The USFL is coming back. Here are the most obvious eight franchises to bring with it
These are the USFL teams I need in my life (for one season before it folds again). Plus, we pick the NFL's equivalent to Chris Paul.
The United States Football League, defunct since before Milli Vanilli were a thing, is coming back. For some reason.
The USFL, buoyed by the minor progress made by recent spring football leagues the last three years, has chosen to ignore the ignominious fates of the AAF (fleeced, then folded) and XFL (ravaged by COVID, purchased by The Rock) and re-enter the sporting landscape. That means the league that once gave Jim Kelly, Reggie White, and Steve Young their first pro jobs will have a wonderful chance to extend its legacy of failure.
The first iteration of the league failed after three seasons when USFL owners, led by some guy from the New Jersey Generals who went on to live a quiet, respectful life and definitely never attempted to subvert the United States government, attempted to take on the NFL by moving its schedule from spring to fall. This effort, which was really a thinly veiled attempt to force a merger or buyout, ultimately won an antitrust suit in court. The $3 awarded in damages did not cover the $168 million the league had recorded in operating losses to that point, and the USFL spent the next four decades being the royalty-free football clips commercials for big screen TVs could play in the background.
It will have to compete with several factors just to have the chance to lose an island nation’s GDP once more. A shallow player pool will be siphoned by the allegedly returning XFL. Hockey, basketball, and the opening throes of the baseball season will be open to full arenas again. And, given the limited broadcast ratings of FCS football in 2021, there’s a reasonable case to be made that football fatigue is a very real thing.
A revived USFL is probably a bad idea for investors. It’s great for fans who want something other than breathless NFL Draft takes and salary cap analysis to eat up their February through April. The AAF and XFL both provided fun football alternatives that delivered a handful of familiar faces (John Wolford! Cardale Jones!), sloppy-but-entertaining action, and local, medium-to-high-level action in cities starved for it. I will not give a shit about the USFL or its standings, but I will tune in on a chilly March Saturday afternoon when Vanderbilt basketball is losing to Alabama by a tragic margin, see a couple names I recognize, and summarily go “huh, neat.”
That’s a start. The USFL, broadcast deal with Fox Sports intact, can further win by affections by making these teams a part of their eight core franchises for 2022:
Houston Gamblers
Houston deserves a football franchise that isn’t a smoldering underground garbage fire, slowly poisoning their city. Whomever starts at quarterback for the Gamblers in 2022 could probably play his way into a contract with the Texans for 2023.
Plus, their logo falls squarely into “so bad it’s good” territory. I borrowed heavily from it to create an icon for a drinking game my friends and I play every Christmas in Rhode Island.
I understand that the last sentence raises more questions than it answers. We’ll talk about it later.
Washington Federals
These guys deserve a football team that isn’t run by Dan Snyder.
Plus, the logo and uniforms are extremely crisp in an 80s way.
That’s certainly a lot of stripes, but that logo works! Plus, the team based in the nation’s capital also gets to wear our nation’s colors, a stately … green and black! Cool!
Portland Breakers
First off, it’s the best logo/uniform in the USFL. Just look at these and tell me you haven’t seen these blue/gray/white jerseys on a television in the background of Who’s The Boss or Quantum Leap:
More importantly, Portland is a ripe market for a pro football team. The St. Louis BattleHawks thrived as an XFL team (for six weeks, at least) because they played in a city anxious to get football back in its life. The Rams left years prior, and fans who’d grown accustomed to cheering on the Cardinals and Blues didn’t have a local college outlet into which they could pour their displaced energy (with apologies to Washington University, multiple-time UAA champs). Instead, they showed up to watch the BattleHawks despite their extremely XFL name.
Portland is in a similar space, though it hasn’t lost an NFL franchise. The city has proven it can support major sports by showing up in full force for the NBA’s Trailblazers and the MLS’s Timbers. The University of Oregon is an hour and 45 minutes away, leaving FCS Portland State (zero FCS playoff wins in school history) as the local alternative.
Oakland Invaders
Like St. Louis, Oakland had its football franchise depart after local residents balked at the idea of financing a billion-dollar project that would mostly benefit a handful of private citizens. Much like the USFL, the Coliseum has mostly been ignored and left to rot since the 80s. It’s a perfect match. The USFL gets a ready-made market and the people of middle California get to see what a football franchise not run by a cursed My Buddy doll looks like.
Birmingham Stallions
If you’re gonna have a spring football league, you’ve got to put a team in Birmingham, for some reason. The XFL had the Bolts. The AAF had the Iron. The World League had the Americans *and* the Vulcans. The WLAF had the Fire. Executives see Legion Field and the proximity to Crimson Tide fans as massive selling points, even though Legion Field is a 100-year-old (almost) shithole and Alabama fans don’t give a shit about anything that isn’t Bama.
Anyway, the most notable thing about the Stallions may be the time Pittsburgh notched its only USFL sellout for a game against Birmingham, just so fans could pelt Terry Bradshaw’s former backup with snowballs.
Jacksonville Bulls
Tim Tebow’s gotta play somewhere in 2022.
San Antonio Gunslingers
I don’t care that there’s an arena football team with the same name. I just want this logo back in professional sports.
Go the extra mile and let Gary Larson design the entire uniform, nerds.
Chicago Blitz
Move them to St. Louis, for reasons outlined in the Portland section. See if the best fans in baseball can support two different spring football franchises. Besides, there are already like three other Chicago Blitzes that sprang up in the absence of the one true franchise. Do you really want to go to court against the former Lingerie Football League? — CD
Who is the NFL’s version of Chris Paul?
Last night, Chris Paul and the Suns sent the defending NBA champs home in the first round of the playoffs. OK, it was more Devin Booker and his 47 points that eliminated the Lakers, but Paul battled through a shoulder injury to lead a young team and do his own damage in the series (12 assists in Game 6, 18 points in Game 4, etc etc).
So the Suns move on, keeping Paul’s hopes of a championship alive. Earning a ring has managed to elude Paul throughout his 15-year career. Despite starting in 115 playoff games, he hasn’t even been to the NBA Finals. Yet, anyway.
Paul is hardly alone in that regard. Pick any major sport and you could easily reel off a number of star athletes who have never won it all. The NFL’s list of Super Bowl-lacking names includes some of the most famous players the game has ever seen (Randy Moss! Dan Marino! Barry Sanders!)
The dream of winning a Super Bowl is long dead for those Hall of Famers. Same for Philip Rivers after his recent retirement, and perhaps Larry Fitzgerald, depending on if decides to hang it up.
There are still other big-time players who have a shot at taking home the Lombardi Trophy before their career is over, such as J.J. Watt, Julio Jones, Calais Campbell, and Aaron Donald. But whose situation is most analogous to Paul’s?
I think it’s Matthew Stafford: a future Hall of Famer who still plays at a high level, even into his mid-30s, and doesn’t get enough credit for it. He’s had some unfortunate injury luck, and his teams have a tendency to underachieve when it matters most. He was recently traded to a team on the West Coast, with the intention that he’ll give the roster enough of a boost to put them over the top.
I’m not sold enough of the Rams’ offseason moves, even with the addition of Stafford, to predict they’ll make it to Super Bowl 56. And I’m not sure the Suns are quite ready to get all the way to the NBA Finals, whenever that is (like a month from now?). But if either end up proving me wrong, I’ll at least be happy to see a veteran who has had his share of bad breaks get his long-awaited championship. — SH