A while back we mentioned that the United States Football League had risen like a phoenix from the ashes and thanks to an investor was seeking to establish itself as a viable spring football league. At the time there was scant information about the USFL’s plans but the league has been slowly releasing information about its plans so it seems an update is in order.
An entity called EndZone Sports Management purchased all of the rights to the league from Michael Dwyer, who held the rights. EndZone was founded by Jamie Cuadra who is also the President and Chief Executive Officer of the USFL. The deal did not include any of the old teams, and new ones are in the process of being created.
A tour has started to evaluate potential cities and the USFL said that it wants places that teams will want to stay and establish themselves rather than engage in the migratory pattern that has plagued other startup football leagues. At the same time it is evaluating owners for the teams.
It plans to operate in much the same manner as Major League Soccer does, which in part means that the players and the coaches are under contract to the league and not to the individual teams. I also believe that MLS soccer has a semi-hard salary cap and that the bulk of the players salaries come from advertisers, particularly Adidis, which has a huge sponsorship deal with the league that it signed a few years back.
The league’s advisory board includes Jim Bailey who was executive vice president of the Cleveland Browns/Baltimore Ravens for 21 years who heads up the business operations side. Former pro footballers Marshall Faulk and Jeff Garcia along with athletes coach and trainer Terrell Jones join Bailey. On the Football operations side there is former Raiders great Fred Biletnikoff, who was also a coach for two teams in the original USFL
The overall goal of the league is to launch a 14 game season starting in the Spring of 2013 with eight teams playing and a championship event game in June. It is hoping to establish relationships with other leagues (read NFL) and will use the NFL rule book for its games.
It has also refreshed its web site to look much more professional and created a new logo so that it has a clean break from the past and a new image to brand itself to. The leagues logo will be “Real. Fun. Football.” I guess that is better than the No Fun League.
We will check in again in a few weeks to see how things have progressed. Hopefully it will have cities, team names and possibly a broadcasting and/or live streaming deal in place as well.
[…] minor league approach is what the rival USFL is trying, and it has not appeared to make any headway yet but with a spring schedule it still has […]