United Football League (2024)

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

This article is about the gridiron football league. For the soccer video game, see UFL (video game). For other uses, see UFL.
United Football League
Current season, competition or edition:
Current sports event
USFL
Affiliated: IFL
Other: NFL, CFL, AAF
Official websitetheUFL.com

The United Football League (UFL) is a

United States Football League (USFL).[3] It consists of eight teams, all of which were members of the XFL or USFL prior to the UFL's creation, concentrated in the Midwest and Southern United States.[4]

Background

Main articles:
United States Football League (2022)

2020–2021

Main articles: 2020 XFL season, 2020 The Spring League Fall season, and 2021 The Spring League season

In 2017,

relaunched the XFL with a similar business structure (though, unlike the 2001 XFL, operated as a sole proprietorship of McMahon's separate from his professional wrestling corporation, WWE) and an emphasis on speed and innovation.[6] The XFL, which was largely successful with its attendance and television ratings, was forced to shut down halfway through its 2020 season in March due to stay-at-home orders imposed during the COVID-19 pandemic and declared bankruptcy in April;[7][8] later that year, McMahon sold the league to a consortium led by businesswoman Dany Garcia, Garcia's ex-husband Dwayne Johnson (a former WWE wrestler under the name "The Rock"), and private equity firm RedBird Capital Partners.[9][10] The XFL chose not to play a 2021 season (most gathering restrictions would not be lifted until spring of that year) and cancelled the 2022 season after partnership discussions with the Canadian Football League collapsed without any agreement in fall 2021.[11]

While the XFL was on hiatus, Fox Sports—which had been one of the XFL's broadcast partners along with ESPN in 2020—entered a partnership with Brian Woods, who had been operating The Spring League (TSL) as a non-paying, pay-to-play developmental showcase for professional players[12] under a single-campus bubble format[13] since 2017. The XFL had funded The Spring League's 2019 season to test rule changes and were holding discussions about a potential affiliation between the two leagues before the bankruptcy.[14] Fox aired the autumn 2020 and spring 2021 seasons of The Spring League.[15]

2022–2023

Main articles: 2022 USFL season, 2023 USFL season, and 2023 XFL season

Following the 2021 season, Woods and Fox announced they had acquired the trademarks of the original 1980s incarnation of the

reboot of the USFL in spring 2022.[16] The 2022 USFL season, though its eight teams nominally bore the names of eight former USFL franchises including their cities, continued to use the bubble format with all eight teams based in Birmingham, Alabama, in the 2022 season.[17] The playoffs were held in Canton, Ohio.[18] Woods eventually backed out of the USFL after the 2022 season.[19]

The XFL and USFL played separate, partially overlapping seasons in 2023, to roughly similar television viewership numbers.

Detroit, Michigan,[22] to Birmingham and Canton, with each city hosting two teams, while the XFL moved three of its eight teams to new cities and held all eight teams' practices at a hub in Arlington, Texas.[23]

For the 2023 season, the USFL average viewership in 2023 was down 16% from its debut season to 601,000 and 3% lower than the

XFL.[20] The championship game also saw a significant decline in viewership from 2022 as the game averaged 1.2 million viewers across NBC, Peacock, and NBC Sports digital platforms.[24] USFL President Daryl Johnston expressed disappointment and anger that the USFL was comparable to the XFL in ratings for the 2023 season, dismissing the XFL as "no competition" to the "far superior" USFL and musing "to be on par with our competition from a ratings standpoint in Year 2, I'm still trying to figure out: How did that happen? (...) they're not even close."[20] The USFL was already seeking additional investors prior to the start of the 2023 season and had hired Allen & Company to assist in the search; Fox lost an unspecified amount of money on the venture in 2023 due to the high startup expenses for a professional football league.[25]

At the same time, the XFL lost nearly $60 million during the season after spending approximately $140 million in expenses over the course of the 2023 season and earning $80 million in gross revenue, including roughly $20 million that came from its broadcast contract with ESPN.[26][27] Executives with the league and ESPN indicated that they considered the season a success.[28] Like the USFL, the XFL was also seeking additional investors with the assistance of PJT Partners.[29] After the season ended, the XFL made league-wide cuts affecting up to 30 people, including two marketing executives, and shifted other employees to seasonal work.[30][31]

Both the USFL and XFL believed that the leagues could be independently viable in the long term even if they continued to compete against each other but, by the time of the 2023 USFL championship, they had decided that setting aside the business rivalry and merging the two leagues would be even more financially advantageous.[32]

History

XFL–USFL Merger

See also: 2024 UFL dispersal draft

In September 2023, Axios reported that the XFL was in advanced talks with the USFL to merge the leagues prior to the start of their 2024 seasons.[33] On September 28, 2023, the XFL and USFL announced their intent to merge with details surrounding the merger to be announced at a later date.[34] The merger would also require regulatory approval.[35] In October 2023 the XFL filed a trademark application for the name "United Football League".[36] On November 30, 2023, Garcia announced via her Instagram page that the leagues had received regulatory approval for the merger and were finalizing plans for a combined season to begin March 30, 2024.[37]

The merger was formally announced on Fox NFL Sunday on December 31, 2023.[38] The eight surviving teams were announced the following day on College GameDay, along with the alignment; the XFL and USFL will survive as separate conferences.[39] Daryl Johnston would note in February that maintaining the XFL and USFL conferences as separate entities was designed to build an on-field rivalry between the two brands and to give the winner of the league's championship "bragging rights."[40] President/CEO Russ Brandon would later say that the league would be looking at expansion shortly,[41] while Defenders defensive coordinator Gregg Williams revealed plans to expand to 12 teams by 2025 and to 16 teams by 2026.[42][43] In a May 2024 interview, Johnston stated that he did not anticipate any relocations for 2025.[44]

2024 season

Main article: 2024 UFL season

The 2024 UFL season began on March 30, 2024, with a matchup between the

2023 USFL champion Birmingham Stallions.[38]

Teams

See also:
Timeline of the UFL

Four teams came from the XFL and three came from the USFL, while each league's Houston-based teams merged, maintaining the branding of the XFL's Roughnecks, and the divisional alignment, players rights and coaching staff of the USFL's Gamblers.[38][45] In essence the Gamblers changed their name to the Roughnecks.

Overview of United Football League teams
Conference Team Location Stadium Capacity First season Head coach

USFL Conference 		Birmingham Stallions Birmingham, Alabama Protective Stadium 47,100 2022 Skip Holtz
Houston Roughnecks Houston, Texas Rice Stadium[41] 47,000 2020 Curtis Johnson
Memphis Showboats Memphis, Tennessee Simmons Bank Liberty Stadium 58,325 2023 John DeFilippo
Michigan Panthers Detroit, Michigan Ford Field 65,000 2022 Mike Nolan

XFL Conference 		Arlington Renegades Arlington, Texas Choctaw Stadium 25,000 2020 Bob Stoops
DC Defenders Washington, D.C. Audi Field 20,000 2020 Reggie Barlow
San Antonio Brahmas San Antonio, Texas Alamodome 64,000 2023 Wade Phillips
St. Louis Battlehawks St. Louis, Missouri The Dome at America's Center 67,277 2020 Anthony Becht
class=notpageimage|
Locations of teams for the 2024 UFL season (USFL Conference in red, XFL Conference in blue)

Timeline

Players

Each team carries 75-men roster to training camp, with regular season rosters will stand at 50 (45 active on game day).[46][47] The minimum stay on injured reserve is five games, while season ending injured reserve designation guarantees player a camp invite the following season.[48]

While the UFL embraced more of a "developmental league" mentality,[49] they're also targeting veteran backups type players, with Johnston saying: "there are a lot of guys who are at peace that their NFL window has closed, but they love the camaraderie of the locker room. They love the day-to-day grind... That's been the really inspiring thing to me, is there is a number of guys in our league who just love the game and want to keep playing it as long as they can.[50] Players that have three or four years in the NFL and want to kind of rewrite that narrative, the way that they’re being viewed by front office’s in the NFL, they want an opportunity to come into the UFL and change that narrative".[51] Johnston also mentioned that the league would like to change the narrative, from "developmental league" and starting to talk about the "sustainability of spring football": "I think one of the things that we’ve started to have conversations is what do we want our new messaging to be? We do want to move off of the developmental component. We want to get away from the opportunity component. We want to talk about the talent of the players that are in this league... (compare to) spring football that you have seen in other iterations, this will be the best talent that if you’re a fan of spring football, you will have seen in recent history".[52]

Unionization & compensation

Local 9004 of the

collective bargaining agreement.[53][55]

Initial reports suggested that, contrary to the 2023 XFL season, quarterbacks would not be allowed to sign for salaries higher than the other positional players.[56][55] However, the UFLPA later clarified that the agreement with the league is for minimum salary only, and any player could sign a personal contract above the minimum.[57] As late as January 2024, the league had resisted "pushback" from some of the higher-paid XFL quarterbacks to increase quarterbacks' salary, with Johnston at the time refusing to deviate from the plan to pay all players equally while acknowledging "there's a good argument for both sides. How do we manage this situation(...)? It's hard to thread that needle."[50]

Select XFL players, who had voted against joining the USW in 2023, expressed concern about the lack of winning bonuses (a key feature of the XFL's pay structure) and a requirement to pay union dues,

AJ McCarron revealed that XFL players were in advanced talks with the National Football League Players Association (NFLPA) for exclusive representation.[58]

Salary

UFL players' minimum salaries will be $5,500 per week ($2,500 for inactive players) and $150 a week toward 401K contributions, with $400 a week house stipend and $55-a-day per diem stipend during travel days. All contracts will run from January 1 to August 24. During training camp, all players will receive $850 a week. Players on injured reserve will receive $2,500 a week (plus house stipend). UFL players will also be entitled for "players accolade bonuses" for Player of the week ($1,000), All UFL ($2,500), Player of the year ($5,000), and MVP ($7,500).[48] The overall league player budget is $24 million.[32]

Rules

Mike Pereira and Dean Blandino are in charge of the UFL's officiating and rules.[41][59]

The league rulebook was released February 13, 2024. Though most of the UFL's unique rules were common to both the USFL and XFL (such as allowing a second forward pass if the first does not cross the line of scrimmage, and the treatment of a fumble through the end zone the same as other forward fumbles in that it is brought back to the spot of the fumble), a limited number required compromise or were changed entirely from both leagues' rules:[60][61][62]

Partnerships

In February 2022, the XFL signed a collaboration agreement with the

NFL to "experiment with proposed rules, test new equipment and develop prospective officials and coaches and explore new ways to address player safety".[66][67] In October 2022, the XFL announced a player personnel partnership with the Indoor Football League (IFL), with the IFL functioning as the XFL's de facto minor league.[68]

In 2023, Dwayne Johnson said that "the XFL specifically designed its schedule to give its players the best chance of latching on with an NFL team in May",[69] while Gerry Cardinale stated that "the minor league analogy is valid, that's an important part of this."[70] After the merger, UFL Executive VP of Football Operations Daryl Johnston refuted the notion of a "minor-league" when he said in an interview: "I don’t want to be considered a developmental league or a feeder league. We’re a professional, stand-alone football league", but he also acknowledged the importance of an NFL partnership: "the number of people we have at the top of our league office that have connections to the NFL, I’m hoping we’re able to accelerate that process and have meaningful conversations with the NFL about what our league can provide (...) What we’re trying to do is maximize the talent and quality of play in our league. One way we can do that is having access to guys who are in the NFL, on that fringe, on that cusp".[71] It was later announced that the XFL's previous agreement with the NFL would continue for the 2024 UFL season.[41]

League finances

The league was created as a "merger of equals", with the respective leagues' owners assuming 50% ownership of the newly formed UFL[72] and The Walt Disney Company also holding a minority stake.[32] RedBird Capital Partners owner Gerry Cardinale called it "a tremendous opportunity to achieve something unique. A legitimate shot at becoming one of the top professional leagues in the country after the big four leagues".[73] In the event that the league, in the future, begins accepting individual team owners, it stated in 2024 that it would follow the Major League Soccer business model of buyers buying into the league itself and not separating the teams into individual business entities.[32]

In March, 2024,

Upper Deck announced they'll release "2024 UFL Game Dated Moments Cards".[79]

Personnel

Source[80]

Broadcasting

In the United States, the television rights for the UFL are held by

ESPN Xtra and Fox Sports Radio, respectively.[87]

Beginning in the 2025 season, Fox will include the UFL as a permanent part of its Friday night schedule.[88][89]

Champions

UFL Champions
Date Winning Team Score Losing Team Score Stadium Location MVP Attendance Network Viewership
June 16, 2024 Birmingham Stallions 25 San Antonio Brahmas 0 The Dome at America's Center St. Louis, Missouri Adrian Martinez 27,396 Fox 1.60 million

Notes

Informational notes

  1. ^ Spanish audio/broadcast

References

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External links

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