Aafl ??

User avatar
Pounder
Site Admin
Posts: 2736
Joined: Tue Mar 23, 2004 7:01 pm
Location: Portland freaking Oregon!

Aafl ??

Post by Pounder » Wed Mar 21, 2018 5:49 pm

http://variety.com/2018/digital/news/al ... 202731190/

A league forming that has a network already lined up?

That, if anything, is promising to practically be the anti-XFL?

I do not know what to make of this.
Mean Spirited Blogger #107

User avatar
Sam Hill
Site Admin
Posts: 4142
Joined: Wed Nov 26, 2003 3:29 am
Location: Denver, CO

Post by Sam Hill » Wed Mar 21, 2018 7:31 pm

It's apparently just AAF.

Odd that you'd announce that late on a random Tuesday, but, whatever.

They at least do have actual investors and partners. Whether CBS is paying a rights fee or not is unclear.

That's not all that's missing that's interesting:
1 - No sense that it's a "developmental league," the type fanboys keep salivating about, as if we desperately need a whole league to develop backup left tackles.
2 - The release did not use the standard "Plenty of players who are drafted but cut every year blah blah blah" thing. Those players exist, yes, but they're not worth paying to go see.

It feels like it's more of a play to get you to stream stuff on your phone and/or play fantasy. (How you're going to play fantasy effectively with players you've barely got a sense for is also unclear.)

But this prospective league suffers from the same myopia as the rest: the idea that people just want to watch 11 guys play football against another 11 guys as long as you call it professional.

There aren't 32 quality quarterbacks now (see Jets, New York and their eternal quest for one). There surely aren't eight or sixteen other ones worth paying to watch. (And with football being the most expensive sport there is, yeah, you're not going to be paying $10 a ticket.)

If they're envisioning this as a TV show and hoping that single-entity will give them enough economies of scale to make up for the lack of revenue that is surely going to be theirs unless they spend the hell out of sales and marketing and ticket-sales people, it's doomed. The XFL was a TV show whose target demographic wasn't going to be home on the nights they were showing their main game. No wonder it failed.

Let's watch what happens next. I'm still of a mind that it can't be done, but at least this isn't FXFL Boy who can't even pull off a handful of games, or the scamming NAFL couple or the League of Extraordinary High School Age Gentlemen or MLFB or Jerry Craig's vaporware league. This has some gravitas behind it, at least.
Old enough to remember when bashing the ABA was fun.

robster2001
Site Admin
Posts: 1046
Joined: Wed Dec 29, 2004 11:02 pm

Post by robster2001 » Thu Mar 22, 2018 10:30 am

What's going to be more fun to watch is the anticipated media battle between AAF and the XFL.

AAF co-founder Charlie Ebersol is the son of XFL 1.0 co-founder Dick Ebersol, who happens to be one of Vince McMahon's few non-wrestling friends.

Charlie produced the pending ESPN "30 for 30" about the XFL.

He then, apparently, took what he learned from the documentary and began work on AAF... which, possibly, is why McMahon rushed out his partial plans for the XFL.

Deadspin tells the rest of this story: https://deadspin.com/why-is-charlie-ebe ... 1823959869

Renandpat
Site Admin
Posts: 340
Joined: Fri Oct 10, 2014 5:56 pm

Post by Renandpat » Thu Mar 22, 2018 12:02 pm

Both this and the xfl want to sign players who are basically who NFL clubs would sign to futures contracts (at their most talented) thus those targeted will have that decision to make.

CBSSN ain't paying them much, if at all since they're not giving much to Conference USA.

User avatar
Sam Hill
Site Admin
Posts: 4142
Joined: Wed Nov 26, 2003 3:29 am
Location: Denver, CO

Post by Sam Hill » Sun Mar 25, 2018 3:20 pm

[quote=""robster2001""]Charlie produced the pending ESPN "30 for 30" about the XFL.[/quote]

It's not pending. It started airing Feb. 2, 2017.
Old enough to remember when bashing the ABA was fun.

robster2001
Site Admin
Posts: 1046
Joined: Wed Dec 29, 2004 11:02 pm

Post by robster2001 » Tue Mar 27, 2018 10:35 pm

[quote=""Sam Hill""]It's not pending. It started airing Feb. 2, 2017.[/quote]

And we now know how little attention I am paying to the series... :)

nksports
Site Admin
Posts: 3669
Joined: Wed Feb 23, 2005 7:53 am
Location: Newton, KS (the land of Oz)

Post by nksports » Wed Mar 28, 2018 8:23 pm


Renandpat
Site Admin
Posts: 340
Joined: Fri Oct 10, 2014 5:56 pm

Post by Renandpat » Thu Mar 29, 2018 1:35 am

[quote=""nksports""]https://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/2 ... 465231002/[/quote]

Head Ball Coach wrongly assumes that just because it's on TV that the network is paying the league. Sure, there is some capital there, but it ain't coming from CBS.

User avatar
Sam Hill
Site Admin
Posts: 4142
Joined: Wed Nov 26, 2003 3:29 am
Location: Denver, CO

Post by Sam Hill » Thu Mar 29, 2018 3:16 am

Ohhhhhhhh, sorry alt-nerds....not a developmental league.

https://cbssports.radio.com/articles/mc ... all-league
Old enough to remember when bashing the ABA was fun.

crixus
Site Admin
Posts: 52
Joined: Thu Sep 24, 2015 8:42 am

Post by crixus » Fri Apr 20, 2018 9:34 am

[quote=""Pounder""]http://variety.com/2018/digital/news/al ... 202731190/

A league forming that has a network already lined up?

That, if anything, is promising to practically be the anti-XFL?

I do not know what to make of this.[/quote]

Steve Spurrier, the coach of the team in Orlando say's he wants Tim Tebow to play for him. Tebow playing football in Florida again would be a money maker. He's a class act and they love him down there. Now the other 7 teams in the league need to find their own regional football legends to keep pace with Orlando. ;)

http://profootballtalk.nbcsports.com/20 ... tim-tebow/
Last edited by crixus on Fri Apr 20, 2018 9:38 am, edited 3 times in total.

Post Reply

Return to “General Football”