There was also failed attempts in 2020 to start Major League Football and the Freedom Football League. Ian Jones, who was born in Cork, Ireland, was Head Strength & Conditioning Coach for the Salt Lake Stallions in the AAF in 2019.

Biography of Ian Jones

Ian Jones, born in Cork, was appointed Assistant Strength & Conditioning Coach at the Houston Texans in 2017. He started doing voluntary work, mostly coaching in the GAA while still in College in 2010, where he was Head Strength & Conditioning Coach with Cork GAA (Official) and one other coach, Mark Kilgallon, who is now Head Strength and Conditioning Coach with the AFL’s Sydney Swans, saw potential, and got him an Internship at the University of South Carolina, using his contacts with Craig Fitzgerald, whom he had worked with at Harvard University in the mid-2000s.

He worked 12 Hours a Day at USC, seven days a week, 8 hours each day coaching the Football Team.
[1] After two summers at USC he moved on to London Welsh Rugby Union team, and his first Professional Contract. he was surprised at how low-level the set-up was. They had just been promoted to the Premiership, but the budget was small compared the Colleges in the USA, where Stsdiums can seat 110,000 people and there are massively successful alumni who can fund the College Programmes. He decided to phone Fitzgerald again and tell him it was not working out and secured a contract with Penn State College Football Team.

He stayed for three years at Penn State coaching the University’s Football Team as well as being involved in Coaching 30 other sports during his time there, including the College Rugby Team, and the USA Women’s Rugby Squad which also had s base there. While involved with the USA Women’s Rugby Team he got to go to Canadaon Tour with the, and also travel to Wales, England and the World Cup in france in 2014. . By now Fitzgerald had moved on to become a Coach at the Houston Texans. Jones ended up taking a low level position with the Cleveland Browns in 2016, and from there went on to the Houston Texans in 2017, after Fitzgerald called him up when a position became vacant. [1]

At the Texans a typical day stated at 3 A.M. the S&C Staff train at 3:45 AM, At 6 AM they Preview the Day and set up the Weight Room. At 7 AM they train the 30-or-so Rookies (First Year Players). At 8 AM they have a team meeting and 8:30 AM the S&C staff meet for injury/rehab reports. 9 AM they train the five Long Snappers, Kickers and Punters. 10 AM is full practice – Three Hours Long. At 1 PM until 3 PM the non-Rookies are trained individually, staggerred, before they move off to their own individual training. After that it calms down – they eat, review what needs to be done in the Weightroom, look at data from Practice. at 5 or 6 PM another full team meeting and at 7 PM a Final walk-through for the Day. Once the meetings are finished around 8 or 9 PM, that’s the day done. [1]

From the Texans he took up the position of Head Strength and Conditioning Coach at Salt Lake Stalions, of the Alliance of American Football, a AAA American Football League, the equivalent of Championship in English Soccer, and from July 2019 to July 2020 was Assistant Athletic Director for Sports Performance at Wagner College, Staten Island, New York, a multi-sports NCAA College programme position. In December 2019 he took up the position of Head StrengthConditioning Coach at Rugby United in New York, and also the role of Strength and Conditioning Consultant. From June 2018 to August 2020 he was also Head of Physical Performance of USA Rugby and at the same time Physical Performance Consultant.

References

Websites

[1] Alliance of American Football (2019) Standings [Internet] Available from: https://aaf.com/standings [Accessed 4 April 2019]

[2] Alliance of American Football (2019) Scores [Internet] Available from: https://aaf.com/scores [Accessed 4 April 2019]

Images

[3] Seeklogo (2019) Alliance of American Football Logo [Internet] Available from: https://seeklogo.com/images/A/alliance-of-american-football-logo-8F9D3F5942-seeklogo.com.jpg [Accessed 11 April 2020]

Websites

[4] Irish Times (2017) Jones’ Road: From coaching GAA to the backroom team of the Houston Texans Friday, September 8, 2017. [Internet] Available from: https://www.irishtimes.com/business/work/jones-road-from-coaching-gaa-to-the-backroom-team-of-the-houston-texans-1.3211694 [Accessed 7 April 2018]

Social Media

[5] Ian Jones LinkedIn (2020) Profile [Internet] Available from: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ian-jones-735aa01ab [Accessed 30 December 2020

Images

[6] Ian Jones LinkedIn (2020) Profile Picture [Internet] Available from: https://media-exp1.licdn.com/dms/image/C4E03AQEcEMKlYmWiLA/profile-displayphoto-shrink_200_200/0/1605395567742?e=1614816000&v=beta&t=deF-6Z0ekS7Soo9on_4MB137hgWkme_JtsmQwZ9nkwY[Accessed 31 December 2020]

Acknowledgements

Thanks to Rick Kelley & Kim Kelley.

About this document

Researched, compiled and written by Enda Mulcahy for the

Eirball | Irish North American & World Sports Archive 2020

Last Updated: 11 April 2020

(c) Copyright Enda Mulcahy and Eirball 2020

You may quote this document in part provided that proper acknowledgement is given to the authors. All Rights Reserved.