Gridiron Enterprises
Encyclopedia
Gridiron Enterprises is a sports consulting company based in Chicago
Chicago
Chicago is the largest city in the US state of Illinois. With nearly 2.7 million residents, it is the most populous city in the Midwestern United States and the third most populous in the US, after New York City and Los Angeles...

, Illinois
Illinois
Illinois is the fifth-most populous state of the United States of America, and is often noted for being a microcosm of the entire country. With Chicago in the northeast, small industrial cities and great agricultural productivity in central and northern Illinois, and natural resources like coal,...

. Although they offer services to the public, their primary focus and notability is in being the patent holder of the system of play for Arena Football
Arena football
Arena football is a variety of gridiron football played by the Arena Football League . It is a proprietary game, the rights to which are owned by Gridiron Enterprises, and is played indoors on a smaller field than American or Canadian outdoor football, resulting in a faster and higher-scoring game....

 until the patent expired on March 27, 2007, as well as being an equity member of the league.

The company is owned by James F. Foster, Jr.
Jim Foster
James F. Foster is the founder and first commissioner of the Arena Football League. He, along with two other partners, owns Gridiron Enterprises, which acts as the sanctioning body of the sport of arena football...

, the original founder of the Arena Football League
Arena Football League
The Arena Football League is the highest level of professional indoor American football in the United States. It is currently the second longest running professional football league in the United States, after the National Football League. It was founded in 1987 by Jim Foster...

, attorney William Niro, and Jerry Kurz
Jerry Kurz
Jerry B. Kurz is one of the founding members of arena football, and part owner of Gridiron Enterprises. He currently serves as commissioner for the Arena Football League, and had previously been the league president for 10 seasons in the af2.-Formation of AF1:...

. Gridiron was one of the parties that forced the original Arena Football League into bankruptcy liquidation; Kurz then went on to set up a new league originally known as Arena Football 1, separate from the AFL organization, for some of the AFL teams. AF1 went on to purchase all of the assets of the AFL organization in a bankruptcy auction in December 2009, enabling it to brand itself as a continuation of the original AFL.
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