Thunder plans to return in 2009

By John Kovach

The af2 franchise owners were still pleased despite the team’s 3-13 record.

YOUNGS-TOWN — Despite a losing record for a second straight year and a drop in attendance from the first season, the Mahoning Valley Thunder, along with coach Mike Hold, will return next year for a third season in af2.

“We will be back next season. We love being here,” said Dr. Michael Slyk, one of three co-owners of the team along with Timothy Chesney and Dr. Jon Saadey.

Slyk and Chesney are principal owners of Jilltin Management of Boardman, which owns and manages nursing homes. Saadey is a dentist.

“Although attendance was down [at the Chevrolet Centre], we saw more fan interest and involvement than last year and more appreciation,” said Slyk.

“That very last game is an example, and I was taken aback by how many fans tried to seek me out and thank me for a great season,” he said, referring to the July 26 finale that the Thunder lost, 61-13, to the Green Bay Blizzard.

Slyk said despite a losing record (3-13 after a 7-9 inaugural record in 2007), “The bottom line is a quality entertainment value for the community. We are involved in this because we are from the community and we want to improve the community. We know that this makes a difference in the community because it provides entertainment. The stronger response tells us we are doing the right thing.”

He would not say if the Thunder made or lost money this season, but emphasized that the team is ”financially solvent. We have no concerns about that at this point.”

Slyk said it takes time to build a team, and that the Thunder is committed to doing just that.

“It is a learning process and takes time and there are so many benefits that it can bring to the community,” said Slyk, who hopes to learn from experience.” As we refine the team and coaching staff, we will further develop the team.”

Slyk said the Thunder started the season with a good team before adversity struck.

“We did not expect to go through the struggles we did and not finding a quarterback. We went through five quarterbacks and John Tackmann jumped in some to give us six quarterbacks,” said Slyk. ”We struggled with that and injuries and that made it difficult to execute they way we planned. “

He conceded attendance was down, but not by that much, and believes that could be corrected.

“We are not certain why the attendance was down,” he said. “It was not down dramatically where we can pin it on one specific thing.”

He said a dip in attendance in a franchise’s ”sophomore season” is typical around the league.

“But what is more important is why it was down a little and what are we going to do next year to increase attendance,” he said. However, “We expect it to go up next year.”

Anthony Farris, an account executive and the media relations coordinator for the Thunder, estimated that attendance for eight home games on Cortland Banks Field dropped by 800 fans per game from the first year, from 4,500 to 3,700 this season.

But Farris optimistically reported that “we are well ahead of our season ticket sales for 2009 [than] we were at this time last year. It’s come to my attention that our fan base has been extremely loyal despite a disappointing on-field performance in 2008, all of which is extremely encouraging as we prepare for 2009.”

Slyk said the Thunder has decided to retain Hold as coach despite the Thunder’s 10-26 record over the first two years, because he is the best man for the job at this point in the progression of the fledging franchise.

“We believe Mike is a good coach,” said Slyk. ”If you take a look at the season, his coaching ability is not an issue. It’s not that he put together a poor team, but that we had quarterback problems and injuries. We had a stronger team than last year before the quarterback problems and injuries.

Slyk said they want to give Hold ”enough time to build a new team. Changing coaches in rapid succession and not giving the coach enough time to develop a team would not be a good decision. If we dropped Hold, we will be starting all over.”

In fact, ”For us to get rid of Mike Hold now would be a poor business decision. We are going to give him the time to develop his product.”

Slyk said the team will spend the next few weeks “evaluating the season as a whole [and] to see what we can do to improve the [next] season as a whole.”

kovach@vindy.com