Pro Football Is Alive and Well in Brooklyn

By Joe Pietaro
- Tweet
- Pin It
Updated: October 16, 2014

Bolts Bounce Boston Brawlers, 27-20, in FXFL Coney Island Downpour

Brooklyn, NY – The wind and rain seemed to get heavier as the evening wore on but that didn’t ruin the party that was professional football being played once again within the confines of Brooklyn or New York City, for that matter. The Brooklyn Bolts and Boston Brawlers of the Fall Experimental Football League had a back-and-forth match-up at MCU Park in Coney Island that ended with the home team hanging on for a well-deserved 27-20 win in the franchise’s inaugural game.

The Brawlers (0-2) opened the scoring in the first quarter with a Wynel Seldon five-yard touchdown run. Brooklyn answered when Mario Fannin punched it in from the 4-yard line but Nick Marsh missed the PAT attempt. The FXFL places the ball at the 17-yard line for extra points, a rule that the NFL experimented with during the first two weeks of the preseason.

Inside the two-minute warning, both teams scored touchdowns and Boston led 14-13 at halftime.

A blocked punt and 24-yard return for a score by Quandon Christian extended the Brawlers lead to seven points but the Bolts took over from there, scoring the game’s final 14 points on a touchdown, safety and two field goals.

The FXFL will use a four-team, six-game format in this first year and the rosters are full of young players, most with previous NFL experience. The idea behind it is to showcase them for another opportunity.

One is Bolts wide receiver Kevin Elliott, who appeared in 13 games for the Jacksonville Jaguars in 2012 and was waived by the Buffalo Bills this past August. The Florida A&M product had two touchdowns (46 and 14 yards), feels that he has something to offer and said with a laugh:

“No offense, but I don’t plan on being here that long. Put some game film together and stay in shape.”

Bolts head coach John Bock, a former offensive lineman for the New York Jets, knows that the success of the league largely depends on getting all of the players reps, even if that means rotating quarterbacks Corey Robinson and Kolton Browning, which he did frequently throughout the contest, and commented:

“You want to play everybody. That’s what this league is about. (These men) are the top 120 players in the country not currently on an NFL roster.”

Some of them may have just taken the first step to change that and the brave fans who made their presence known showed their appreciation, chanting louder in the fourth quarter as the inclement weather poured down on them. And they won’t have very long to wait, either, as the Bolts host their next game on October 24 versus the Omaha Mammoths.

Quite a difference from the previous gaps between games around these parts. That would be 1949 with the Brooklyn Dodgers (yes, there was a football team sharing not only a nickname, but Ebbetts Filed, as well) and 1983, when the New York Jets abandoned Shea Stadium in Flushing, Queens to play second banana to the Giants in New Jersey.

For more info on the FXFL, visit their official website, FXFL.com.