XFL (2020)
The XFL is a professional American football league which began play in 2020.
Consisting of eight teams divided equally between an East and West division, the league was founded in 2018 and began play in 2020. It was headquartered in Stamford, Connecticut, and was the successor to the original XFL, which was controlled by Vince McMahon's World Wrestling Federation and NBC, and ran for a single season in 2001. The league intended to compete in a ten-game season and a two-week postseason in the winter and spring months, after the Super Bowl. All eight teams were centrally owned and operated by the league and spread across the United States in markets currently or recently represented by an NFL franchise.
In announcing the reformed XFL, McMahon stated that while it would share its name and trademark with the previous incarnation, it would not rely on professional wrestling-inspired features and entertainment elements as its predecessor did, instead aiming to create a league with fewer off-field controversies and faster, simpler play compared to the NFL. The league and its teams were owned by Alpha Entertainment, a private company formed independently of WWE by McMahon.
After 5 weeks of play, the XFL announced that its inaugural season would come to a close on March 12 because of growing COVID-19 pandemic concerns and social distancing mandates. On April 10, the league suspended day-to-day operations and laid off its employees; it filed for bankruptcy three days later and put itself up for sale. On April 21, recently fired former XFL commissioner Oliver Luck sued McMahon for wrongful termination. In July 2020, ESPN decided to cut ties with the XFL. It was also confirmed that despite a potential sale of assets, the league was now defunct.
History
XFL (2001)
The original XFL ran for a single season in 2001, as a joint venture between WWF and NBC spearheaded by Vince McMahon and NBC executive Dick Ebersol. The league attempted to be a competitor to the National Football League—the predominant professional league of American football in the United States, running during the late winter and early spring to take advantage of lingering desire for football after the end of the NFL season. It featured various modifications to the rules of football in order to increase its intensity, as well as on-air innovations such as Skycams, placing microphones on players, and in-game interviews with players. The league was criticized for relying too heavily on "sports entertainment" gimmicks similar to professional wrestling. Back in 2001 the XFL aired during the wrestling “attitude era,” and was more maintaining their lust for violence and sex appeal making them have harder hits, fewer rules, and modest cheerleaders, and for the lack of high-level talent among its players. Despite strong ratings for its first games, viewership eventually nosedived, and the league folded after the conclusion of the inaugural season. Both partners lost $35 million on the XFL, and McMahon eventually conceded that the league was a "colossal failure".Rebuild
In the 2017 ESPN 30 for 30 documentary This Was the XFL, McMahon openly mused about reviving the XFL, noting that changes would need to be made compared to 2001 in order to make it viable and relevant in the modern era. McMahon had purchased the trademarks of the defunct United Football League and an alternative brand, "UrFL", in early 2017. The following year, the director of the documentary, Charlie Ebersol, would go on to help form the Alliance of American Football in 2018, hoping to beat the revived XFL in being the first to play. While the league was able to launch in 2019, a year before the XFL's first season, it went bankrupt before its first season finished after it twice lost its major investors. On December 15, 2017, Bleacher Report columnist Brad Shepard reported that McMahon was seriously considering a revival of the XFL, with an expected announcement on January 25, 2018. In a statement to Deadspin, WWE did not confirm or deny the rumors, but did state that McMahon was establishing a new company known as Alpha Entertainment, which would "explore investment opportunities across the sports and entertainment landscapes, including professional football." On December 21, 2017, WWE issued a filing to the Securities and Exchange Commission, stating that McMahon had sold $100 million worth of WWE stock to fund Alpha Entertainment. Alpha Entertainment is headquartered next door to WWE headquarters in Stamford, Connecticut.On January 25, 2018, Alpha Entertainment announced a new incarnation of the XFL, which would begin with a 10-week inaugural season beginning in January or February 2020. In a press conference, McMahon stated that the new XFL would be dissimilar to its previous incarnation, stating that "There's only so many things that have 'FL' on the end of them and those are already taken. But we aren't going to have much of what the original XFL had." McMahon stated that the league would feature eight teams as a single entity owned by Alpha, which had been revealed in 2019. Alpha Entertainment was established in order to keep the league's management and operations separate from that of WWE. McMahon is prepared to invest as much as $500 million, five times as much as his investment in the 2001 XFL. The XFL's decision to nix cheerleaders is in part due to changing attitudes regarding women's participation in entertaining sports fans. He liquidated an additional $270 million in WWE stock in March 2019 to provide additional funding for the league.
, the commissioner of the XFL
The XFL discourages political gestures by players during games such as, for example, taking a knee in protest. McMahon also planned to forbid any player with a criminal record from participating Felony convictions are still a disqualification. McMahon justified his intentions by stating that the XFL would be "evaluating a player based on many things, including the quality of human being they are", and that "people don't want social and political issues coming into play when they are trying to be entertained". He suggested that players who wish to express political opinions should do so on their personal time. Luck stated in October 2018 that the ban on protesting during the national anthem would be written into player contracts as a condition of employment and that the stipulation was McMahon's idea; Luck agreed that the league aimed to be as non-political as possible. Players are not barred from using cannabis, as the league will not test for the drug.
McMahon did not initially reveal any specific details on rule changes that the new XFL would feature but did state that he aimed to reduce the length of games to around two hours. The league later revised this to a two-and-a-half-hour target length. Later, when announcing new changes to overtime rules, it was implied that television broadcasts would have three-hour time slots, into which the entire game and overtime would fit. Test games resulted in an average game time of 2 hours and 40 minutes with a comparable number of plays to an NFL game. Halfway through the first season, the average length of a regular season game clocked in at 2 hours, 50 minutes, exactly the same as the Canadian Football League. He also noted that by announcing it two years in advance, there would also be more time to prepare the league in order to deliver a more desirable product.
McMahon denied that the timing of the announcement was meant to coincide with a recent ratings downturn being experienced by the NFL, explaining, "What has happened there is their business, and I'm not going to knock those guys, but I am going to learn from their mistakes as anyone would if they were tasked with re-imagining a new football league."
On June 5, 2018, Oliver Luck was named the league's commissioner and chief executive officer. Luck left his previous positions with the NCAA to take over the operations of the XFL. Doug Whaley, most recently general manager of the Buffalo Bills, was hired as the league's senior vice president of football operations on November 8, 2018. On January 22, 2019, Jeffrey Pollack was named the president and chief operating officer, coming from his previous role as the chief marketing and strategy officer and special adviser for the Los Angeles Chargers.
Commissioner Luck announced the eight host cities and stadiums for the first franchises on December 5, 2018, and also announced the starting date of February 8, 2020, the weekend after Super Bowl LIV, the date on which its first two games were later played. Its first head coach and general manager, Dallas's Bob Stoops, was announced February 7, 2019, with the coaches for Seattle, Washington, and Tampa Bay following later in the month. The last of the inaugural head coaches, Houston's June Jones, was hired May 13 and introduced May 20.
McMahon stated that he wanted to play in existing NFL markets but did not identify potential cities specifically and did not rule out any specific cities. McMahon also did not rule out playing on artificial turf. The original XFL avoided artificial playing surfaces ; however, the technology has advanced considerably since 2001, with modern artificial turfs mimicking real grass more closely. John Shumway from KDKA-TV in Pittsburgh and local media from Orlando and San Diego both inquired about potential teams in their respective cities, but McMahon declined to name any cities for teams. McMahon also stated that teams would have new identities compared to recycling old identities from the old league. The league sent solicitations to thirty metropolitan areas as potential locations for a team. Commissioner Luck announced the eight host cities and stadiums for the first franchises on December 5, 2018. The emergence of the Alliance of American Football created issues selecting cities to host XFL teams, as many potential candidates became home to AAF teams. Not wanting teams to compete against other spring football teams in the same market, the XFL chose different cities than the AAF.
The league chose to focus on placing teams in large media markets, selecting five of the top seven largest media markets in the U.S.; based on 2017 census bureau estimates, all eight XFL markets have over 2.9 million residents each. This was seen as a stark contrast to the other emerging spring football league, the Alliance of American Football, which primarily chose markets without NFL teams, seen as a decision to avoid competing with existing fan bases; three of the AAF's markets had populations less than half that of St. Louis's. The only XFL market which does not currently host an NFL team is St. Louis, which in 2015 saw its NFL team return to Los Angeles.
In May 2019, the XFL placed a bid on some of the AAF's former assets as part of that league's bankruptcy proceedings. The league was outbid by former Arena Football League executive Jerry Kurz. Several months earlier in December 2018, Charlie Ebersol asked Vince McMahon about merging the AAF with the XFL. McMahon turned him down.
The league signed its first player, quarterback Landry Jones, on August 15, 2019. The XFL revealed team names and logos on August 21, 2019. Players were assigned to each team in the 2020 XFL Draft from October 15 to 16, with schedules released October 22 and ticket sales opening to the general public October 24. Uniforms were revealed December 3. The XFL did not hold a preseason.
In the week leading up to the kickoff, the XFL secured sponsorships from Gatorade and Anheuser-Busch. The Anheuser-Busch sponsorship is used to promote Bud Light Seltzer; the "seltzer chug" became a postgame locker room tradition in part because of the product placement deal.
Premature end of 2020 season and bankruptcy
On March 12, 2020, the league canceled the remainder of its regular season games over concerns related to the COVID-19 pandemic; similar concerns led other major sports leagues, including the NBA, NHL, MLS, MLB, MLR seasons and NCAA to suspend or cancel games. The announcement came after a Seattle Dragons player, who self-reported symptoms to his team's medical staff, had been tested for coronavirus but had not yet received his results. Although teams only played five games, the league announced it would pay all players their base salary for the rest of the season; players who receive legitimate offers from the NFL or CFL would be allowed to sign with those teams but with a clause requiring them to return to their XFL squads if the league were able to hold its championship game. The league later suspended plans for a 2021 season. Days before suspending operations, the XFL was exploring relocating as many as three of its teams, with the league contacting authorities in San Antonio, Texas, in early April about potentially placing a franchise there. Other potential 2021 actions included moving the Tampa Bay Vipers to Orlando and the New York Guardians to a smaller New Jersey stadium, Red Bull Arena.On April 10, 2020, league president Jeffrey Pollack informed employees on a conference call that the league was suspending operations and that all employees would be terminated. Three days later, on April 13, the league filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection, stating that the coronavirus pandemic had deprived the league of tens of millions of dollars in revenue. With the bankruptcy filing, the league put itself up for sale and began the process of seeking a buyer in order to maximize the value of its assets to pay off creditors. Luck, who had returned home to Indiana March 13, was fired from his position before the bankruptcy filing, which led him to sue McMahon personally for wrongful termination on April 21.
On May 20, 2020, the league made its first actions toward resuming operations by asking authorities in St. Louis, Houston and Seattle to reinstate stadium lease agreements that it had previously been attempting to discharge in the bankruptcy.
On May 26, 2020, court filings in the XFL bankruptcy case revealed key dates surrounding the possible sale of the league. As part of the bankruptcy agreement, McMahon agreed not to buy back the XFL. The deadline to file as a bidder is set for July 30, the auction has been scheduled to take place August 3 and the sale hearing is set for August 7 at 10am. However, court documents which were made public on July 28, 2020 revealed that the XFL would not sell unless they successfully negotiated a new broadcasting agreement.
On July 1, 2020, ESPN filed a motion in court stating that they would be willing to consider broadcasting the XFL again under new ownership, but also made clear they would not hold any stake in XFL assets. ESPN even stated that the XFL's "services, skills and talents are not fungible.” On July 23, 2020, Fox also filed a motion in court which signaled a willingness to broadcast the XFL as well, but only under the condition that a new league owner could negotiate a new broadcasting agreement. Fox described the XFL as a "Debtor." On July 28, 2020, it was revealed that ABC had joined Fox and ESPN in calling for new television deals via the court system. It was also reported that ESPN, which is also connected to ABC, wanted to sever ties with the XFL, which was by now considered "defunct" without the financial "accommodations" which McMahon was more willing to give the organization. However, Fox was still open to continuing negotiations with the XFL, but wanted new terms for any future broadcasting agreement and was noncommittal.
On July 30, it was revealed that despite the potential sale of assets and claims by XFL officials that buyers wanted that league to return in 2021, the league was now defunct. NBC Sports journalist Mike Florio stated that bidders would only be purchasing its "carcass."
Rule changes
The XFL ran test games with community colleges in Mississippi, as well as with Your Call Football and with The Spring League during their spring 2019 seasons, to experiment with rule changes. It has hired Dean Blandino as its head of officiating.Confirmed
These are rule changes the league officially confirmed in the January 7, 2020 release of the official rule book:Kickoffs
The league has an active interest in reviving the kickoffs as an element of the game. This is in contrast to the former AAF, which eliminated kickoffs outright, and the NFL and college football, both of which imposed rules minimizing the impact of the kickoff in the mid-2010s to improve player safety. Many of these kickoff rules were adapted from rules created by The Spring League's predecessor, the Fall Experimental Football League.- The spot of the kickoff is set at the kicking team's 30-yard line. However, members of the kicking team line up at the receiving team's 35-yard line and blockers on the receiving team must line up at their 30-yard line. Only the kicker and returner can move until the ball is either caught or three seconds after it hits the ground.
- Kickoffs that go out of bounds, or fall short of the receiving team's 20-yard line, come to the kicking team's 45-yard line.
- The XFL uses two different types of touchbacks. A major touchback occurs when a kick travels into the endzone in the air, which results in the receiving team taking possession at the 35. A minor touchback occurs when the ball bounces into the endzone, which results in the receiving team taking possession at the 15. These rules discourage either team from purposefully taking a touchback.
- Teams can request to attempt an onside kick under more conventional kickoff rules. If a team opts for an onside kick, the ball must travel at least ten yards before it can be recovered by the kicking team but may not travel more than 20 yards downfield in the air from the spot of the kick, to prevent the formation from being used as a loophole.
Punts
- The XFL does not allow gunners; all players on a punting team must remain on or behind the line of scrimmage until the ball is kicked..
- The coffin corner punt is treated as a touchback and brought to the 35-yard line. The attempts to neutralize punt coverage are made with the intention of encouraging more fourth-down conversions; Luck conceded halfway through the inaugural season that the effort was largely unsuccessful, as coaches continued to punt as usual.
- The same touchback rules for kickoffs also applies to punts.
Points after touchdown
Double-forward pass
Teams are able to attempt two forward passes on the same play, so long as the ball never crosses the line of scrimmage before the second pass.Overtime
Overtime is decided by a five-round shootout of two-point conversions similar to a penalty shootout in soccer or ice hockey. Such a shootout had never been attempted in organized football at the time the rule was proposed; in April 2019, the NCAA adopted a similar concept for games that reach a fifth overtime starting with the 2019 FBS season. Unlike other football leagues, a coin toss is not used to determine who is on offense first; instead, the visiting team is on offense first and home team on defense first for each round, similar to baseball. The defense is not able to score, as should a turnover occur, the play would be dead. Defensive penalties result in the ball moving up to the 1-yard line, while any subsequent defensive penalty on any play, even in future rounds, result in a score awarded to the offensive team. Pre-snap offensive penalties result in the ball being respotted pursuant to regular rules, while post-snap offensive penalties result in a loss of down and no score. If both teams remain tied after five rounds, multiple rounds of conversions will be played until one team succeeds, thus ensuring that no game can end in a draw.Clock changes
- Outside of the two-minute warning, the clock runs continuously. During this time, the clock only stops during a change of possession. This reverses after the two-minute warning, after which the clock stops after all plays from scrimmage until the ball is spotted and reverts to NFL timing rules otherwise, stopping after incomplete passes, advancing the ball out of bounds and spiking the football.
- The play clock is 25 seconds long measured from the spotting of the ball, roughly the same as the NCAA rule for plays when the clock is stopped. The NFL standard is 40 seconds from the end of the previous play, also used during the NCAA during plays when the clock is running; the former AAF and previous XFL measure was 35 seconds from the end of the previous play. In conjunction with this rule, the XFL has a one-way radio in all offensive players' helmets to allow the offensive coordinator to run a no-huddle offense and call plays directly to all of the players from the sidelines. This eliminates the need for a huddle.
- Teams are given two time-outs per half instead of three.
- Instant replay reviews are limited to 60 seconds. There are no coach's challenges; the sky judge originates all reviews automatically.
Officiating changes
- The XFL expands on the NCAA system of eight on-field officials including a ninth official — a specialized "ball judge" whose only duty is to quickly spot the ball after the end of the previous play. By utilizing the ball judge, who wears a red hat to differentiate themselves from the other officials, the league aims to have a ball-spotting time of between five and seven seconds.
- A new rule proposal would add a new "tap penalty", imposed on individual players instead of entire teams. Players who commit a foul which is not serious enough to warrant a penalty flag will be sent off the field for one play. This type of enforcement will keep the game moving quickly without allowing players to break the rules. Unlike the almost-analogous power play used in ice hockey, the offending team would be allowed to substitute another player.
- The defunct Alliance of American Football introduced the sky judge, an additional official in the press booth for the sole purpose of reviewing on-field decisions. Luck had said he thought this was a great innovation to the game and, in December 2019, confirmed the XFL would use the sky judge. Robert Lu, who served as the AAF's sky judge in 2019, continues in that capacity with the XFL.
- Penalty enforcement places priority on fouls that pose a threat to player safety, with less emphasis on procedural violations so as not to slow down the game with unnecessary penalty calls. Officials would also have access to both teams' play calls. The sky judge would also have full access to the officials' microphones.
- All six of the XFL's officiating crews have at least one woman.
- The league uses Lazser Down chain crew equipment, which uses wideband radio waves to precisely measure the spotting of the ball.
Ball
Miscellaneous
The league uses the amateur football and CFL standard of one foot in bounds for a complete forward pass.- Offensive linemen are allowed to advance up to two yards downfield on a forward pass.
- The designated home team automatically gets, at the start of the game, to choose to kick off, receive or defer to the second half. There is no coin toss traditionally seen in other football leagues, or any opening scramble that was a hallmark of the original XFL. In the event of overtime, the visiting team will be given the choice of going first or second or selecting which end zone to attack.
- Players are allowed to wear colored or decorated visors.
- There is a 10-minute halftime.
Proposed
- Previous proposals for the kickoff had the ball moved as far back as the 15-yard line, to make touchbacks all but impossible.
- The original proposal for the multiple forward pass rule would have treated any pass behind the line of scrimmage as a lateral pass. Luck stated that this would also have the added benefit of simplifying officiating, as he surmised it would be easier to judge whether a person was behind a fixed line of scrimmage compared to whether a pass thrown by a moving player was traveling along a parallel line. The XFL ran test plays with double forward passes during its rules testing in Mississippi. Under this rule, all players behind the line of scrimmage would have been eligible receivers, including those on the offensive line, and thus it would eliminate the "illegal touching of a forward pass" penalty at other levels of the game. Offensive linemen would still have been prohibited from advancing downfield before a forward pass that crosses the line of scrimmage is in the air. It also would have had the intended consequence of providing employment to utility players who play multiple positions and have a broader range of skills. In November 2019, an ESPN.com article noted that the rule had been thrown out before the season began, and that offensive linemen would still not be allowed to touch forward passes, regardless of where the ball was.
- The league proposed using a wider one-yard neutral zone used by the CFL. This rule became less likely after testing, as the league feared it would make short-yardage situations too easy to convert for the offensive team.
- The original XFL allowed for forward motion by a single backfield player. The XFL had briefly mentioned they may use this rule again.
- During the announcement of the league, McMahon suggested the XFL may eliminate halftime completely. This was eventually abandoned, and instead there is, as mentioned in the rules above, a ten-minute halftime period.
- A proposed rule would prohibit offensive linemen from putting their hand on the ground, outlawing the three-point stance used at all other levels of the game.
- The XFL had announced that there would be no fair catches and that a five-yard halo rule would instead be used; both of these rules are used in the CFL and were prominent rules in the original XFL. The XFL legalized the fair catch in the official rulebook while noting that the other rule changes were intended to make its use uncommon.
Teams
Besides the eight competitive teams, the XFL had operated a centralised practice squad and farm team, which operated as a full team with a coaching staff and a 40-man roster but didn't play any on-the-record games against the other eight teams. The team shared practice facilities with the Dallas Renegades and was internally known as "Team 9". Team 9 replenished itself after Week 5 when the team's members were assigned to rosters when it expanded to 57 players each; but the season ended abruptly.
Full stadium capacity. The large stadiums with multiple decks only open the lower bowl for XFL games, similar to the former AAF games and MLS matches played in large stadiums. The XFL has a target stadium size of 30,000 seats, so that in the event of playoff games, the upper decks can be opened to increase capacity.
Team 9
Team 9 is a specialized team that acts as a hybrid farm team and practice squad for the league, and was inspired by a similar scheme employed by NFL Europe. It holds a maximum of 40 players at a time and is meant to prepare players for call up to one of the XFL's 8 teams to fill roster vacancies due to injuries of other players or if the teams see a player as a "hidden gem". The team shares practice facilities and support staff with the Dallas Renegades but maintains its own coaching staff; its head coach is Bart Andrus and is assisted by Pete Kuharchek and Peter Vaas.During the first two weeks of the season, teams are encouraged to use players from Team 9 to fill roster spots, but are not required to do so, as they may prefer to sign a player unaffiliated with the XFL or re-sign a player who participated in their preseason camps but was cut. After Week 2, exclusively using Team 9 players to fill rosters will become a requirement, with Team 9 constantly replenishing itself by adding new players from outside the XFL.
On March 10, each team's maximum roster size increased from 52 to 57 players and the majority of Team 9 was dispersed. Team 9 was to reload to approximately 36 players. Team 9 does not include the specialist positions of kicker, punter, or long snapper, who are instead reserved in a separate "player pool."
Draft
The inaugural draft took place on October 15, 2019, with the second part of the draft taking place the following day. A supplemental draft was held November 22 of that same year.Season structure
The XFL has a 10-week regular season, with each team hosting 5 home games, and no bye week. This is followed by a two-week post-season, featuring the top two teams in each division competing in a single elimination bracket. The league is split into two divisions of four teams. Each team plays all three teams in their division twice, once each of home and road. Each team also plays the remaining teams in the league once. This is the same schedule model used by the original XFL and by the former AAF. Both leagues followed an Eastern/Western division, which the XFL also confirmed during its Summer Showcase in Dallas. The XFL East includes New York, DC, Tampa and St. Louis while the West includes Seattle, Los Angeles, Dallas and Houston.Four games are played per-week during the regular season, consisting mainly of afternoon/primetime doubleheaders played on Saturdays and Sundays. One game per-week in the final two weeks of the regular season is tentatively scheduled to be played on Thursday night instead of Saturday. The playoffs, despite initial reports stating they would use the same crossover approach used by the 2001 XFL, with each division's regular-season winner facing the other division's runner-up, instead use a division championship model, with the top two teams in the division playing each other. The 2020 XFL Championship Game was scheduled to be played at TDECU Stadium, the home of the Houston Roughnecks.
Luck has denied any plans to move the schedule to the fall and does not intend to either compete with the NFL in the fall, or attempt to fill any void that a potential lockout might cause in 2021.
Players and compensation
The XFL use a standard form contract paying $2,725 per week for each player on the active roster, $1,040 of which is guaranteed. A $2,222 victory bonus is paid to the players on each game's winning team; this feature is a carryover from the original XFL. The contracts expire at the end of the season, freeing players to sign with any other league. Players are also paid $1,040 per week during the preseason and through the playoffs if their team does not qualify. Starting quarterbacks make an annual salary of up to $495,000, with the average XFL quarterback earning $125,000. 52 players are on each team's regular-season roster, far more than the 38 in the original XFL and comparable to the size of the 53-man NFL rosters; 46 of those 52 are active on any given game day.Plans were for the league to offer contracts between one and three years in length. Signing for a longer-term would make the player eligible for a loyalty bonus above and beyond their tiered salary; in return, the player would not be allowed to play in any other league during the spring, summer or autumn months, nor is the contract guaranteed. The overall salary cap will be approximately $4,000,000 per team. The XFL chose a more flexible salary structure so as not to overpay for the lower ends of the roster and to be more competitive for better starting quarterbacks.
Head coaches are eligible for up to a $500,000 salary, with each team having a football operations staff of 25 people. The XFL explicitly wants to avoid any minor league developmental partnership with the NFL or any other league, so as not to lose control of its personnel decisions. In contrast to the original XFL, players' health insurance is covered by the league. Players did not form a labor union by the time play commenced, thus league policies are not subject to collective bargaining, which could help prevent work stoppages like a lockout or strike.
The XFL does not employ separate general managers for each team; instead, each team's head coach doubles as his team's respective general manager. Each team has a team president.
XFL does not have the same eligibility requirements for players as the NFL. Currently the NFL requires all players to be at least 3 years removed from high school to be eligible for a team's roster. Almost all prospects then participate in NCAA football for the 3-year waiting period. This eligibility requirement is an agreement between the NCAA and the NFL. The NFL, in exchange for not signing young players who would ordinarily play in the NCAA, is allowed nearly unlimited access to scout and recruit college players. With the XFL not using the same set of requirements for players, there is the possibility the league will sign players who are less than 3 years out of high school. The XFL has also not ruled out signing players who play college football in 2019, something the NFL has not done since 1925, which Luck says will be considered on a case-by-case basis; the league's primary target for players will be veteran backups who may not be getting the repetitions needed to develop properly on NFL scout teams and practice squads. Due to budget concerns and an unwillingness to antagonize the NFL, it does not get into bidding wars for marquee players.
Unlike other alternative football leagues, the XFL does not use a territorial draft and teams were not restricted to the locations from which they could select players.
Gambling
In February 2020, the XFL announced that DraftKings would be the official daily fantasy sports provider of the league and an "authorized gaming operator". McMahon has a minority investment in the company.Luck stated he anticipated mobile sports betting to be legal in many states by the 2020 launch date, much like it is in New Jersey, and hoped to integrate legal sports betting as part of the XFL. Every state hosting an XFL team, except Florida which has an existing law banning sports betting, has either introduced or passed legislation for the legalization of sports betting. "California also has a pending voter referendum that could legalize sports betting." In December 2019, Luck stated he was cooperating with the Las Vegas sportsbooks in providing official information for betting purposes.
Both of the XFL's broadcast partners have official partnerships with gambling operators, with ESPN partnered with Caesars Entertainment to use its sportsbook information during telecasts, and Fox Corporation owning a minority stake in The Stars Group — which operates sports betting services in the U.S. under the Fox Bet brand. Fox Bet, like DraftKings receives official live feeds from the XFL
The XFL also has an in-house gaming app service called PlayXFL where fans can win cash prizes for correctly predicting the exact score of select XFL games each week. Additionally, fans attending an XFL game can opt-in to play a 4-Question Pick’em contest pertaining to the game they are attending for the chance to win prizes, including merchandise and tickets, from the applicable home team.
Broadcasting
In January 2019, Sports Business Journal reported that the XFL was desiring that the majority of games air on broadcast television, and was in preliminary talks with ABC/ESPN and Fox Sports as potential broadcast partners. The XFL officially confirmed these arrangements on May 6, 2019, under a three-year deal. XFL games were split primarily among ABC, Fox, ESPN, and FS1. ESPN would broadcast the western division championship and the XFL championship, while one game each was scheduled for ESPN2 and FS2.The Wall Street Journal reported via inside sources that neither the broadcasters or the league are making any upfront payments, but that the XFL sells the in-game sponsorship inventory. The networks will cover the production costs, hold the digital rights to their telecasts, and the right to sell the conventional commercial inventory during their games. Although the networks have ultimate control over the game presentation, McMahon and his longtime media man Joe Cohen brought back many of the features from the original XFL such as the skycam and the on-field "Bubba Cams," along with some innovations introduced in the AAF. The broadcast partners are given access to all on-field microphones, including the coach-to-player radios, referees and the sky judge. As with the original XFL, sideline reporters are given full access to coaches and players for interviews at all times. In terms of financial investment into the telecast, Levy described it as "not getting the Monday Night Football treatment but it's pretty close."
Upon the announcement of the new XFL, McMahon stated that he aimed to leverage streaming media as part of broadcasting arrangements, and argued that fans wanted "totally different ways" to see the game, rather than having digital streams be only a straight simulcast of the television broadcast. The XFL will not consider viewership to be a metric of its success; McMahon argued that "to me the landscape has changed in so many different ways. Just look at technology and companies like Facebook and Amazon bidding for sports rights. Even if ratings go down, there's no denying that live sports rights continue to be valuable and continue to deliver." Luck stated that broadcasts would not feature the same sports entertainment gimmicks as the original XFL, explaining that "in football, you don't need that bravado and swagger and flair, because it's always there."
Curt Menefee and Joel Klatt served as Fox's lead XFL broadcast team. Fox also auditioned Greg Olsen for the second XFL broadcast team in October 2019 by having him call play-by-play for an NFL contest during his bye week from the Carolina Panthers and eventually hired him as color commentator for the second broadcast team, which features Kevin Burkhardt on play-by-play. Brock Huard was the sideline reporter for FOX's lead broadcast while Jenny Taft covered the sidelines for their second broadcast team. In week 5, New Orleans Saints star Cameron Jordan served as a guest sideline reporter for FOX's lead broadcast. ESPN and ABC's top team features Steve Levy, Greg McElroy, Tom Luginbill, and Dianna Russini, and their second team included Tom Hart, Joey Galloway, and Pat McAfee. McAfee did not return to the second team after the week 1 game between the Renegades and the BattleHawks, and was replaced on the sidelines by Cole Cubelic and Molly McGrath in weeks 2-5. In lieu of network-employed rules analysts, Dean Blandino, head of officiating for the XFL is made available to analyze replay reviews and officials' rulings.
On February 6, 2020, the XFL announced a partnership with iHeartMedia and Vegas Stats & Information Network, under which iHeartRadio streams gambling-centric "BetCast" coverage of two games per-week.
A league-produced pregame show was released before each game day on the XFL's official YouTube channel. Jonathan Coachman and Alyse Ashton serve as the co-hosts.
International broadcasters
simulcasts select ESPN Deportes games. ESPN International's ESPN Player service streams XFL games in the Europe and MENA continents. Fox Sports broadcasts in Hong Kong, Macau, Papua New Guinea, and Southeast Asia. ESPN's British partner BT Sport, and Canada's TSN also air XFL games, as does Sony ESPN in India.Reception
The XFL received mostly positive reviews on opening weekend. Conor Orr of Sports Illustrated credited the league with generating positive social media buzz without relying on a single viral event. Orr summarized the XFL as "on-the-rails, appropriately-quirky spring football." Michael David Smith of Profootballtalk.com noted that "there was a lot to like" about the league.In a mixed review for USA Today, Lorenzo Reyes wrote that "There will be much that the league will want to learn from as it tries to grow." Another mixed review from Ben Kercheval at CBS Sports stated "while Saturday provided fans with the type of excitement they were hoping to get from the league, Sunday was evidence that start-up leagues still face uphill battles getting watchable football on television."
Viewership for the first week of play averaged 3.1 million, but by Week 4 the average had decreased to 1.4 million. This led Smith of Profootballtalk.com to conclude that if "the XFL settles into the range of around 1 million to 2 million viewers per game and stabilizes over the course of the season, the league would seem to be viable. If ratings continue to drop as the season progresses, that would spell trouble for the upstart league."