Arena Football gets the first NYC black owner.
Arena Football is back in the Big Apple and this time with a black franchise owner.
The National Arena League announced New York City as the new location for their latest team, The Streets.
According to The Daily News, it’s been nearly 10 years since the last team, the New York Dragons, folded from the league.
Legacy Growth Partners, a New York-based investment firm, will own the new franchise with Brooklyn native Corey Galloway as the head.
Galloway becomes the first black owner of a New York sports franchise team.
“It’s great to be the first black sports owner, but it’s even better to have the legacy of the being the first black sports owner,” Galloway told the Daily News. “To quote Wu-Tang a little bit, ‘We don’t wanna hop in and hop out.’ We want to be here for the long term, and that’s our goal.”
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“Ten years from now we want to look back and see what we did, while also creating a legacy.”
The Streets will be the seventh program in the NAL, a league that was founded in 2016.
As part of the resurrection process, Galloway aims to diversify both the front office and coaching staff with people of color and women.
“We are definitely making sure that our front office is as diverse as we want anyone else’s office to be,” Galloway explained.
The new arena football team will play their games at the Westchester County Center and have at least two games played in Madison Square Garden.
Overall, it is great to not only see arena football back in NYC but also see the new ownership. The diverse representation of team owners is a great thing to see. But, it is another reminder of how much further we must go before we see this sort of representation in the NFL.
But, with all great changes came baby steps, and this one being a first for New York City.
