ELF: Stuttgart Surge sign Austrian wideout Yannick Mayr

| American Football | 11/17/2022

The Stuttgart Surge have signed 2022 Tirol Raiders’ wideout Yannick Mayr ahead of the 2023 European League of Football (ELF) season.

the 6′, 198 pound, 26-year-old Mayr began his football journey in Salzburg, Austria, with the Ducks in 2015 before moving on to Austrian powerhouse Vienna Vikings a year later. In four years with the Vikings, Mayr went from a relatively unknown to one of the best young receivers in the country. 

In 2020, Mayr won an Austrian Bowl (in a shortened Covid-19 season) with the Vikings and began to look further afield for the next football challenge. He found it in neighboring Germany with the then dominant Schwäbisch Hall Unicorns who were led by head coach Jordan Neuman.

The Unicorns went undefeated in the German Football League in 2021 but fell short at the German Bowl in a thrilling battle against the Dresden Monarchs, a game in which Mayr had five receptions, 78 yards and a touchdown (despite being deprived of his starting quarterback due to injury).

In 2022, Mayr decided to make the leap to the ELF and join the Raiders Tirol. Mayr struggled to stay healthy this past season but proved a formidable weapon for the Raiders when healthy. In seven games he amassed 385 yards and five touchdowns.

Now, the young receiver will return to Germany and be reunited with Jordan Neuman.

Mayr is not the first, and will unlikely be the last, big-name signing that Neuman manages to secure as the Surge look to rebuild a franchise that has struggled since its inception.

Daniel Mackenzie is a Press Association graduate who works in journalism and communications in the third sector. Daniel began playing football for the London Warriors and Team Great Britain and has since played across Europe.