The Arena Football League officially confirmed late Thursday that its previously scheduled week one game telecasts on NFL Network had all been canceled, citing equipment and technical issues as the rationale. The league made the announcement via its own official podcast nearly two days after the NFL first started removing AFL games from NFL Network schedule listings.
Saturday’s Orlando Predators at Albany Firebirds and Sunday’s Georgia Force at West Texas Desert Hawks and Southwest Kansas Storm at Salina Liberty games all had been scheduled to air on NFL Network for week one. Orlando/Albany in particular would likely have enjoyed a strong initial sampling, slotted for just an hour after the conclusion of NFL Network’s NFL Draft coverage.
The Arena Football League did announce that its games for week one and going forward (excluding NFL Network telecasts) will be available via free live streaming via AFL Live at ArenaFootball.live. The AFL also stated that NFL Network is still on board to carry select Arena Football League games, now starting with week two next Thursday.
UPDATE 4/27: The ArenaFootball.live website will now only stream the Wichita at Billings, Iowa at Rapid City & Washington at Oregon games for week 1. The Vyre site & app will stream Orlando at Albany, Georgia at West Texas & SW Kansas at Salina while Philadelphia at Louisiana & Minnesota at Nashville won’t be televised or streamed at all.