RealGM

Report: New start-up league could rival NFL
FOXSports.com

The NFL may be the most successful league in the country, but that doesn't mean it's without competition.

Bill Hambrecht, a Wall Street businessman, and Tim Armstrong, a senior executive at Google, have decided to start up a rival football league, the United Football League, according to a report on the New York Times web site Wednesday.
For those worried that the UFL will lack name recognition, Hambrecht and Armstrong already have one owner lined up: Mark Cuban, the billionaire owner of the Dallas Mavericks.

And though the league is having a difficult time finding other owners, it appears Cuban is committed to the plan. The league intends to play its first preseason games in August of 2008.

And where will the league find the talent necessary to attract fans?

"(Former NFL coach) Bill Walsh used to tell me that the last 20 players cut from every team were almost interchangeable with the last 20 players to make the team," Hambrecht says.

So far, the UFL has decided to put teams in Los Angeles, Las Vegas and Mexico City. Cuban, unsurprisingly, is considering buying the team in Vegas, according to the report.

It sure won't rival the NFL, no one can rival that, but maybe it won't turn out like the XFL and will stick around like Arena football, but i doubt it.

They'll need a figurehead to start - a top level college QB for example, who they throw tons of money at to get it going.

They can have Chad Henne.

Why?

This is quite possibly the dumbest idea ever.. I feel bad for whoever is going to invest into this soon to be train wreck.

How dumb.

If they have their sights on a second-tier league, then yeah I think it could work out....

There's a lot of room...Considering that NFL is the biggest sport in the US, and only derivatives of the NFL exist (CFL, AFL), it's quite surprising.

If they were to try and go for the NFL's throat already, then write this league off because it'll be done very soon.

I did my undergrad senior thesis on the USFL and why it failed. The (very) skinny conclusions for making an alternate league work:

1. Must play when the NFL is not playing
2. Must have unified owners who don't mind losing money for a few years
3. Must control salaries
4. Must thrive in non-NFL markets
5. Must have enough legitimacy to attract the gamblers


Jeez, 62 pages and 4 months of hard work boiled down into 5 sentences. No wonder I only got a B...

treyZz wrote:Why?
I feel bad for whoever is going to invest into this soon to be train wreck.

I did too, until I saw that his name was Mark Cuban. Now I'm going to be watching the train wreck with morbid fascination.

It could be as good as the AFL or perhaps even better.

What I don't understand is that apparently they're going to have the season on at the same time as the NFL season, it would be ok to have it in the spring when the NFL is not on, but during the same time? Wow, no chance this league survives long.

They might get it to work if they don't have games the same time as the NFL. America loves football which is why Arena Football has started to become mainstream. If they played in the spring and got a few stars (by overpaying big bucks) and a few NFL castoffs (maybe someone like Ricky Williams, etc.), it could be pretty interesting. Most of the players would probably be players that couldn't quite make the NFL leap though much like how XFL was. For the record, I actually enjoyed watching the XFL late on Saturday nights, it wasn't quite true football, but it was entertaining.

No one is going to watch second tier players. No league will rival the NFL unless it somehow gets access to top college talent.

Gilbert0Arenas wrote:No one is going to watch second tier players. No league will rival the NFL unless it somehow gets access to top college talent.

No one is going to watch second tier players?

Then why is the AFL starting to thrive?

BTW, Icness, could you send me your undergrad senior thesis on the USFL if you have it in electronic copy? I'd be interested in reading it.

It sure won't rival the NFL, no one can rival that, but maybe it won't turn out like the XFL and will stick around like Arena football, but i doubt it.

There's no way it will rival the NFL. No player is going to want to play UFL over the NFL unless huge loads of money are involved, and that puts them at a huge disadvantage. I could see the UFL attracting a decent fan base though in the spring. They could also recruit troubled NFL castoffs like Odell Thurman, Pacman Jones, etc. if it ever comes to that for those players to get the best football talent available for the league.

hippie wrote:-= original quote snipped =-



I did too, until I saw that his name was Mark Cuban. Now I'm going to be watching the train wreck with morbid fascination.

Hey. You can't have enough football. I would be happy to see another football league for Summer.

J.Kim wrote:-= original quote snipped =-



No one is going to watch second tier players?

Then why is the AFL starting to thrive?

Because it has a gimmick: rules that are rigged so teams score a gazillion points a game. It's a tried-and-true business strategy for the talentless in all fields of entertainment. But a product that's just "regular NFL-style football, only less so?" Meh.

http://youtube.com/watch?v=0CcycaiEDrs

J.Kim wrote:-= original quote snipped =-



No one is going to watch second tier players?

Then why is the AFL starting to thrive?

Slightly different scenarios.

Second tier players will always attract fans if packaged correctly. The AFL attracts a certain niche of football fans, similarly to how minor league baseball attracts baseball fans. I live near an Indy Ball team and they do fairly well for themselves considering they have players who major league clubs don't even bother giving a spot on their lowest minor league teams. They do this through local promotions and having a lot of giveaways and between innings entertainment. It's a family affair, that's how it's marketed and you have quite a few families come out. It's a good time. I have never been to an AFL game before but I imagine is a similar thing, it's marketed towards a younger crowd that is looking for excitement and are too young to understand the finer details of a Cover 2 defense. They go to the game because the tickets are cheap and everyone enjoys themselves.

There is also a lower economic target for the AFL. I read online that the max salary is something like $80,000 a year and back when I used to follow the game, I remember a lot of players needing day jobs to get by. Teams can charge lower ticket prices to attract that audience and you have to remember, the AFL is not brand new, it's been around for 20 years. It took a LONG time for it to achieve any sort of media attention. This new league is going to have to go through the same doldrums.

Honestly, if a guy is looking to make a decent living, he's better served to go to Canada where an NFL "scrub" like Doug Flutie can be an MVP. You'll make a good living and the CFL has some legitimacy to it's game. It's clearly a step below the NFL but it has a fanbase and it's players do alright. Unless this new league does something to set itself apart of the NFL like the CFL and AFL have done, it won't last three years if it's lucky to pass the first year. mahalo
~Chach~

Wow Mark Cuban is an idiot
why the hell would you start another one?
its because his Mavs lost so he's trying to buy himself a league to make himself feel better
The NFL rocks too much to be ignored

I WISH THEY WILL MAKE A TEAM IN MEMPHIS. IF THEY DO, I MIGHT ACTUALLY WATCH IT.