Clint Dolezel - Grand Rapids Rampage - Arena Football League - Discovering Dolezel On MLN Sports Zone

Discovering Dolezel
At 31, Rampage QB Clint Dolezel may never play in the NFL. Their loss.

Dan Hickling
MInorLeagueNews.com

BUFFALO, NY - 07.23.01 - The AFL book calls the Grand Rapids Rampage's star signal caller Clint Dolezel "An NFL caliber quarterback."

He's having a big-league-type season, it continues, with a team that is among the best in the Arena Football League.

Unfortunately, it also says Dolezel is 31. According to the book, that's too old to be taken seriously by the NFL. Too long in the tooth. A big-time player in a small-time league.

Forget the fact that Dolezel, pride of tiny Lorena, Texas (population 1400) owns several AFL passing marks, among whichare the season standards for completions, attempts, and yardage .

Don't consider that, only seven times in the fifteen year history of the AFL, a
quarterback has thrown for 80 touchdowns in a regular season. Dolezel has hit that mark three times, including the season now concluded, his fourth as a starter.

"I don't think you can find a better Arena football quarterback," said Michael Trigg, Rampage Head Coach and Director of Football Operations, minutes after Dolezel had rallied his team from a 16-point deficit to a 44-40 triumph over the Buffalo Destroyers. Trigg, himself a former AFL quarterback, said: "He's mastered this game pretty well."

Mastered to the point of being able to take the controls of what had been a mediocre Rampage football team, leading them to the league's best overall record, and giving them home floor advantage throughout the playoffs.

You wonder if his credentials don't actually work against him. It's as if the NFL has said in passing judgment, "If he's so good, why haven't we discovered him by now?" Seems as though they said the same things about another QB from the AFL. You know the rest of that story.

"I think he has the ability and I think he has the skill," said Trigg. "Making it in the National Football League is really tough. If you're not a quarterback that anybody has spent money on, it's a real battle trying to get in get in there. There's not that many opportunities to to really make it from the outside in."

For Dolezel, that window may have slammed shut last year. He spent the summer with the Chicago Bears, then was cut before the season began. Who needs a fossilized rookie when you've invested so heavily in a young stud like Cade McNown?

Dolezel said he felt the experience was good for him, even though it meant tossing away his 2000 AFL season.

"Bears camp helped me," Dolezel said. "I learned some things there. I missed the [Arena] season. I missed it with all my heart. But I'm back and happy to be back."

Dolezel's football odyssey has been a twisted, but interesting one.

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