He was playing alongside Bryan Hicks, who he backed up for a portion of the season. Trujillo was getting hit time and time again, eventually injuring his throwing hand and exiting the game in the second quarter. It was the first game since the upset against the Cobras, so it was understandable that Carolina would come out playing hard to make a statement. The game went on and Trujillo was sent into the game midway through the second quarter after the new offense saw no productivity. They played for the fans.” The Last Straw for Trujillo “We were just practice dummies ,” Trujillo said. “Doug convinced them to play. Because Miller was going through the same thing, the players were on his side as he was on there’s. The only reason they played was because Miller convinced them to. “There were players in our group chat talking about boycotting that home game so that the franchise lost the money on it since the players weren’t being paid.” The team only practiced twice that week, leading up to the game against the defending champions. Miller played a big role in the team actually playing that upcoming game against the Cobras, too. “He was kind of pulling for us, because it he wasn’t getting paid as a coach,” Trujillo said. So why the behind-the-scenes challenges and massive inconveniences were going on, the head coach of the team was going through it as well.
His lights and water went out in the middle of our session. “During that film session his lights went out,” Trujillo said. Instead a group of offensive players were supposed to go to head coach Doug Miller’s home to watch film and meet the new OC, on Sunday June 23 – a week before the game against the Cobras.
Orlando players, despite needing to learn a new offense before their game against Carolina in two weeks, didn’t practice during their bye week. Two weeks & Two Practices ahead of shutout against Carolina They never met, and what happened in those next two weeks ahead of one of the most puzzling results we’ve seen in the recent history of arena football will come to life.
The owner had promised Trujillo that the two would meet to learn the team’s new offense – a third one at that – to learn before their next game against Carolina coming up in two weeks. The team would move on to hiring their third offensive coordinator of the season in PeeJay Jack. Orlando’s next game featured a close loss to the Massachusetts Pirates in what seems like a high point in the whole saga now.Īfter that loss, McEntyre decided to fire offensive coordinator Ben Bennett, who Trujillo believes is one of the best coaches in the business. “We actually received cash from a player after one game.” “It made absolutely no sense, ,” Trujillo said. Two weeks later, Orlando coaches didn’t even play the player mentioned. “I found out later that had reached out to a player to have him pay all of our checks for the game, which came out to $4100,” Trujillo said. Why would they? There was no money coming from it.īut, Orlando lasted another week, thanks to a player on the team. It was beginning to be difficult to field teams to practice on both sides of the football. It was terrible.”Īfter the conditions got that poor, some players stopped showing up for practice. “Then you come to practice and then go back to hiding. “He was hiding in other players’ apartments just so he could get through the day,” Trujillo said.
One player who stuck around after the eviction notices were sent out, was caught several times on the apartment’s property after being forced out. If he was caught on the property once again, he would be arrested. An eviction letter sent to the Orlando Predators players midway through the year when team owner Kenny McEntyre was not paying the bills. McEntyre wasn’t paying the bills and it was (and still is) hurting athletes’ credit scores because of it. The players were getting eviction notices because name wasn’t on the leases, the players’ names were. That was just going on during the season.” Players couches were thrown onto the side of the curb. A new player would say ‘I came home from practice and my car got towed. “There were cars being towed literally every day we had practice. “Other players were texting group chat about being evicted, having eviction notices on their front doors, the cops coming to their apartments, furniture being literally tossed out of their rooms and onto the side of the road for people to pick up as garbage,” Trujillo said. The same players car was towed later in the week. “Come to find out he just didn’t pay the rent. “They told us it was already going through the court system and everything,” An evicted player that wished to remain anonymous said. On the morning of June 15, players in one apartment were woken up at 7:30 a.m.
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