clarkgriswold
Well-known member
I think that teams were starting to figure out Rudolph wasn't going to throw the ball downfield. Once that happened, he wasn't going to be successful.
2019 Pittsburgh Steelers
- Thread starter Crusaders
- Start date
The St
The Steelers will NEVER be on hard knocks.... EVER
Irwin20
Well-known member
I think if they are asked they have to comply. NFL agreement or something.
I bet they are this year.
Three ways to stay off of it.....
Cannot have a first year coach.
Be in the playoffs the last two seasons.
Be on hard knocks the last ten years.
Steelers fit the bill and would be an attractive team to profile for HBO.
Teams eligible are:
- Pittsburgh Steelers
- Detroit Lions
- Jacksonville Jaguars
- Arizona Cardinals
- Denver Broncos
I bet they make a hard play for the steelers as, HOPEFULLY, this will be one of the rare times they are eligible.
ANY team can be on it if they volunteer, but doubtful anyone would who is not on that list.
The NFL can FORCE once of those teams do to so.
We will see how much power the Rooney's have...
I guess they could fire MT so they are assured to not be on it...……...
MrsStowBulldogs1983
New member
Great scam in Mexico, in the shadow of the NFL Hall of Fame
BEATRIZ PEREYRA
October 20, 2019
A group of Mexicans denounces that they have been victims of fraud by Rich McGuinness, director of the Professional American Football Hall of Fame Academy. They explain that he offered to bring elite coaches of college football and members of the Hall of Fame to Mexico in exchange for large sums of money ... but he did not comply. They also point out deception in the realization of sports clinics in which they promise to take Mexicans to play in the United States. “He seduced me. You are dealing with the number one and two of the Hall of Fame, you think everything they tell you is true, ”says one of those affected.
MEXICO CITY (Process) .- Overlapped by the Hall of Fame of Professional American Football, the American lawyer Rich McGuinness defrauded a group of Mexicans in the organization of sports clinics and the World Bowl, a game between the prospects of the United States universities that took place in 2018 in Mexico and that is intended to be done again in 2
Those affected denounced the irregularities in writing to David Baker, president of the Hall of Fame; also before Cedar Rihani, director of Revenue of the Xenith helmet brand, sponsor of the World Bowl, and Roman Oben, vice president of Youth and High School Strategies of the NFL, whose son of the same name participated in the aforementioned game. However, none responded.
In an interview with Process, Ricardo Álvarez and Mariana Escalante, two of the eight people disappointed, explain how McGuinness, through coach Michael Mike Lopez, entered Mexico with deception to promote the realization of clinics or academies in which he promises to bring coaches with NFL level and former Hall of Famers, such as Randy Moss and Ray Lewis ... In the end, the only one who always appears is Rod Woodson, the closest collaborator of the American lawyer.
“The intention is to warn you not to let yourself be disappointed. Warn that the Hall of Fame itself, the NFL and the sponsors look the other way as if nothing is happening. The NFL and the NFL Mexico are aware. They should have already sent an alert to be careful who does business with McGuinness, with his partner Loretta Hays and other collaborators, such as Gary Howard. We want to unmask them and denounce that they abuse the trust and respect that Mexico has for the Hall of Fame and NFL brands, ”says Mariana Escalante.
McGuinness is the director of the American Football division of Legacy Global Sports, an agency that organizes tournaments and sports events. At the same time he directs the Pro Football Hall of Fame Academy, a project that, in representation of the Hall of Fame, promotes the training of coaches and the development of athletes based on the science and technology, in the hands of NFL level coaches and former players who were enthroned in the immortal grounds.
Along with his ex-partner, lawyer Douglas Berman, McGuinness was a promoter of the US Army All-American Bowl, a game played by the best high school players when they graduate and are about to enter a university, awarded for their talent because they aspire to Become the future stars of the NFL.
The US Army All-American Bowl has been held since 2000. In 2017, the United States Army retired as the main sponsor. According to the complainants, Berman discovered a McGuinness embezzlement. Both agreed to break their society and McGuinness signed a non-compete clause, that is, he accepted that for two years he would not play any games like the Army Bowl, so as not to enter into competition with Berman.
Given the impossibility of performing this sports show in the United States, McGuinness thought about taking it to Mexico. For this he asked for help from coach Gary Howard, who for two decades has been dedicated to recruiting talents in US high schools, and contacted Francisco Frank Bermúdez, who has organized dozens of clinics for coaches and players in Mexico and the United States.
According to Escalante, Frank Bermúdez was the first person that McGuinness disappointed, because he invested around 50 thousand dollars to carry out clinics in Monterrey and Querétaro ... that were not carried out.
Bermudez put him in touch with coach Mike Lopez and, in the end, McGuinness did not return the money and appointed Lopez representative of Pro Football Hall of Fame Academy in Mexico.
In Mexico coach Mike López approached Gustavo Islas and Benjamín León, who in turn contacted Luis Silva to get the facilities of the Acatlán Faculty of Higher Studies to conduct a clinic the first weekend of April 2018.
All three have years in the world of children's and youth football in Mexico, mainly in Fademac league teams. Silva and his family are the creators of the Friendship Bowl, whose purpose is to recruit children and young people to play games in the United States and improve their level.
Islas and León agreed to pay McGuinness $ 45,000 to conduct the clinic in early April. Registration per participant cost 4,500 pesos, but in the end it was reduced to 1,500 pesos due to the lack of registered people. The poor organization and logistics errors ended up raising the cost to over 100 thousand dollars.
The organizers were very upset because what McGuinness promised was not fulfilled.
“They were supposed to install first-class equipment to test the kids - how to measure speed by running 40 yards - and that didn't happen. The parents ended up using a stopwatch and then according to this they installed the posts with the sensors and they did not work. He promised a group of NFL level coaches and only Brian Pariani (ex coach of the Denver Broncos and now trains the closed wings of the Minnesota Vikings).
“He promised to bring three players from the Hall of Fame and only came his workhorse who has been colluding: Rod Woodson. He lends and participates to give him credibility. It only came one day. The serious thing is when after the clinic parents ask what is the platform to see the statistics of their children, because they paid for that and there was nothing, ”says Ricardo Álvarez, businessman, organizer and father of one of the participants.
The following week, from April 13 to 15, the second scheduled clinic was held at the Universidad Anáhuac de Querétaro. There the organizers were coach Rassiehl López and Braulio Huerta, general director of Pioneers Academy & Agency Football, based in Dallas. He paid McGuinness another 45 thousand dollars.
As in the first clinic, what was sold to the participants were visions by NFL coaches and universities affiliated to the National University Athletic Association, to recruit Mexican talent who aspires to play with a scholarship in football schoolboy.
McGuinness's offer also included selecting some Mexican players to attend a camp at the Pro Football Hall Of Fame Academy in Canton, Ohio, where they would compete against the best high school players in the United States. The promise of recruiting boys to study high school or college and even participate in the NFL Draft was part of the appeal.
“Again, Rod Woodson was the only assistant and coach Mike Lopez tried to charge an additional $ 10,000 to present himself, when it is assumed that in the $ 45,000 his fee was already paid to participate, which is $ 2,500 per day. There they suspected that he wanted to steal them. Everything started to smell worse.
“There were neither posts nor measurements. We are talking about all this being done with the endorsement of the Hall of Fame, they charge very expensive and do not comply. They were dozens of disappointed parents because they paid for a service and did not comply with them, ”Álvarez insists.
They wanted the Aztec
Despite the breaches, Alvarez acknowledges that he became even more involved with Mike Lopez and McGuinness, who appointed him director of the World Bowl, a game that was scheduled for December 22, 2018.
The first thing McGuinness asked for was help to get the Azteca Stadium to host the match.
Álvarez and McGuinness signed a letter of intent in which it was stipulated that the Mexican would get two sponsors who each contributed 375 thousand dollars (about 7 million pesos) and that he would be given a commission of 40%.
Thus, while Alvarez was looking for sponsors, Mike Lopez, as representative of Pro Football Hall Of Fame Academy, took care of the sports side.
However, in the clinics they did not fulfill the services offered, Álvarez and López agreed to work with McGuinness, who invited them to Canton for the enthronement ceremony to the Hall of Fame of the class 2018. Both were presented to the president and the director of Hall of Fame Operations, David Baker and George Veras, respectively, and before the cream and cream of the NFL.
McGuinness presumed that both were the promoters of American football in Mexico, where two clinics were held with more than 500 participants, which had been a success, and spoke of the project as a large expansion program of the Hall of Fame in Mexico. Before the lies, Álvarez and López were silent.
“I was introduced as the director of the World Bowl in Mexico. There were all the owners of the NFL teams. We were in a private room as part of the Hall of Fame activities. A report was submitted to Commissioner Roger Godell and members of the Hall of Fame (the Golden Jackets). That gave him a lot of formality and I believed in them.
“He already had the letter of intent between his company Legacy Global Sports and the Hall of Fame. For me it was something very serious. All this is part of their fraud. McGuinness speaks on behalf of the Hall of Fame and although I know he pays $ 50,000 to use the name, they (Baker and Veras) know him and overlap what he does. Those are the guts of this, they make you fall in love, they convince you with their machinery and you believe them, ”says Álvarez.
After visiting Canton, McGuinness formalized his relationship with Álvarez through a contract to which he made many changes. One of the most important is that he would travel to Mexico to close through a signature the sponsorships he got. With the help of Luis Silva, Álvarez managed to rent the Blue Stadium so that the World Bowl was played there.
Álvarez says that at the same time that he was trying to sell the sponsorships at 7 million pesos, Mike López and a collaborator named Aldo Barrón started doing the same on their own, but only asked for 2 million.
In September 2018, they joined the World Bowl organization Christian Granados and Abril Lazcano, who also work in the production of musical events. They joined Mike López's group because Arturo Peña, cousin of former President Enrique Peña Nieto, introduced them.
Deception Network
McGuinness began to operate behind Alvarez's back and by email sent him in October he told him that he had been dismissed as director of the World Bowl for not having closed any sponsorship. Mike Lopez would take his place, who supposedly had already obtained resources for the event.
"McGuinness told me that he needed the money in cash, that he would take out the money and that we will see how we do it, in the end that 'it is the daily practice in Mexico.' Obviously, I couldn't tell the sponsors that. I met Carso, Hooters, Corona, Chrysler, Bimbo USA. Sales were thrown at me because when Mike and Aldo came to ask for less money they told me: 'Agree'. The damage was already done.
“I closed Hooters as the main sponsor, but they just told me that they wouldn't take me into account. I did not receive my commission. I spent about 20 thousand dollars of my money on everything I had to do and in the end the event was a failure because we told the sponsors that 20 thousand people were going to attend and if perhaps 500 thousand arrived.
“The sponsorships give them to you based on the scope and we don't comply. VIP tickets were sold at 2,000 pesos with the promise that people would live with the Golden Jackets, and they didn't bring them. They organized another clinic with the NFL level coaches that didn't come, so the people who bought a ticket to the World Bowl were also disappointed. ”
According to Escalante and Álvarez, the rent of the Azul stadium cost 500 thousand pesos, Aldo Barrón asked for a loan of around 1.5 million pesos to cover the expenses. That money is still owed by McGuinness to Barrón, who is dedicated to putting on musical shows. Everyone worked and operated with the promise that after the World Bowl they would receive their money.
After the game took place, at the beginning of 2019 work began to make the second edition of the World Bowl and more clinics in Mexico.
The ex-assistant of Rich McGuinness, Loretta Hays, with whom Mike Lopez and Ricardo Álvarez had already treated in 2018, joined the project as director of the World Bowl and the clinics. Hays worked hand in hand with Granados and Lazcano. She met Mariana Escalante by chance in Cancun. Escalante worked in a travel agency and Lazcano invited her to coordinate the logistics of the trip of the 150 people who will come to Mexico next December, as well as the lodging to avoid the repetition of the disorganization of 2018.
Like Álvarez, Escalante envisioned a great opportunity to do a business. If he managed to position the World Bowl in Mexico, and in general the American collegiate football of the United States, they would open a new market. According to them there would be sports benefits because Mexican players could be exported to universities and even to the NFL and, at the same time, it would be very profitable in economic terms.
Escalante says that when he started knocking on doors with the sponsors he found that the event and coach Mike Lopez had a very bad reputation (Hays also accused him of stealing some shirts when he went to the meeting in Canton). The representatives of the companies that knocked on the door told him what had happened in 2018 and he also knew that McGuinness had been owed money.
As part of his strategy to position the World Bowl brand and clinics, he asked the Communication Council for help, invited the president of the National Student Organization of American Football, Juan Manuel Bladé Cavazos, and Fademac, César Sotomayor.
He knocked on companies like Cinemex, Coca Cola, the owner of the Cóndores team, lawyer José Luis Nassar, and added a friend, María Elena Gamboa, to his team, who could approach her with American Express.
Among his projects, Escalante invited Loretta Hays to the American College, where her children study. They began to organize a visit by former players and Hall of Famers, such as Ray Lewis, Rod Woodson and Andre Reed, which also failed to materialize.
According to Escalante, by then I suspected that there was something strange. Although there was a promise to sign contracts, due to the history of non-compliance, he doubted that the former NFL players would come to Mexico. Still he decided to move on.
She says that McGuinness and Hays, with the same modus operandi of 2018, took her to Canton to the enthronement ceremony last August.
He was paid for the trip. With her were Christian Granados and Abril Lazcano. He invited Blade, who did not attend, and Sotomayor, who sent his son on his behalf. There he met McGuinness in person.
“At the meeting we had Rich and Loretta told me that the money from the sponsors was going to enter Legacy Global Sports and then Sportz Strategy Marketing Group, which is another company where Loretta is. That they would pay what is owed last year and then to us for 2019. I thought: 'I am not going to launder the money. The sponsors are not going to want to make deposits other than for the Hall of Fame and I'm not going to get money to pay off last year's debts. ' Rich owes money to Abril, Christian, Aldo and Mike.
“I still didn't know what he did to Ricardo, Gustavo, Luis and the others. That meeting was accompanied by my husband, Luis, and he told Rich that we needed contracts for the clinics. We asked you to clarify why the money deposits would be to those companies and there they jumped. We present a business proposal to raise funds and make the World Bowl for three or five more years. Rod Woodson asked us for the presentation to ask the NFL between 4 and 5 million dollars through Roman Oben, to carry out the project in Mexico, ”he says.
Then, Luis Escalante turned to Loretta Hays and asked how much they would be paid to hand over the strategy. Escalante says that Hays very violently shouted at them, get out of here and began to deal with César Montemayor's son to perform the clinics directly with Fademac.
The lie goes on
On their way back to Mexico, the Escalante talked to coach Mike López, who told them what happened in 2018. Then they looked for Ricardo Álvarez and met the rest of the group of Mexicans who had been disappointed. Through a WhatsApp conversation, Loretta Hays demanded that the presentation be delivered to Woodson. As they did not, he told them that she would build his own based on what he had seen, that is, that he would plagiarize her.
“With the relationship they have with Roman Oben, getting 2 or 5 million dollars from the NFL is not difficult. Rich gets a budget from the NFL to pocket that money and seeks sponsorships in Mexico to get the expenses. It takes 50 thousand dollars on the one hand, another 50 thousand on the other and has people here working for free, ”says Álvarez.
To prevent McGuinness from continuing to defraud Mexicans, the Escalante and Álvarez sent letters to alert both David Baker and potential sponsors.
Mariana Escalante says that she met for three hours with Arturo Olivé, general director of the NFL Mexico, who told them she would notify the NFL in the United States.
The completion of the 2019 World Bowl is in doubt, since the official presentation has not even taken place. The roster of participating players is now available and is scheduled for December 21 at the Blue Stadium.
Also the realization of clinics continues. Together with the Southeast American Football Organization (Ofase), Pro Football Hall Of Fame Academy had already announced one in Cancun from October 18 to 20, where Rod Woodson would participate.
In a statement the Ofase announced that it is canceled until further notice, but internally reported that it is due to the lack of guarantees of the McGuinness company.
- Why, if they saw the signs that McGuinness is not reliable, did they decide to work with him?
–The theme of the Hall of Fame seduces you –Avarez responds.
Barrón says the same thing: “He seduced me. You're dealing with the number one and two of the Hall of Fame, you think everything they tell you is true. ”
Escalante adds that the CBS network pays McGuinness for the World Bowl broadcasting rights and that its main sponsor, the Xenith helmets, gave him $ 25,000 in 2018 and will deliver another $ 50,000 for the 2019 game.
“What McGuinness needs is for someone to pay for the event, he takes money from the NFL for clinics through Rod Woodson and Xenith as well. He keeps all that. Our ideas, our strategies come and steal. I bet that the World Bowl is as important in Mexico as in the United States, thus evading non-competing and keeping the money, ”says Escalante.
All those involved will collectively sue McGuinness in the United States for moral damage, for the money that made them lose and because their image was lacerated before the companies with which they managed the financial resources to finance the World Bowl.
They don't want to talk
Last week David Baker, president of the Hall of Fame, finally became interested in the fraudulent practices of McGuinness.
Rod Woodson and Loretta Hays phoned Frank Bermudez when they learned that he also wants to take legal action against McGuinness.
Following that communication, Woodson spoke with Baker to warn him that if McGuinness continues to lead the clinic project in Mexico he will no longer participate or go to any Hall of Fame event.
Baker contacted Bermúdez, who claimed that for a year he did not answer the emails sent to him informing him about the behavior of someone who exploits the Hall of Fame brand in an abusive and fraudulent way.
This is narrated by Mariana and Luis Escalante whom Bermudez informed of both conversations:
“Frank told Baker that we need him to intervene. He demanded that he did not answer us and Baker told him that he did not have to answer since we did not send him proof.
“Bermudez told him: 'You had to investigate what I sent you and the deceived people; it's not just about recovering money, but about our integrity, including mine. ' They stopped talking again and Frank told us he would inform us. Ricardo also wrote to Roman Oben and told him that he will give him an answer shortly, ”says Escalante.
Process contacted coach Mike López and Abril Lazcano, who did not respond to an interview request. Christian Granados also declined to speak. McGuinness and Veras also did not respond to the email in which they were asked for their version of the events.
Instead, the general director of the NFL Mexico, Arturo Olivé, clarified that the league is not related to the organization of the World Bowl in Mexico.
BEATRIZ PEREYRA
October 20, 2019
A group of Mexicans denounces that they have been victims of fraud by Rich McGuinness, director of the Professional American Football Hall of Fame Academy. They explain that he offered to bring elite coaches of college football and members of the Hall of Fame to Mexico in exchange for large sums of money ... but he did not comply. They also point out deception in the realization of sports clinics in which they promise to take Mexicans to play in the United States. “He seduced me. You are dealing with the number one and two of the Hall of Fame, you think everything they tell you is true, ”says one of those affected.
MEXICO CITY (Process) .- Overlapped by the Hall of Fame of Professional American Football, the American lawyer Rich McGuinness defrauded a group of Mexicans in the organization of sports clinics and the World Bowl, a game between the prospects of the United States universities that took place in 2018 in Mexico and that is intended to be done again in 2
Those affected denounced the irregularities in writing to David Baker, president of the Hall of Fame; also before Cedar Rihani, director of Revenue of the Xenith helmet brand, sponsor of the World Bowl, and Roman Oben, vice president of Youth and High School Strategies of the NFL, whose son of the same name participated in the aforementioned game. However, none responded.
In an interview with Process, Ricardo Álvarez and Mariana Escalante, two of the eight people disappointed, explain how McGuinness, through coach Michael Mike Lopez, entered Mexico with deception to promote the realization of clinics or academies in which he promises to bring coaches with NFL level and former Hall of Famers, such as Randy Moss and Ray Lewis ... In the end, the only one who always appears is Rod Woodson, the closest collaborator of the American lawyer.
“The intention is to warn you not to let yourself be disappointed. Warn that the Hall of Fame itself, the NFL and the sponsors look the other way as if nothing is happening. The NFL and the NFL Mexico are aware. They should have already sent an alert to be careful who does business with McGuinness, with his partner Loretta Hays and other collaborators, such as Gary Howard. We want to unmask them and denounce that they abuse the trust and respect that Mexico has for the Hall of Fame and NFL brands, ”says Mariana Escalante.
McGuinness is the director of the American Football division of Legacy Global Sports, an agency that organizes tournaments and sports events. At the same time he directs the Pro Football Hall of Fame Academy, a project that, in representation of the Hall of Fame, promotes the training of coaches and the development of athletes based on the science and technology, in the hands of NFL level coaches and former players who were enthroned in the immortal grounds.
Along with his ex-partner, lawyer Douglas Berman, McGuinness was a promoter of the US Army All-American Bowl, a game played by the best high school players when they graduate and are about to enter a university, awarded for their talent because they aspire to Become the future stars of the NFL.
The US Army All-American Bowl has been held since 2000. In 2017, the United States Army retired as the main sponsor. According to the complainants, Berman discovered a McGuinness embezzlement. Both agreed to break their society and McGuinness signed a non-compete clause, that is, he accepted that for two years he would not play any games like the Army Bowl, so as not to enter into competition with Berman.
Given the impossibility of performing this sports show in the United States, McGuinness thought about taking it to Mexico. For this he asked for help from coach Gary Howard, who for two decades has been dedicated to recruiting talents in US high schools, and contacted Francisco Frank Bermúdez, who has organized dozens of clinics for coaches and players in Mexico and the United States.
According to Escalante, Frank Bermúdez was the first person that McGuinness disappointed, because he invested around 50 thousand dollars to carry out clinics in Monterrey and Querétaro ... that were not carried out.
Bermudez put him in touch with coach Mike Lopez and, in the end, McGuinness did not return the money and appointed Lopez representative of Pro Football Hall of Fame Academy in Mexico.
In Mexico coach Mike López approached Gustavo Islas and Benjamín León, who in turn contacted Luis Silva to get the facilities of the Acatlán Faculty of Higher Studies to conduct a clinic the first weekend of April 2018.
All three have years in the world of children's and youth football in Mexico, mainly in Fademac league teams. Silva and his family are the creators of the Friendship Bowl, whose purpose is to recruit children and young people to play games in the United States and improve their level.
Islas and León agreed to pay McGuinness $ 45,000 to conduct the clinic in early April. Registration per participant cost 4,500 pesos, but in the end it was reduced to 1,500 pesos due to the lack of registered people. The poor organization and logistics errors ended up raising the cost to over 100 thousand dollars.
The organizers were very upset because what McGuinness promised was not fulfilled.
“They were supposed to install first-class equipment to test the kids - how to measure speed by running 40 yards - and that didn't happen. The parents ended up using a stopwatch and then according to this they installed the posts with the sensors and they did not work. He promised a group of NFL level coaches and only Brian Pariani (ex coach of the Denver Broncos and now trains the closed wings of the Minnesota Vikings).
“He promised to bring three players from the Hall of Fame and only came his workhorse who has been colluding: Rod Woodson. He lends and participates to give him credibility. It only came one day. The serious thing is when after the clinic parents ask what is the platform to see the statistics of their children, because they paid for that and there was nothing, ”says Ricardo Álvarez, businessman, organizer and father of one of the participants.
The following week, from April 13 to 15, the second scheduled clinic was held at the Universidad Anáhuac de Querétaro. There the organizers were coach Rassiehl López and Braulio Huerta, general director of Pioneers Academy & Agency Football, based in Dallas. He paid McGuinness another 45 thousand dollars.
As in the first clinic, what was sold to the participants were visions by NFL coaches and universities affiliated to the National University Athletic Association, to recruit Mexican talent who aspires to play with a scholarship in football schoolboy.
McGuinness's offer also included selecting some Mexican players to attend a camp at the Pro Football Hall Of Fame Academy in Canton, Ohio, where they would compete against the best high school players in the United States. The promise of recruiting boys to study high school or college and even participate in the NFL Draft was part of the appeal.
“Again, Rod Woodson was the only assistant and coach Mike Lopez tried to charge an additional $ 10,000 to present himself, when it is assumed that in the $ 45,000 his fee was already paid to participate, which is $ 2,500 per day. There they suspected that he wanted to steal them. Everything started to smell worse.
“There were neither posts nor measurements. We are talking about all this being done with the endorsement of the Hall of Fame, they charge very expensive and do not comply. They were dozens of disappointed parents because they paid for a service and did not comply with them, ”Álvarez insists.
They wanted the Aztec
Despite the breaches, Alvarez acknowledges that he became even more involved with Mike Lopez and McGuinness, who appointed him director of the World Bowl, a game that was scheduled for December 22, 2018.
The first thing McGuinness asked for was help to get the Azteca Stadium to host the match.
Álvarez and McGuinness signed a letter of intent in which it was stipulated that the Mexican would get two sponsors who each contributed 375 thousand dollars (about 7 million pesos) and that he would be given a commission of 40%.
Thus, while Alvarez was looking for sponsors, Mike Lopez, as representative of Pro Football Hall Of Fame Academy, took care of the sports side.
However, in the clinics they did not fulfill the services offered, Álvarez and López agreed to work with McGuinness, who invited them to Canton for the enthronement ceremony to the Hall of Fame of the class 2018. Both were presented to the president and the director of Hall of Fame Operations, David Baker and George Veras, respectively, and before the cream and cream of the NFL.
McGuinness presumed that both were the promoters of American football in Mexico, where two clinics were held with more than 500 participants, which had been a success, and spoke of the project as a large expansion program of the Hall of Fame in Mexico. Before the lies, Álvarez and López were silent.
“I was introduced as the director of the World Bowl in Mexico. There were all the owners of the NFL teams. We were in a private room as part of the Hall of Fame activities. A report was submitted to Commissioner Roger Godell and members of the Hall of Fame (the Golden Jackets). That gave him a lot of formality and I believed in them.
“He already had the letter of intent between his company Legacy Global Sports and the Hall of Fame. For me it was something very serious. All this is part of their fraud. McGuinness speaks on behalf of the Hall of Fame and although I know he pays $ 50,000 to use the name, they (Baker and Veras) know him and overlap what he does. Those are the guts of this, they make you fall in love, they convince you with their machinery and you believe them, ”says Álvarez.
After visiting Canton, McGuinness formalized his relationship with Álvarez through a contract to which he made many changes. One of the most important is that he would travel to Mexico to close through a signature the sponsorships he got. With the help of Luis Silva, Álvarez managed to rent the Blue Stadium so that the World Bowl was played there.
Álvarez says that at the same time that he was trying to sell the sponsorships at 7 million pesos, Mike López and a collaborator named Aldo Barrón started doing the same on their own, but only asked for 2 million.
In September 2018, they joined the World Bowl organization Christian Granados and Abril Lazcano, who also work in the production of musical events. They joined Mike López's group because Arturo Peña, cousin of former President Enrique Peña Nieto, introduced them.
Deception Network
McGuinness began to operate behind Alvarez's back and by email sent him in October he told him that he had been dismissed as director of the World Bowl for not having closed any sponsorship. Mike Lopez would take his place, who supposedly had already obtained resources for the event.
"McGuinness told me that he needed the money in cash, that he would take out the money and that we will see how we do it, in the end that 'it is the daily practice in Mexico.' Obviously, I couldn't tell the sponsors that. I met Carso, Hooters, Corona, Chrysler, Bimbo USA. Sales were thrown at me because when Mike and Aldo came to ask for less money they told me: 'Agree'. The damage was already done.
“I closed Hooters as the main sponsor, but they just told me that they wouldn't take me into account. I did not receive my commission. I spent about 20 thousand dollars of my money on everything I had to do and in the end the event was a failure because we told the sponsors that 20 thousand people were going to attend and if perhaps 500 thousand arrived.
“The sponsorships give them to you based on the scope and we don't comply. VIP tickets were sold at 2,000 pesos with the promise that people would live with the Golden Jackets, and they didn't bring them. They organized another clinic with the NFL level coaches that didn't come, so the people who bought a ticket to the World Bowl were also disappointed. ”
According to Escalante and Álvarez, the rent of the Azul stadium cost 500 thousand pesos, Aldo Barrón asked for a loan of around 1.5 million pesos to cover the expenses. That money is still owed by McGuinness to Barrón, who is dedicated to putting on musical shows. Everyone worked and operated with the promise that after the World Bowl they would receive their money.
After the game took place, at the beginning of 2019 work began to make the second edition of the World Bowl and more clinics in Mexico.
The ex-assistant of Rich McGuinness, Loretta Hays, with whom Mike Lopez and Ricardo Álvarez had already treated in 2018, joined the project as director of the World Bowl and the clinics. Hays worked hand in hand with Granados and Lazcano. She met Mariana Escalante by chance in Cancun. Escalante worked in a travel agency and Lazcano invited her to coordinate the logistics of the trip of the 150 people who will come to Mexico next December, as well as the lodging to avoid the repetition of the disorganization of 2018.
Like Álvarez, Escalante envisioned a great opportunity to do a business. If he managed to position the World Bowl in Mexico, and in general the American collegiate football of the United States, they would open a new market. According to them there would be sports benefits because Mexican players could be exported to universities and even to the NFL and, at the same time, it would be very profitable in economic terms.
Escalante says that when he started knocking on doors with the sponsors he found that the event and coach Mike Lopez had a very bad reputation (Hays also accused him of stealing some shirts when he went to the meeting in Canton). The representatives of the companies that knocked on the door told him what had happened in 2018 and he also knew that McGuinness had been owed money.
As part of his strategy to position the World Bowl brand and clinics, he asked the Communication Council for help, invited the president of the National Student Organization of American Football, Juan Manuel Bladé Cavazos, and Fademac, César Sotomayor.
He knocked on companies like Cinemex, Coca Cola, the owner of the Cóndores team, lawyer José Luis Nassar, and added a friend, María Elena Gamboa, to his team, who could approach her with American Express.
Among his projects, Escalante invited Loretta Hays to the American College, where her children study. They began to organize a visit by former players and Hall of Famers, such as Ray Lewis, Rod Woodson and Andre Reed, which also failed to materialize.
According to Escalante, by then I suspected that there was something strange. Although there was a promise to sign contracts, due to the history of non-compliance, he doubted that the former NFL players would come to Mexico. Still he decided to move on.
She says that McGuinness and Hays, with the same modus operandi of 2018, took her to Canton to the enthronement ceremony last August.
He was paid for the trip. With her were Christian Granados and Abril Lazcano. He invited Blade, who did not attend, and Sotomayor, who sent his son on his behalf. There he met McGuinness in person.
“At the meeting we had Rich and Loretta told me that the money from the sponsors was going to enter Legacy Global Sports and then Sportz Strategy Marketing Group, which is another company where Loretta is. That they would pay what is owed last year and then to us for 2019. I thought: 'I am not going to launder the money. The sponsors are not going to want to make deposits other than for the Hall of Fame and I'm not going to get money to pay off last year's debts. ' Rich owes money to Abril, Christian, Aldo and Mike.
“I still didn't know what he did to Ricardo, Gustavo, Luis and the others. That meeting was accompanied by my husband, Luis, and he told Rich that we needed contracts for the clinics. We asked you to clarify why the money deposits would be to those companies and there they jumped. We present a business proposal to raise funds and make the World Bowl for three or five more years. Rod Woodson asked us for the presentation to ask the NFL between 4 and 5 million dollars through Roman Oben, to carry out the project in Mexico, ”he says.
Then, Luis Escalante turned to Loretta Hays and asked how much they would be paid to hand over the strategy. Escalante says that Hays very violently shouted at them, get out of here and began to deal with César Montemayor's son to perform the clinics directly with Fademac.
The lie goes on
On their way back to Mexico, the Escalante talked to coach Mike López, who told them what happened in 2018. Then they looked for Ricardo Álvarez and met the rest of the group of Mexicans who had been disappointed. Through a WhatsApp conversation, Loretta Hays demanded that the presentation be delivered to Woodson. As they did not, he told them that she would build his own based on what he had seen, that is, that he would plagiarize her.
“With the relationship they have with Roman Oben, getting 2 or 5 million dollars from the NFL is not difficult. Rich gets a budget from the NFL to pocket that money and seeks sponsorships in Mexico to get the expenses. It takes 50 thousand dollars on the one hand, another 50 thousand on the other and has people here working for free, ”says Álvarez.
To prevent McGuinness from continuing to defraud Mexicans, the Escalante and Álvarez sent letters to alert both David Baker and potential sponsors.
Mariana Escalante says that she met for three hours with Arturo Olivé, general director of the NFL Mexico, who told them she would notify the NFL in the United States.
The completion of the 2019 World Bowl is in doubt, since the official presentation has not even taken place. The roster of participating players is now available and is scheduled for December 21 at the Blue Stadium.
Also the realization of clinics continues. Together with the Southeast American Football Organization (Ofase), Pro Football Hall Of Fame Academy had already announced one in Cancun from October 18 to 20, where Rod Woodson would participate.
In a statement the Ofase announced that it is canceled until further notice, but internally reported that it is due to the lack of guarantees of the McGuinness company.
- Why, if they saw the signs that McGuinness is not reliable, did they decide to work with him?
–The theme of the Hall of Fame seduces you –Avarez responds.
Barrón says the same thing: “He seduced me. You're dealing with the number one and two of the Hall of Fame, you think everything they tell you is true. ”
Escalante adds that the CBS network pays McGuinness for the World Bowl broadcasting rights and that its main sponsor, the Xenith helmets, gave him $ 25,000 in 2018 and will deliver another $ 50,000 for the 2019 game.
“What McGuinness needs is for someone to pay for the event, he takes money from the NFL for clinics through Rod Woodson and Xenith as well. He keeps all that. Our ideas, our strategies come and steal. I bet that the World Bowl is as important in Mexico as in the United States, thus evading non-competing and keeping the money, ”says Escalante.
All those involved will collectively sue McGuinness in the United States for moral damage, for the money that made them lose and because their image was lacerated before the companies with which they managed the financial resources to finance the World Bowl.
They don't want to talk
Last week David Baker, president of the Hall of Fame, finally became interested in the fraudulent practices of McGuinness.
Rod Woodson and Loretta Hays phoned Frank Bermudez when they learned that he also wants to take legal action against McGuinness.
Following that communication, Woodson spoke with Baker to warn him that if McGuinness continues to lead the clinic project in Mexico he will no longer participate or go to any Hall of Fame event.
Baker contacted Bermúdez, who claimed that for a year he did not answer the emails sent to him informing him about the behavior of someone who exploits the Hall of Fame brand in an abusive and fraudulent way.
This is narrated by Mariana and Luis Escalante whom Bermudez informed of both conversations:
“Frank told Baker that we need him to intervene. He demanded that he did not answer us and Baker told him that he did not have to answer since we did not send him proof.
“Bermudez told him: 'You had to investigate what I sent you and the deceived people; it's not just about recovering money, but about our integrity, including mine. ' They stopped talking again and Frank told us he would inform us. Ricardo also wrote to Roman Oben and told him that he will give him an answer shortly, ”says Escalante.
Process contacted coach Mike López and Abril Lazcano, who did not respond to an interview request. Christian Granados also declined to speak. McGuinness and Veras also did not respond to the email in which they were asked for their version of the events.
Instead, the general director of the NFL Mexico, Arturo Olivé, clarified that the league is not related to the organization of the World Bowl in Mexico.
eastside_purple
Well-known member
Lol, he was definitely a failure this year.