About discontinuing the NFL Europa league,

I’m extremely sad and disappointed the NFL has closed the NFL Europe league after 15 years. As a Mexican player who wasn’t born and raised in USA, the NFL Europa league is the only professional football I had, and the only option to have an opportunity to be seen by the NFL teams. It’s very discouraging for the next generation of Mexican football players not having the NFL Europa as a league to develop their football skills to the next level.
As a 5 years NFL Europa Pro, I can confidently assure that is almost impossible to jump from any Mexican, European or Japanese college level to the NFL, simply because of the speed and technique the NFL Players develop from their NCAA college years. In my personal experience, it took me 2 years to get use to the speed of the game, and then I was able to compete with the American players. My third year I was injured, but my last to years with the Berlin Thunder I had excellent stats for the short playing time I was given.
That was the great thing of the NFL Europa, giving the opportunity to players from around the world to develop their football skills by getting playing time in a more competitive level. So in the future, international players could have more football experience at a higher level, and then be able to compete with the NFL players.
This is why one of the biggest mistakes of the NFL was to cancel the NFL Europa league. They have unmotivated all of the worlds American-football college or semi-pro leagues (Europe, Mexico, Japan, etc) to pursue a higher level of football. You won’t conquer international markets by bringing one season game to their grounds; you will conquer markets when one of their local heroes makes it to the 53 man-roster of an NFL team. Countries would buy more TV rights, fans would follow 16 or17 regular seasons games, and the NFL merchandise would become more international than ever.
Nevertheless, all of my condolences to all of the Europeans fans, especially the Berlin Thunder fans, my best 2 pro years were with them. These memories would stay with me forever…

Wish everybody the best,
Sincerely,
Alejandro Gamez Guerra
(Barcelona Dragons 03, Amsterdam Admirals 04, RheinFire 05, BERLIN THUNDER 06-07)


Y aquí un vídeo suyo anunciando la fiesta que organizó la página web We Love NFLE.

http://www.myvideo.de/watch/1903867


Cuándo tenga un momento me pondré a traducir el mensaje...