UFL on thin ice?

[Saintsfan]

I don't know but I would imagine that insurance payments etc would make a full on farm system hard to set up in Football. Also I think a May/June/July timetable for a development league might be a workable idea. How about this as a possible list of markets

Portland

Birmingham

Somewhere in New England

Columbus

Toronto (?)

San Antonio

Richmond

Sacramento

it's not like these markets haven't been attempted at some time before and met with abject failure.

Well that may be true, but this 'NDFL' concept would be a part of the NFL, with full on NFL marketing, but also with limited ambition. no expectation of selling out 80,000 seat stadia, but with enough bucks behind it to give markets time to grow.

it's not like these markets haven't been attempted at some time before with NFL support and met with abject failure.

Primarily though this wouldn't be a money based league, at least to start with. It would be a developmental league developed to give inexperienced players a chance to gain some playing experience in a professional NFL system.

[rams80]

I don't know but I would imagine that insurance payments etc would make a full on farm system hard to set up in Football. Also I think a May/June/July timetable for a development league might be a workable idea. How about this as a possible list of markets

Portland

Birmingham

Somewhere in New England

Columbus

Toronto (?)

San Antonio

Richmond

Sacramento

it's not like these markets haven't been attempted at some time before and met with abject failure.

Well that may be true, but this 'NDFL' concept would be a part of the NFL, with full on NFL marketing, but also with limited ambition. no expectation of selling out 80,000 seat stadia, but with enough bucks behind it to give markets time to grow.

it's not like these markets haven't been attempted at some time before with NFL support and met with abject failure.

Primarily though this wouldn't be a money based league, at least to start with. It would be a developmental league developed to give inexperienced players a chance to gain some playing experience in a professional NFL system.

1) How do you distribute playing time and system education when you have less than 32 teams?

2) Why should the NFL take a loss on this when the NCAA does it for them for free?

[Gothamite]

Two excellent questions.

How did the NFL allocate playing spots in Europa?

[Saintsfan]

I don't know but I would imagine that insurance payments etc would make a full on farm system hard to set up in Football. Also I think a May/June/July timetable for a development league might be a workable idea. How about this as a possible list of markets

Portland

Birmingham

Somewhere in New England

Columbus

Toronto (?)

San Antonio

Richmond

Sacramento

it's not like these markets haven't been attempted at some time before and met with abject failure.

Well that may be true, but this 'NDFL' concept would be a part of the NFL, with full on NFL marketing, but also with limited ambition. no expectation of selling out 80,000 seat stadia, but with enough bucks behind it to give markets time to grow.

it's not like these markets haven't been attempted at some time before with NFL support and met with abject failure.

Primarily though this wouldn't be a money based league, at least to start with. It would be a developmental league developed to give inexperienced players a chance to gain some playing experience in a professional NFL system.

1) How do you distribute playing time and system education when you have less than 32 teams?

2) Why should the NFL take a loss on this when the NCAA does it for them for free?

How does the NBDL sort those things out?

And does the NCAA really prepare players for full on NFL careers? Some guys it obviously does, but there are guys who get to the NFL without experience of professional play books and systems, and then flounder.

The way I see it happening is a bit like the MLS. The NFL would run the teams and asign players to each team. Rookies would get asigned first, NFL teams could request that players be asigned, and undrafted players might get a chance to prove themselves.

But I don't suppose the NFL would do something like this. NFL Europe was reasonable succesful in markets the NFL invested in and wasn't too ambitious about. If they weren't interested in investing in NFL Europe, I don't suppose some NFDL would interest them.

[jgiff17]

Why not have them start with what they have...4 teams no home stadium...just listen...regional based...NFL South NFL North and so on...afc and nfc south allocate players to NFL South and so on. Then...just wait they have an 8 game season...a game every two weeks starting the 1st week of NFL...the home team plays in a make shift 10000 seat artificial turf stadium near main venue of one of their affiliates only when the NFL team has an evening game so the NDFL game can kickoff at 12 cst !!!! Or like the texans already have practice facilities right by the stadium with seating so bam all the texans need is to make the playoffs then there can be some evening games. Championship game played divisional round of playoffs for NFL. This long schedule gives players rest as well as the whole season to stay inshape if NFL squad needs them. You could even go six games and championship game played last week of NFL season. Either way I think this is the best bang for your buck...tailgaters and people trickling through would stop ESP if it wasn't an every home game event.

[jgiff17]

Hey and Nike could use these four squads and all the games for different uniform adaptations. Byob for standing room fans outside fences...sounds better than nothing to me.

[dfwabel]

Bump as Omaha and Virginia are set to start it's (last) season on Thursday night.

[missouri tigers]

Bump as Omaha and Virginia are set to start it's (last) season on Thursday night.

This links to the ESPNU team specific logos video.

[dfwabel]

Bump as Omaha and Virginia are set to start it's (last) season on Thursday night.

This links to the ESPNU team specific logos video.

I fixed the link and will add a blog entry from The Big Lead today discussing the various financial issues they face.

[Mac the Knife]

Having analyzed the histories of the AFL, WFL, USFL, XFL and now the UFL, I've come to the opinion that The way to do an 'alternate' pro football league that survives, at least to me, is pretty simple and straight-forward:

• Don't announce your formation until you have (i) eight franchises with owners in place, minimum, and (ii) ownership groups committed to losing a minimum of $100 million, each, over a five year period. Not just investing, but losing.
  
• Play in the spring and early summer, wrapping up games no later than 4th of July weekend. This, if anything, is the UFL's kiss of death. Had it opted for a spring season, it'd at least not be encountering a number of the problems it currently faces.
  
• Get a multi-year television commitment and your games on every local radio station you can, even if it's just a "shared revenue" deal between the league and the network or station. For 2009 and 2010, the UFL paid to get its games on the air. Obviously, they did it wrong.
  
• Keep team operating expenses to an absolute minimum. Recruit players from local colleges, and maybe, maybe one 'name' player at a skill position. Your product is going to be held up to the NFL as a standard no matter what, so you might as well spend $2 million a season missing that expectation with 50 guys named 'Marvin' than spend $20 million on guys who used to be in the big league, but don't have it anymore.
  
• PLAY SEVERAL PRESEASON GAMES prior to each season, particularly the first one. Every league since the AFL has jumped immediately into a regular season with no preseason games, exposing a raw, under-developed product to people who expect more than that. For season one, each team plays a minimum of 5 preseason games - with no television or radio coverage.
  
• Promote the ever-loving bejeezus out of your team by developing strong ties with the community for at least a year before you inflate a single ball. Do local charity events, meet the team events, whatever it takes to get the word out so that people know you're there.
  
• Make attending your games uber-affordable, and ultra-fun, so that win or lose, those who attend games feel like they've enjoyed themselves. Arena Football used to do a good job of this; minor league baseball has for decades. Sell the overall experience, emphasizing fun over true quality football; because frankly, you won't have it.
  
• Guarantee franchise stability in its markets, any way you possibly can. Have club owners post a $30 million letter of credit up front, so that if they decide to bail on the team, the league can operate it for as long as reasonably need be until it finds new owners. One of the chief reasons the USFL died was that Harry Usher ultimately decided to release teams from their letters of credit; whereupon every one of them withdrew everything they could.
  
• Play in facilities suitable for the situation. The AFL played in places like Frank Youell Field in Oakland, the WFL played in Ypsilanti, Michigan. The USFL went big time for the most part, as did the XFL, while the UFL took a mixed approach. If you hope to draw a crowd of 20,000 a game, don't rent a facility that holds 35,000. Those seats will sit empty no matter what - and the owners will pay for 'capacity' they'll never use. And finally...
  
• Recognize from the beginning that your product is not, and will never likely be perceived as, NFL calibre - and act accordingly in everything you do. The minute someone in the league or one of the teams starts making any kind of comparison, fire them. The NFL is the NFL. Build your own brand by building an experience, not by presenting it as a potential competitor, ally, complimentary league, developmental league, etc.
  

[NatsFan2004]

Having analyzed the histories of the AFL, WFL, USFL, XFL and now the UFL, I've come to the opinion that The way to do an 'alternate' pro football league that survives, at least to me, is pretty simple and straight-forward:

Oh boy, what's the old saying? Ah yes... MOD EDIT: There's no need to get personal.

Don't announce your formation until you have (i) eight franchises with owners in place, minimum, and (ii) ownership groups committed to losing a minimum of $100 million, each, over a five year period. Not just investing, but losing.

Agree with this. Fighting the NFL monopoly at its own game, regardless of the time of year, is and always will be a costly endeavor. You don't need a millionaire's club here, you need a billionaire's club - and preferably, a multi-billionaire's club.

Play in the spring and early summer, wrapping up games no later than 4th of July weekend. This, if anything, is the UFL's kiss of death. Had it opted for a spring season, it'd at least not be encountering a number of the problems it currently faces.

No way. The UFL may currently suffer from exposure issues having to do with competing directly with the NFL and college football - ie, a problem of excess supply of football. But moving to the spring simply shifts to a different set of problems. With the exception of a limited group of rabid football fans who see no other sport than football, most Americans aren't interested in watching spring football. The casual fans have had enough after the Super Bowl, and general sports fans are ready to move on to soccer or baseball.

Look, the USFL wised up and opted for a fall season, albeit too late to make a difference. The XFL revealed the lack of mass interest in spring football, even after all the gimmicks and hoopla that made it a household name. Arena Football bled itself into oblivion before coming back as a thinly-veiled corporate clone of itself to burn away some more money. The writing is on the wall here: Fall is the only way to go for a football league to succeed.

Get a multi-year television commitment and your games on every local radio station you can, even if it's just a "shared revenue" deal between the league and the network or station. For 2009 and 2010, the UFL paid to get its games on the air. Obviously, they did it wrong.

Don't disagree, but it's going to be incredibly tough to convince a station to turn over their airwaves to you when they know that the "revenue" they're going to share with you is zero in the first few years. Most radio stations are so tied to format these days, they aren't going to break it to broadcast football games for a second-tier football league. And for the stations that are formatted as sports talk (ESPN Radio, Fox Sports Radio, etc.), they know they're going to get a certain steady stream of ad revenue from sticking to that format - so why chance losing out on a sure thing by broadcasting games of a team no one's heard of?

(As an aside, the Sacramento Mountain Lions' station, KHTK-AM, was on the brink of a format flip when they picked up the team for 2010. The only reason why they were broadcasting the UFL games was because they had virtually nothing else going on, ratings-wise.)

Not that it can't happen, but getting radio people to buy in to an unproven league that guarantees them no profits is tough. Hence why the UFL was paying to get its games on the air. Honestly, if you're going to have 8 owners committing from the outset to lose money, wouldn't you want to buy some airtime to broadcast your games if no other options were available? Honestly, I'd consider that a marketing expense, if nothing else...

Keep team operating expenses to an absolute minimum. Recruit players from local colleges, and maybe, maybe one 'name' player at a skill position. Your product is going to be held up to the NFL as a standard no matter what, so you might as well spend $2 million a season missing that expectation with 50 guys named 'Marvin' than spend $20 million on guys who used to be in the big league, but don't have it anymore.

THIS.

Honestly, keeping salary expenses down has to be one of the top 3 things that a new league has to do. And I'd much rather see a league that bills itself as being a breeding ground for the stars of tomorrow rather than the repository of the fading stars of yesterday. (See also: Culpepper, Daunte) Same thing goes for coaches, IMO. I don't need to see Denny Green or Jim Fassel coaching teams - there's a reason why these guys can't get another job at the NFL level.

PLAY SEVERAL PRESEASON GAMES prior to each season, particularly the first one. Every league since the AFL has jumped immediately into a regular season with no preseason games, exposing a raw, under-developed product to people who expect more than that. For season one, each team plays a minimum of 5 preseason games - with no television or radio coverage.

So you're bleeding cash by holding preseason games that no one knows are going on to improve quality of the game? Remember, stadiums cost money to open up for games regardless of whether or not they count in the standings - most of the cash going towards rent and staffing.

Also...preseason games at the NFL level are a massive time suck for fans. The stars only play maybe half the game and the rest of the time, it's watching a rotating cast of backups playing a game that really doesn't matter (because it doesn't count in the standings).

The most I can legitimately see fans tolerating is a 2-game preseason (a la the CFL - remember, they have had the 2-game preseason for years and no one can legitimately say they have a raw, under-developed product. It may not be as good as the NFL, but it's at least professional). Guarantee that all the starters will play at least 3 quarters. If you want to really impact the quality of the game, extend the length of training camp, and hold free, open intrasquad games at your training facility. Couple those with fan fests to give away branded merchandise and promote the product, and it's a win-win.

Promote the ever-loving bejeezus out of your team by developing strong ties with the community for at least a year before you inflate a single ball. Do local charity events, meet the team events, whatever it takes to get the word out so that people know you're there.

Critical point. This is what the Omaha Nighthawks have done particularly well, and it shows.

Make attending your games uber-affordable, and ultra-fun, so that win or lose, those who attend games feel like they've enjoyed themselves. Arena Football used to do a good job of this; minor league baseball has for decades. Sell the overall experience, emphasizing fun over true quality football; because frankly, you won't have it.

Yes, but don't forget that if you let the sideshow overshadow the game on the field, the true growth potential of the league will be stifled. Minor league baseball is a perfect example of this - only a limited crowd of true seamheads go to minor league games for the baseball. Everyone else goes for the sideshow - the Dippin' Dots, the wacky games, the wah-wah sound effects. And it works for minor league baseball because it's designed to never truly compete with MLB. But I suspect that football fans would demand a better experience than that, at least if the league isn't associated with the NFL.

Guarantee franchise stability in its markets, any way you possibly can. Have club owners post a $30 million letter of credit up front, so that if they decide to bail on the team, the league can operate it for as long as reasonably need be until it finds new owners.

This could work, but what happens when that $30 million letter of credit gets bled dry through operating expenses and payroll? If the owner suddenly gets cold feet at the thought of losing another $70 millon, do they get to cut and run? Or conversely, how do you commit an investor by letter of law to losing money? What investor is going to place a bet on this longshot league without at least having an exit strategy?

Play in facilities suitable for the situation. The AFL played in places like Frank Youell Field in Oakland, the WFL played in Ypsilanti, Michigan. The USFL went big time for the most part, as did the XFL, while the UFL took a mixed approach. If you hope to draw a crowd of 20,000 a game, don't rent a facility that holds 35,000. Those seats will sit empty no matter what - and the owners will pay for 'capacity' they'll never use.

A good idea in theory. Unfortunately, it's hard sometimes to find the "right size" facility for the job which also isn't embarrassingly bush league (ie, some Texas high school stadiums seat 20,000 - but you'd have a hard time being taken seriously as a pro league playing in a high school stadium where your needs are secondary to those of 16 year olds). Also you have to consider stadium access and parking - if it's too hard to get to or there isn't easy parking nearby, you're consigning your team to failure.

Also, I'll point out that Frank Youell Field was little more than a makeshift stadium built because the Raiders (nee Senors) had literally nowhere else to play in Oakland. Which brings up a thought: what if, as part of these owners' commitment to losing money, the plan was for each team to build its own stadium on its own land? Granted, the stadia would be spartan affairs - probably no more than bleachers with some nice concession stands/restrooms and ample parking - but at least that would let them control their own building, pay no rent, and establish their presence where the fans are (instead of trying to get the fans to come to whereever the stadium is).

Recognize from the beginning that your product is not, and will never likely be perceived as, NFL calibre - and act accordingly in everything you do. The minute someone in the league or one of the teams starts making any kind of comparison, fire them. The NFL is the NFL. Build your own brand by building an experience, not by presenting it as a potential competitor, ally, complimentary league, developmental league, etc.

I think this depends on the experience you're talking about building. If it's not a competitor of the NFL and it's not a developmental league, then what exactly IS it? Why should I come to the game as a fan if it's not about the game? Why should I be interested? That'd be the main question to answer.

[Saintsfan]

I don't really get what the UFL is for? To make a few people some money?

The USFL got close to competing with the NFL, until it became the Trump FL. So I'd add one other- make sure any owner wanting to buy into the league is committed to the league itself and doesn't have an agenda that is against the direction of the league.

[neo_prankster]

I don't really get what the UFL is for? To make a few people some money?

The USFL got close to competing with the NFL, until it became the Trump FL. So I'd add one other- make sure any owner wanting to buy into the league is committed to the league itself and doesn't have an agenda that is against the direction of the league.

So basically No Al Davises, right?

[Mac the Knife]

Oh boy, what's the old saying? Ah yes... MOD EDIT: There's no need to get personal.

Yeah, and it's my opinion that, for the most part MOD EDIT: Ditto.

[UnclearInitial]

Having analyzed the histories of the AFL, WFL, USFL, XFL and now the UFL, I've come to the opinion that The way to do an 'alternate' pro football league that survives, at least to me, is pretty simple and straight-forward:

Oh boy, what's the old saying? Ah yes... MOD EDIT: There's no need to get personal.

Don't announce your formation until you have (i) eight franchises with owners in place, minimum, and (ii) ownership groups committed to losing a minimum of $100 million, each, over a five year period. Not just investing, but losing.

Agree with this. Fighting the NFL monopoly at its own game, regardless of the time of year, is and always will be a costly endeavor. You don't need a millionaire's club here, you need a billionaire's club - and preferably, a multi-billionaire's club.

Play in the spring and early summer, wrapping up games no later than 4th of July weekend. This, if anything, is the UFL's kiss of death. Had it opted for a spring season, it'd at least not be encountering a number of the problems it currently faces.

No way. The UFL may currently suffer from exposure issues having to do with competing directly with the NFL and college football - ie, a problem of excess supply of football. But moving to the spring simply shifts to a different set of problems. With the exception of a limited group of rabid football fans who see no other sport than football, most Americans aren't interested in watching spring football. The casual fans have had enough after the Super Bowl, and general sports fans are ready to move on to soccer or baseball.

Look, the USFL wised up and opted for a fall season, albeit too late to make a difference. The XFL revealed the lack of mass interest in spring football, even after all the gimmicks and hoopla that made it a household name. Arena Football bled itself into oblivion before coming back as a thinly-veiled corporate clone of itself to burn away some more money. The writing is on the wall here: Fall is the only way to go for a football league to succeed.

Get a multi-year television commitment and your games on every local radio station you can, even if it's just a "shared revenue" deal between the league and the network or station. For 2009 and 2010, the UFL paid to get its games on the air. Obviously, they did it wrong.

Don't disagree, but it's going to be incredibly tough to convince a station to turn over their airwaves to you when they know that the "revenue" they're going to share with you is zero in the first few years. Most radio stations are so tied to format these days, they aren't going to break it to broadcast football games for a second-tier football league. And for the stations that are formatted as sports talk (ESPN Radio, Fox Sports Radio, etc.), they know they're going to get a certain steady stream of ad revenue from sticking to that format - so why chance losing out on a sure thing by broadcasting games of a team no one's heard of?

(As an aside, the Sacramento Mountain Lions' station, KHTK-AM, was on the brink of a format flip when they picked up the team for 2010. The only reason why they were broadcasting the UFL games was because they had virtually nothing else going on, ratings-wise.)

Not that it can't happen, but getting radio people to buy in to an unproven league that guarantees them no profits is tough. Hence why the UFL was paying to get its games on the air. Honestly, if you're going to have 8 owners committing from the outset to lose money, wouldn't you want to buy some airtime to broadcast your games if no other options were available? Honestly, I'd consider that a marketing expense, if nothing else...

[b]Keep team operating expenses to an absolute minimum. Recruit players from local colleges, and maybe, maybe one 'name' player at a skill position. Your product is going to be held up to the NFL as a standard no matter what, so you might as well spend $2 million a season missing that expectation with 50 guys named 'Marvin' than spend $20 million on guys who used to be in the big league, but don't have it anymore.

THIS.

Honestly, keeping salary expenses down has to be one of the top 3 things that a new league has to do. And I'd much rather see a league that bills itself as being a breeding ground for the stars of tomorrow rather than the repository of the fading stars of yesterday. (See also: Culpepper, Daunte) Same thing goes for coaches, IMO. I don't need to see Denny Green or Jim Fassel coaching teams - there's a reason why these guys can't get another job at the NFL level.

PLAY SEVERAL PRESEASON GAMES prior to each season, particularly the first one. Every league since the AFL has jumped immediately into a regular season with no preseason games, exposing a raw, under-developed product to people who expect more than that. For season one, each team plays a minimum of 5 preseason games - with no television or radio coverage.

So you're bleeding cash by holding preseason games that no one knows are going on to improve quality of the game? Remember, stadiums cost money to open up for games regardless of whether or not they count in the standings - most of the cash going towards rent and staffing.

Also...preseason games at the NFL level are a massive time suck for fans. The stars only play maybe half the game and the rest of the time, it's watching a rotating cast of backups playing a game that really doesn't matter (because it doesn't count in the standings).

The most I can legitimately see fans tolerating is a 2-game preseason (a la the CFL - remember, they have had the 2-game preseason for years and no one can legitimately say they have a raw, under-developed product. It may not be as good as the NFL, but it's at least professional). Guarantee that all the starters will play at least 3 quarters. If you want to really impact the quality of the game, extend the length of training camp, and hold free, open intrasquad games at your training facility. Couple those with fan fests to give away branded merchandise and promote the product, and it's a win-win.

Play in facilities suitable for the situation. The AFL played in places like Frank Youell Field in Oakland, the WFL played in Ypsilanti, Michigan. The USFL went big time for the most part, as did the XFL, while the UFL took a mixed approach. If you hope to draw a crowd of 20,000 a game, don't rent a facility that holds 35,000. Those seats will sit empty no matter what - and the owners will pay for 'capacity' they'll never use.

A good idea in theory. Unfortunately, it's hard sometimes to find the "right size" facility for the job which also isn't embarrassingly bush league (ie, some Texas high school stadiums seat 20,000 - but you'd have a hard time being taken seriously as a pro league playing in a high school stadium where your needs are secondary to those of 16 year olds). Also you have to consider stadium access and parking - if it's too hard to get to or there isn't easy parking nearby, you're consigning your team to failure.

Also, I'll point out that Frank Youell Field was little more than a makeshift stadium built because the Raiders (nee Senors) had literally nowhere else to play in Oakland. Which brings up a thought: what if, as part of these owners' commitment to losing money, the plan was for each team to build its own stadium on its own land? Granted, the stadia would be spartan affairs - probably no more than bleachers with some nice concession stands/restrooms and ample parking - but at least that would let them control their own building, pay no rent, and establish their presence where the fans are (instead of trying to get the fans to come to whereever the stadium is).

Recognize from the beginning that your product is not, and will never likely be perceived as, NFL calibre - and act accordingly in everything you do. The minute someone in the league or one of the teams starts making any kind of comparison, fire them. The NFL is the NFL. Build your own brand by building an experience, not by presenting it as a potential competitor, ally, complimentary league, developmental league, etc.

I think this depends on the experience you're talking about building. If it's not a competitor of the NFL and it's not a developmental league, then what exactly IS it? Why should I come to the game as a fan if it's not about the game? Why should I be interested? That'd be the main question to answer.

That is the essential point. Also, all owners should be patient and committed enough to the league as to not bolt after the first signs of trouble. You need owners who realize that the league will never gain money for at least 10 years, and they wont make the money again in 10 more

Agree that spring football just doesn't work,most die hard football fan who follow football are NFL fans. The select few who are fans of any football all year round just aren't enough to support a football league. Americans associate football with fall, but another league should start playing when training camps starts. I think the best period for another football league is from around July 4th to around Halloween ensuring 16 weeks of football. Which brings me to my next point: No more than a 13 week regular season (counting bye weeks) and 3 weeks of playoff.

I don't think the network would get zero in revenue shared the first few years. Last year the most watched game for the UFL was around 215,000 households. A new league should try to get a deal with regional networks for their first year, with 1 game a week shown on a second-tier national network like Versus or CBS Sports.

Agree with most non-skill position being unknown players, but you will need a few known players per team at the skill position. You just need players who had success for a few years and are now third stringers ( something like Troy Smith or Trent Edwards). Name coaches who have fallen off the NFL radar are a smart pick up, especially if they are not good commentators. THe UFL was smart on this part signing Denny Green, Jim Fassel, Marty Schoettenheimer, and Jerry Glanville.

(BTW, Jim Fassel has probably been the best signing the UFL ever made. He is now the president in addition to being GM and head coach for the Locos and he hasn't gotten a raise. I doubt the Locos win those two championships without Jim Fassel as a coach. He is also still certainly NFL level, seeing as how the Broncos courted him last summer.

No preseason games, but there should be a practice, no contact games between teams at one league training facility during training camps, with free fan attendance. OR, there should be full preseason games in potential markets to test the market.

A stadium should seat anything from 18,000 to 40,000. What you absolutely cannot have is 76,000 stadiums like the Citrus Bowl. Also, you need to be sure that all the markets are football crazy.

[jkrdevil]

The AFL in the 60's worked because the NFL was undersized in the number of markets it was in, and under paid pay their players. The NFL now is in 30 markets and they pay the player more than a start-up can be able to afford to.

[Sodboy13]

And that's all she wrote, folks.

Obviously the writing was on the wall before the season started, but it's still a bit of a stunner to see it go down like this. But when the main tenet of your league's business plan is "When the NFL locks out and starts canceling games..." and that doesn't happen, there's going to be issues.

I look forward to the next attempt at a minor pro outdoor football league, hopefully with a spring schedule and The Mad Mac as commissioner.

[bosrs1]

And that's all she wrote, folks.

Obviously the writing was on the wall before the season started, but it's still a bit of a stunner to see it go down like this. But when the main tenet of your league's business plan is "When the NFL locks out and starts canceling games..." and that doesn't happen, there's going to be issues.

I look forward to the next attempt at a minor pro outdoor football league, hopefully with a spring schedule and The Mad Mac as commissioner.

No loss. The UFL seemed Mickey Mouse from the get go and just turned into a comedy of errors as it went on.

[Sodboy13]

I think there is a loss for fans in Omaha and Virginia Beach, who brought solid crowds to their teams' games, but obviously are in markets too small for the NFL to consider at any point ever.

[RedSox44]

That's sad for the fans of the teams. But really, this was obvious from when the league was announced.