Blizzard rebuilds toward next step

The Green Bay Blizzard knew it would be tough to retain a majority of the impact players who helped boost the 2005 team to the first playoff appearance in the three-year league history of the franchise.

A constantly changing roster is the nature of the arenafootball2 league, and team owner Brian Noble and coach Bob Landsee must offset the Blizzard's inexperience. Landsee, Noble and General Manager Jim Kraft aggres- sively sought recruits to not only return Green Bay to the playoffs, but improve upon last year's 9-7 record.

"We feel as if we have more talent than we had last year," Landsee said. "It's just a matter of getting the reps and learning the assignments. The veterans will play a big role in how we compete this year by teaching the young guys the system."

Noble is doing his part by trying to make the Resch Center a more formidable place to play for foes, as he dropped single-game ticket prices to between $7 and $15 in an attempt to increase the fan base. Last year, the price of a good ticket was $27.

Green Bay averaged 3,658 fans last year, but Noble hopes to increase the team's average to 6,000 to 7,000.

Before Noble gets too ahead of himself, there must be a product on the turf worth watching. Enter Landsee and Kraft, who have been busy in the af2 free-agent market while retaining a handful of players from last year's roster.

The Blizzard, however, lost both of its first-team, all-league players. Defensive specialist Ryan Bowers signed with the NFL's Atlanta Falcons and is with Berlin in NFL Europe, and lineman Joe Peters signed with the Arena Football League's Chicago Rush.

"We lost some key veterans — I'm not going to pretend that didn't hurt," Landsee said. "But we worked hard to get a lot of guys back, and there's no reason that if we stay focused, we shouldn't improve on what we did last year."

Second-team all-af2 performer Brent Holmes is back at receiver and defensive back, while after a one-year hiatus, former Purdue wideout Randall Lane is returning. Last year, Holmes caught 64 passes for 857 yards and 14 touchdowns, and also had three kick-return touchdowns.

Also returning are defensive specialists Marcus Thurman, David Crocker and Asa Francis, wide receiver/defensive back Dontrell Jackson, and fourth-year veteran wide receiver/ linebacker Robert Garth. The high-flying Garth is the only four-year veteran on the roster, and is the Blizzard's career leader in receptions, receiving yards, touchdowns and interceptions.

The Blizzard picked up fullback/linebacker Jermaine Petty, who is a veteran of the Packers' 2003 training camp, the AFL and NFL Europe. Another player with some Packers experience is wide receiver/ linebacker J.R. Taylor, who was part of their post-draft minicamps last season.

Other notable additions are lineman Clint Bakken, fullback/linebacker Matt Pagel, quarterback James MacPherson and wide receiver/defensive back Sedric Ashley.

The Blizzard tried to upgrade its coaching staff, as well, with 13-year arena football veteran Mark Stoute being added as assistant head coach, offensive coordinator and defensive assistant.

"I could say that with the talent we have here, we expect success, but that's nothing that people haven't heard before," Stoute said. "We really do expect success, because we have the ability to win and shouldn't shoot for anything less."

The Blizzard plays an exhibition game tonight at Quad City before hosting Albany in its season opener on March 31.