Vince McMahon to Target Alienated NFL Fans with 'New XFL'

Arizona vs. Memphis.

 

I'm not optimistic, and I probably won't watch, but I do hope both the AAF and XFL are successful in the same manner minor league baseball or the AHL are successful. I'd love to see these leagues become competition for NCAA recruiters, more than anything.

I don't think athletes should be forced to fake their way through a year or more of college if they'd rather get paid to play a sport they're already good enough to earn a living at.

 

Here is an odd question, what gives upstart leagues the idea that Memphis would support a team?

 

I have yet to figure out what makes people think "upstart leagues" are viable on any level.

 

The MLS is working - though it helps to have a billionaire to subsidize the league.
I'm not sure where you would put the WNBA.
The Big 3 seems more like a promotion than a league.

 

One thing that will hurt is optics. Drawing 7,000 people to a minor league baseball or hockey game is tremendous. Hell, drawing 2,000 on a summer weeknight is great in a lot of places. Most minor league ballparks and arenas aren't designed to hold much more than about 7,000.
Drawing 7,000 people to the 60,000-seat stadiums the AAF and XFL have to play in is a death sentence. It just looks awful. But they can't play at smaller college venues in the 20-30,000 seat range because they don't exist in the markets where the leagues need teams. Atlanta is the only AAF team with a stadium that is the size this league really needs right now.

 

Realistically, the only thing that would make an upstart league viable is a shit-fucking-ton of capital. Like a trillion dollars worth of it. You'd need to lure college stars with a bigger payday than they'd receive in the NFL You'd need TV support. You'd need to rent/buy/build infrastructure to house the teams.

Seems like the only way an upstart league supplants or rivals one of the current big four leagues is if a significant portion of current owners bails and puts out the capital to make it happen.

 

Watched the San Diego game last week. It's amazing - at least to me - how many of the players were 2016 or 2017 draftees. You play football all through your childhood, into college, reaching what seems to be the highest levels, and then, bam. You're out and pretty much done after a half season.

That's not an original statement but considering I'm not actually paying to watch these games (or have already bought my Gamepass for the year,) the level of play isn't bad.

 

That would mean the NFL would have to give up having a completely free minor league system.

 

Getting that many folks to the Liberty Bowl on a winter night is actually kind of impressive.

 

As much crud as the MLS gets - when you look back at where pro soccer was 20 years ago and where it is today - it's pretty impressive. The problem with new leagues is they always get compared to the NFL (100 years), MLB (120 years) the NBA (70 years) and the NHL (102 years) today when it would probably be more fair to compare them to those leagues at similar points in their development.

 

I think MLS is in a pretty good place, especially as the USL has sort of streamlined the development model below it. It is what it is -- probably the eighth or ninth best domestic soccer league in the world. But the fan base has grown nicely and places like Atlanta have given it a real boost. MLS' biggest early issues was trying to play in NFL stadiums in front of 20,000 people. Once clubs began building dedicated soccer facilities, the experience began to improve.