Over the course of the last offseason, the Outlaws were welcomed as the inaugural franchise in the reboot of the AFL. But early into week one of this season, it was evident that not all was as it seemed. Titus provided a great wealth of information on joining and everything since then.

“I think that the business model that was presented by Lee Hutton and Travelle Gaines was very appealing to me,” Titus said. “In terms of sustainability. You know, we had it was talked to us that we were going to have network revenue sharing. We were going to have revenue sharing in terms of any kind of sports betting their ad, national sponsorship deals in that. I believe they were building a business model that would be sustainable everything that they said checked out.”

Titus said that they had a lot of attorneys and business professionals involved in the decision to join the AFL. While they had questions, they believed in the message that the AFL’s leadership fed to them at the time.

“If it wasn’t for that vision and the fact that they were making these promises, I don’t think we would have ended up in the AFL,” Titus said. “However, we decided to sign up last July. The Billings franchise was the first franchise announced in the AFL rebirth, and we really felt strong in their vision until the House of Cards started crumbling.”

The warning signs would soon start with games that were supposed to be aired on NFL Network not happening. They’d keep saying that they’d make an announcement, but it never happened. The games would go on, but they’d end up on Vyre Network. As that pattern continued, it became evident that more issues would likely start popping up. Yet the league would continue to make excuses and good ones at that according to Titus.

“There was always a good excuse for it,” Titus said. “There was always an excuse for everything and a lot of the things that they said would happen. happen that may have been delayed. However, things kind of worked themselves out. I think the first warning signs that we saw significant problems were probably two weeks before kickoff our jerseys hadn’t arrived yet. The travel for the away games, we had the travel coordinator at the league office. Because part of the deal was that our league travel would be reimbursed. That person ended up quitting.”

The excuses continued to come before a little truth started to show with the inability of the league to pay players.

“There were excuses for all of that and a lot of the promises didn’t come to fruition at that time,” Titus said. “Teams were told that player pay may be an issue and that they may not be able to reimburse us for the player pay. However, they were doing everything possible to make sure that that would work itself out.”

The warning signs really ramped up in week one in Louisiana when they had a semi-pro arena team from Dallas, Texas called the Dallas Falcons fill in for the Philadelphia Soul. The AFL continued to try to sell the team as the Soul by having all the Falcons personnel wear Soul gear.

“Then we saw Oregon’s playing surface, the rebound nets in Oregon, Louisiana and Minnesota look absolutely terrible. We knew that we were in trouble,” Titus said.

Once they were able to push out Hutton as commissioner, a title that Titus doesn’t even think he deserved, they started to get things going in the right direction. By getting things going in the right direction, the league’s owners met and appointed Nashville Kats executive Jeff Fisher and interim commissioner.

“I think with Commissioner Fisher and G Six Sports heavily involved on things I think we hit rock bottom in terms of the AFL franchise, and that everyone is looking to the future and the long-term future that this isn’t just going to be for a 2024 season,” Titus said. “We’re looking for the steps to go in the right direction to make sure that the franchises are AFL franchises in their sustainable in the future for the long term.”

As far as the Outlaws and the future of the other teams, Titus said they’re focused on staying in the AFL. He said they’re committed to it for the foreseeable future, specifically noting the next couple of years.

“We’re looking at making this thing work for the long term and being part of that arena football, Ironman football, rebound nets, all of that we’re looking to being part of this organization for the long term,” Titus said. “I’m not looking to switch leagues or anything like that right now.”

As far as the number of teams going forward, it was evident from Titus that things could change in the future. He said they weren’t sold on just being a 10 or 12 team league. But it was clear that they want stability and not to rush into things.

“Our darkest days are behind us without a doubt,” Titus said. “There’s a light at the end of the tunnel. Jeff Fisher is the man with the plan, and he has the opportunities that we were lied to about with Lee Hutton. I think that we can get refocused on football.”

Titus acknowledged that there’ll be some roadblocks and hurdles that they’ll need to overcome. But the confidence is there in that they can come back from the shaky start and do what they need to do in order run a successful league.

“We’re doing what we need to do to build a successful league and do what we need to do to fix the things moving forward,” Titus said. “Everything’s one step at a time. We have a great group of owners that are still with us here. We talk every day. It seems like multiple times a day about different things. We have communication between the owners now.”

Titus revealed that when Hutton ran the league there was a clear censorship effort by him to prevent communication among the owners in the league.

“He would really reprimand us for talking to other owners outside of his presence,” Titus said. “He was trying to control the narrative of his fraud and so all things considered, things are getting a lot better. We’re working together as a team. There’s a lot of collaboration. We’re doing we need to do this to share strategies to ensure social media engagement, good turnout at games, make sure all the officials are on the same page. A lot of things have changed for the better in the last few weeks since Lee has really lost power. We’re doing what we need to do to make the AFL everything it can be and more.”

He understands how upset fans have likely been with all the chaos and apologized to them. Titus acknowledged how a lot of them are just diehard AFL fans and how it must’ve been really upsetting to get a false sense of hope before coming into a trainwreck wondering what they signed up for and what they were getting their hopes up for.

“I can just tell them with 100% confidence we’re doing everything we need to do to fix the thing to right the wrongs and put us on the path of direction we need to go in for prosperity,” Titus said. “I’m really hopeful for the future and I know what we’re doing what we need to do in Billings to set our team up for a championship.”

Since the league’s championship game was originally going to be played at the Target Center in Minneapolis, Minnesota they now have to figure that out as well. The ArenaBowl is one of the question marks that they still have to figure out. Titus didn’t know if it’ll be at a neutral site or if the higher seeded team would host. He made it clear that they’re just trying to get through the next few weeks. But it’s evident that they’ll be able to figure it all out and finish the season strong.

“We’re doing everything that the league office has a whole year to work on in two weeks,” Titus said. “The league office really didn’t do very much in the last eight months except scam team owners out of money scam players out of what they’re owed, scam coaches out of false promises. That’s what they were busy doing. Now that we have the refocus with Commissioner Fisher, we can focus on what we need to do to be a sustainable football team and not scam anyone and that we can get focused on playing football.”

As far as how the drama might distract players from focusing on playing football, that’s no issue in Billings. He praised their management with the resources that they have in place so their players can focus on just playing football.

“What I’m glad about in Billings, as my players don’t have to worry about if their paychecks are going to clear, they don’t have to worry about whether they’re going to have food on the table or not, they don’t have to worry about whether they’re going to be evicted from a hotel or apartments or not,” Titus said. “They’re focused on football. “When all is said and done my players are lucky enough to be focused on the task at hand the task for which they were hired to do and that is winning football games. They don’t get caught up in the league drama they don’t care about the league drama they just care about who their next opponent is and how they’re going to beat them.”

It’s clear that Titus is focused on winning and has the personnel to do that. He has a very well-built coaching staff and that shows in

“I’m very lucky in Billings, we have two great coaches,” Titus said. “We have Coach Walker who is our head coach Cedric Walker, he played for the Rattlers in the 90s and then coach Cedric Bonner as our assistant head coach, who was the Arizona Rattlers quarterback for 10 or 15 years. We have some of the greatest arena football players of all time, who have now kind of went into the coaching thing and really built a great franchise.”