Thursday, June 05, 2003
The official word: Tag-up offsides and no-touch icing, yes. And the same alignment that I posted below.
But no change in the instigator rule. And as far as El Paso, what's left unsaid speaks volumes. The market is indeed taking a year off, and all remaining players will be free agents.
"Could we have played in El Paso this year? Yeah," CHL Vice President of Communications Steve Cherwonak told me. "But it would have been difficult to go in and give them a shot at being viable and successful. Our much more preferred route is to continue to work with the county and potential owners and get something set up for next season."
Chewy also noted that New Mexico was fully behind the move to the Northwest, which, considering all Doug Frank has done for the league this year, is no surprise. The goal there was to get Amarillo and San Angelo back in the same division with their biggest rivals (Lubbock and Odessa, respectively).
The schedule will remain unbalanced based on geography as well as history -- for example, you can be sure Amarillo will continue to play the Oklahoma teams as if they'd never left the North, while San Angelo will play Austin more than the rest of the Southwest.
