Arena Football League Relaunching, Will Return to Play in 2024 After Hiatus

It's been quite some time since the Arena Football League has been active, and since then, multiple upstart football leagues have launched to provide alternatives to the NFL.

Now, the Arena Football League is jumping back into the fray, as it announced Wednesday that it plans to re-launch in 2024 after a four-plus-year hiatus:

Per John Lynch of Business Insider, the AFL will resume operations under the investment group F1 Sports and Entertainment, which bought the rights to the league in January 2022. The professional indoor league's new commissioner, Lee A. Hutton III, will be the first Black commissioner of a professional sports league in the United States.

Hutton is an attorney who "has represented both Fortune 500 companies as well as athletes, celebrities and artists in contract negotiations" and "worked on high-profile cases, ranging from NFL concussion litigation to NCAA NIL legal cases," according to an AFL representative via Lynch.

"The Arena Football League brand has always sat at the promontory of indoor football by offering gridiron entertainment, fast action, and iron tough athletes in conjunction with delivering a family fun fan experience that uniquely engages the pig skin enthusiast," Hutton said in a statement via Lynch. "Ultimately, the professional sports brand speaks for itself and is proud to announce, 'We are back!'"

The AFL, which filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy in 2019, will field 16 teams that will play 10 regular-season games before the playoffs.

The AFL joins the USFL, XFL and Fan Controlled Football as leagues that launched or relaunched in recent years to satiate football fans even after the NFL season ends.