August 22, 2006 in Sports

Will Siegfried return next season?

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Spokane Shock head coach Chris Siegfried will make countless decisions this week regarding game plans, personnel and preparations for Saturday’s ArenaCup.

Thereafter, he’ll probably be faced with a decision about his own career path.

Siegfried has at least one Arena Football League team waiting to talk to him about an offensive coordinator position after the ArenaCup. He’s also heard from numerous arenafootball2 teams that are interested in his services.

“We’ll sit down and discuss options and see where it goes,” said Siegfried, who was named the af2 coach of the year after guiding the Spokane Shock to West Division and National Conference championships. “At the same time, we’ll be talking with the ownership here.”

Siegfried stressed that he’s enjoyed his first season in Spokane and his focus is on Saturday’s game against Green Bay in San Juan, Puerto Rico. The top-ranked Shock are 16-2 and easily led af2 in attendance, averaging nearly 10,000 per home game.

“I’m not going to rule anything out,” he said, “but I’m happy here.”

Shock majority owner Brady Nelson said re-signing Siegfried and his staff are the team’s top priority after the season. Af2 coaches and players operate on one-year contracts.

“We’ve sat down and talked and we’ve let him know we want to do everything we can to keep him,” Nelson said. “If we could offer him a long-term contract we would, but we can’t. He’s actually not a Shock employee, he’s a league employee. We want to make sure we do everything we can to make sure Spokane is his best fit.”

Per af2 rules, Siegfried will make $53,000 this season. Nelson said league rules call for coaching salaries to go up $2,500-$3,000 next season.

For now, Nelson must play the waiting game.

“Once the AFL team decides how bad they want him and what they’re willing to do, then he’ll have to say, ‘Do I want to go there?, or, Do I stay here, try to win another championship and then maybe I can get a head coaching job in AFL,’ ” Nelson said.

Siegfried has more wins (56) than any coach in af2 history, but he’s also been on the losing end. He saw his tenure at South Georgia end 10 games into the 2005 season.

“Last year I was talking with the New York Dragons and it pretty much ended positively,” he said. “New York wasn’t the right situation. Unfortunately I didn’t put myself in a good situation (at South Georgia), but you live and learn and what I went through at South Georgia helped me become a better coach.”

Delayed departure

The Shock’s travel plans, organized by the Puerto Rican-based company in charge of promotion and marketing for the ArenaCup, have been pushed back a day, further complicating the team’s attempts to practice. Spokane will bus to Seattle today and leave for Puerto Rico early Wednesday.

The Shock weren’t able to practice Monday and Siegfried wasn’t optimistic they’d be able to practice today before departing. Siegfried wants to have practice Wednesday night when the team arrives in Puerto Rico, but the league expects the team to attend a welcome dinner.

“I said, ‘How much is the fine?’, because I’m going to go to practice first,” Siegfried said.

Spokane has workouts Thursday and Friday at the Coliseo de Puerto Rico, site of Saturday’s game.

Memorable season

Nelson had lofty goals for the Shock’s first season, but he never imagined 16 victories and a trip to the af2 title game.

“I’ve been asked so many times, ‘Did you expect this?’ ” Nelson said. “I expected to put people in the stands, but winning like we have and the atmosphere at the playoff games was beyond what I even imagined. It’s been so fun I can’t even describe it.”

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