Memphis Maniax

The Memphis Maniax were an American football team based in Memphis, Tennessee. The team was part of the XFL begun by Vince McMahon of World Wrestling Entertainment and by NBC, a major television network in the United States. Home games were played at Liberty Bowl Memorial Stadium.

Memphis Maniax

Established	2001
Folded	2001; 24 years ago (2001)
Based in	Memphis, Tennessee
Home stadium	Liberty Bowl Memorial Stadium
Head coach	Kippy Brown
League	XFL
Division	Western
Colors	Teal, burgundy, gold, black[1]
League titles	0
Division titles	0

History

The team's name and logo were designed to lead the team's fans into calling the team "The Ax", a shortened form of the word "maniacs".

The Maniax Director of Player Personnel was Steve Ortmayer, who had become respected in the pro football world for helping to build the Super Bowl XVIII-champion Los Angeles Raiders. Steve Ehrhart, who had managed both the Memphis Showboats and Memphis Mad Dogs, returned as general manager for the Maniax. The head coach was Kippy Brown.

At slightly over 20,000 fans per game, the Maniax were in the lower half of league average attendance; this figure was higher than the Mad Dogs had drawn, and comparable to that of the NFL's Tennessee Oilers during their lone season in Memphis, but lower than the Showboats.

They were in the Western Division with the Los Angeles Xtreme, San Francisco Demons, and Las Vegas Outlaws. They finished tied for second place at 5-5 with the Demons, but did not make the playoffs as the Demons had the better division record during the season. The Maniax were one of two teams to beat the eventual league champion Xtreme, and the only team to beat them twice, going 2-0 vs. their divisional rivals in the regular season; not coincidentally, they, along with the Xtreme and Demons, were the only three XFL teams to maintain the same starting quarterback through the entire season.

NBC officials wanted to move the XFL games to afternoons after the first season (2001) due to dismal ratings, and when, somewhat to McMahon's surprise and disappointment the United Paramount Network (UPN) wanted to follow suit, the league was then folded and the team disbanded.

Ehrhart would later claim that he was originally approached by the XFL to sell the intellectual property rights of the United States Football League to them, but that he owned the rights to the league, received royalties from them, and refused to sell.^[2] (Ehrhart's claims are somewhat dubious as he never held any ownership stake in the league, the original XFL had an Attitude Era aesthetic which did not match the brands the USFL had, and the United States Patent and Trademark Office has never recognized any claims from any vestige of the USFL, which dissolved in 1990, regarding the league's intellectual properties and has allowed other organizations to register the trademarks.)

Season by season

Season records

Season	W	L	T	Finish	Playoff results
2001	5	5	0	3rd Western	Did not survive

Schedule

Regular season

Week	Date	Opponent	Result	Record	Venue
1	February 4	at Birmingham Thunderbolts	W 22–20	1–0	Legion Field
2	February 11	Las Vegas Outlaws	L 3–25	1–1	Liberty Bowl Memorial Stadium
3	February 17	San Francisco Demons	L 6–13	1–2	Liberty Bowl Memorial Stadium
4	February 25	at Los Angeles Xtreme	W 18–12	2–2	Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum
5	March 4	Orlando Rage	L 19–21	2–3	Liberty Bowl Memorial Stadium
6	March 10	Chicago Enforcers	W 29–23	3–3	Liberty Bowl Memorial Stadium
7	March 17	at New York/New Jersey Hitmen	L 15–16	3–4	Giants Stadium
8	March 24	at San Francisco Demons	L 12–21	3–5	Pacific Bell Park
9	April 1	Los Angeles Xtreme	W 27–12	4–5	Liberty Bowl Memorial Stadium
10	April 7	at Las Vegas Outlaws	W 16–3	5–5	Sam Boyd Stadium

Personnel

Roster

2001 Memphis Maniax roster

Quarterbacks (QB)  5 Marcus Crandell 16 Jim Druckenmiller Running backs (RB) 48 Jim Kitts FB 33 Brent Moss 32 Beau Morgan QB 42 Roosevelt Potts FB 22 Ketric Sanford Wide receivers (WR) 86 Keith Crawford 80 Daryl Hobbs 88 Charles Jordan Tight ends (TE) 85 Mark Thomas

Offensive linemen (OL) 79 Harry Boatswain T 69 Isaac Davis G 70 Jesse James C 75 Glenn Rountree G 71 Earl Scott C 77 Mike Sheldon T 74 Bernard Williams T Defensive linemen (DL) 79 Antonio Anderson DT 93 Shante Carver DE 73 D. J. Cooper DE 53 Tramont Lawless DE 92 Leonta Rheams DT 60 Marvin Thomas DE

Linebackers (LB) 59 Richard Hogans 51 Paris Lenon 40 Cornell Menafee 99 Patrick Sapp 50 Caspor Stiles Defensive backs (DB) 35 Tyrone Bell 27 Rico Clark 25 Kevin Cobb  3 Jackie Kellogg 10 Corey Sawyer 21 John Williams 29 Marcus Wimberly Special teams (ST)  4 Jeff Hall K/P

Practice squad 81 Damien Dodson WR 96 T. J. Frier DT 52 Paul Lacoste LB 62 Tim Seymour C 46 Shinzo Yamada DB Reserve 20 Rafael Cooper RB (IR) 12 Kevin Prentiss WR (IR) 31 Rashaan Salaam RB (IR) Rookies in italics , 5 practice squad

Standings

Western Division
Team	W	L	T	PCT	PF	PA	STK
Los Angeles Xtreme	7	3	0	.700	235	166	W1
San Francisco Demons	5	5	0	.500	156	161	L1
Memphis Maniax	5	5	0	.500	167	166	W2
Las Vegas Outlaws	4	6	0	.400	169	143	L3

^[3]

Team leaders

Legend
	Led the league

Passing

Passing statistics[a]
NAME	GP	GS	Record	Cmp	Att	Pct	Yds	TD	Int	Rtg
Jim Druckenmiller	8	7	4–3	109	199	54.8	1,499	13	7	86.2
Marcus Crandell	4	3	1–2	32	67	47.8	463	1	2	63.2
Craig Whelihan	1	0	—	5	12	41.7	46	0	1	18.1
Beau Morgan	—	—	—	1	2	50.0	10	0	0	64.6
Totals	10	10	5–5	147	280	52.5	2,018	14	10	77.6

1. Whelihan was traded to Chicago and the team took his statistics off of the final season statistics.^[4] Morgan threw two passes that were credited to Crandell.^[5][6] For the purpose of this chart, Whelihan and Morgan's statistics are included.

Rushing

Rushing statistics
NAME	Att	Yds	Avg	Lng	TD
Rashaan Salaam	114	528	4.6	39t	5
Brent Moss	33	135	4.1	18	0
Jim Druckenmiller	31	208	6.7	36	0
Ketric Sanford	26	93	3.6	30t	2
Rafael Cooper	19	87	4.6	28	0
Beau Morgan	17	37	2.2	16	0
Roosevelt Potts	5	39	7.8	24	0
Marcus Crandell	5	11	2.2	10	0
Charles Jordan	2	19	9.5	12	0
Kevin Prentiss	1	-9	-9.0	-9	0
Totals	253	1,148	4.5	39	7

Receiving

Receiving statistics
NAME	Rec	Yds	Avg	Lng	TD
Charles Jordan	45	823	18.3	49	4
Daryl Hobbs	30	419	14.0	49t	5
Kevin Prentiss	25	383	15.3	53	0
Mark Thomas	13	133	10.2	23	3
Beau Morgan	10	82	8.2	17	2
Rashaan Salaam	6	41	6.8	8	0
Keith Crawford	4	46	11.5	17	0
Jim Kitts	4	35	8.8	14	0
Rafael Cooper	3	16	5.3	12	0
John Jennings	2	12	6.0	9	0
Roosevelt Potts	2	5	2.5	5	0
Jahine Arnold	1	10	10.0	10	0
Alvin Harper	1	8	8.0	8	0
Brent Moss	1	5	5.0	10	0
Totals	147	2,018	13.7	53	14

Scoring

8-21 (38.1)% on extra point conversion attempts^[7]

Total Scoring
NAME	Rush	Rec	Return	XPM	FGM	PTS
Jeff Hall	0	0	0	0	11	33
Rashaan Salaam	5	0	0	2	0	32
Daryl Hobbs	0	5	0	2	0	32
Charles Jordan	0	4	0	0	0	24
Mark Thomas	0	3	0	0	0	18
Ketric Sanford	2	0	0	3	0	15
Beau Morgan	0	2	0	1	0	13
Totals	7	14	0	8	11	167