Weekly Sports League and Franchise Report
by Dan Krieger
Published on August 4, 2025 under United Football League (UFL)
BASEBALL
California League: Major League Baseball's Los Angeles Dodgers, who are moving their current Single-A California League affiliate called the Rancho Cucamonga Quakes to a new sports complex in Ontario (CA) for the 2026 season, will announce the team's new name on September 18, 2025. MLB's Los Angeles Angels will move its current California League affiliate called the Inland Empire 66ers from San Bernardino to Rancho Cucamonga in 2026 to become a new version of the Rancho Cucamonga Quakes.
South Atlantic League: The ownership of the Aberdeen (MD) IronBirds, an affiliate of Major League Baseball's Baltimore Orioles in the High-A SAL, and the Frederick (MD) Keys in the developmental summer-collegiate Major League Baseball Draft League announced plans to switch the IronBirds to the MLB Draft League and the Frederick Keys to the SAL for the 2026 season. The current Aberdeen team will relocate to become the Frederick Keys in the SAL and the current Frederick team will become the Aberdeen IronBirds in the MLB Draft League. The Frederick Keys were previously part of the High-A Carolina League but lost its MLB affiliation during the 2020 restructuring of Minor League Baseball and joined the new MLB Draft League that was created for the 2021 season. As part of the restructuring, the SAL became a High-A league and the Carolina League became a lower-level Single-A league. The Keys' ongoing attempt to return to affiliated baseball has been successful thanks to funding that was approved to renovate its home ballpark in order to comply with minor league standards.
Eastern League: The Double-A Eastern League's Portland (ME) Sea Dogs played a game this weekend as the Maine Candlepins to honor a New England form of bowling that uses a smaller ball and smaller pins shaped like candles.
Southern League: This weekend, the Chattanooga Lookouts of the Double-A Southern League played the fourth of five games this season as the Chattanooga Wreckers to recognize Chattanooga as the birthplace of the wrecker and to honor the towing industry.
Futures Collegiate Baseball League: The summer-collegiate Futures League announced plans to place a new team at LeLacheur Park in Lowell (MA) for the 2026 season. An affiliated professional team called the Lowell Spinners played at LeLacheur Park as a member of New York-Penn League but that team was eliminated when the league was disbanded during the 2020 restructuring of Minor League Baseball.
BASKETBALL
Athletes Unlimited Pro Basketball: The women's Athletes Unlimited announced the fifth season of its four-week professional basketball competition will return to Nashville (TN) starting on February 4, 2026. The 5-on-5 competition will feature 4 teams consisting of 40 players, many of which are from the Women's National Basketball Association. Players are scored through individual and team statistics. The top four performers each week become captains and select teams for the following week. The one player with the highest score at the end of the season is crowned the individual AU Pro Basketball Champion. The previous seasons were held in Nashville (2025), Dallas (2023 and 2024) and Las Vegas (2022).
Women's National Basketball Association: A minority owner of the National Basketball Association's Boston Celtics has agreed to purchase the WNBA's Connecticut Sun (Uncasville) franchise and relocate the team to Boston for the 2027 season. The Sun has played a couple of well-attended regular-season games in Boston. The potential sale and relocation of the Sun would still need league approval.
FOOTBALL
American Arena League: The AAL, which has not played since the 2021 season, is reported to be preparing for a return in 2026. The AAL has operated the lower-level AAL2 since the 2023 season.
National Arena League: The NAL announced the addition of the new Pueblo (CO) Punishers team for the league's 2026 season. The league has one other Colorado-based team called the Colorado Spartans (Loveland). Pueblo was briefly home to the Steel City Menace in the 2016 season of the American Indoor Football but folded after playing two road games. A team called the Pueblo Pistols played only one road game in the 2007 season of the National Indoor Football League before folding.
United Football League: The UFL has strengthened its ownership group with the addition of a successful entrepreneur who will now lead the league's business operations. As part of these changes, the league will move at least two of its home markets, and possibly four markets, before the 2026 season. One of the new home markets will be Columbus (OH) where the team will play at the 20,000-seat Historic Crew Stadium, which is the former home of Major League Soccer's Columbus Crew. No other new markets or team relocations have been finalized at this time but the league will remain at eight teams in 2026. The UFL would like to expand to 10 to 12 teams in 5 years and to 16 teams in 10 years.
Winter Indoor Football: The fall-season WIF stated the South Jersey Wave (Pitman, NJ), which was previously announced as a 2025 WIF team, will not be part of the upcoming 2025 season. The Wave is the former New Jersey Roughnecks team that played in the 2025 season of the American Arena League 2 (AAL2) and was recently rebranded. The Wave plans to play in the 2026 AAL2 and the 2026 WIF.
HOCKEY
National Collegiate Development Conference: The junior-level United States Premier Hockey League's Tier-II NCDC announced its 2025-26 season schedule will feature 32 teams each playing 54 games from September 11, 2025, through March 28, 2026. The league is aligned in New England, Atlantic and Mountain conferences with the New England Conference further split into three divisions (East, North and Central). The league finished last season with 22 teams but added 10 new teams called the Eastern Charlotte Kingfishers (New Brunswick), Grand Junction (CO) River Hawks, Junior Bruins (Framingham, MA), Lewiston MAINEiacs, Springfield Pics, Presque Isle (ME) Frontiers, St. Croix Seawolves (St. Stephen, New Brunswick), Universel Academy (Sherbrooke, Quebec), Universel Quebec (Quebec City) and Woodstock Slammers (New Brunswick). Last season's Seacoast Spartans (Exeter, NH) were purchased and moved to the Albany area as the New York Dynamo for 2025-26.
United States Premier Hockey League: The junior-level USPHL's Tier-III Premier Conference announced its 2025-26 season schedule will feature 82 team in 10 regional divisions with each team playing 40 to 44 games from September 6, 2025, through March 7, 2026. The conference had 73 teams last season but lost the Junior Bruins and added 10 teams called the Burlington (VT) Beavers, Casper Warbirds, Charleston (SC) Colonials, Coral Springs (FL) Junio. Cats, Evansville Mariners, New Jersey Renegades (Randolph), New York Dynamo (Albany), Ottawa Valley Centennials (Almonte, Ontario), St-Lazare Avalanche (Quebec) and Universel Quebec (Quebec City). There were also four relocated teams for the 2025-26 season. The Motor City Gamblers (Fraser, MI) were purchased and relocated to the Buffalo area as the Bearcat Hockey Club; the Decatur (IL) Blaze was purchased and relocated as the Chicago T-Rex; the Bakersfield Roughnecks moved to become the McCall (ID) Smokejumpers; and the Isanti (MN) Outlaws moved to become the Minnesota Outlaws (East Bethel). After announcing the 82-team schedule, the USPHL Premier Conference added five new Alberta-based Canadian teams that will play within a new Alberta Division for the 2025-26 season and start playing teams in other divisions in 2026-27. The Alberta Division teams include the Bassano Beavers, Southern Alberta Mustangs (Stavely), Three Hills Titans, Hanna Havoc and Diamond Valley Rockies. The owner of the Southern Alberta Mustangs purchased the team name and brand from a team by that name from the Can-Am Junior Hockey League.
SPHL: The minor professional SPHL announced its 2025-26 season schedule will feature the same ten teams as last season and again aligned in a single-table format. Each team will play a 58-game schedule from October 17, 2025, through April 4, 2026.
American Premier Hockey League: The amateur senior-level APHL announced its 2025-26 season schedule will feature ten teams aligned in five-team Eastern and Western divisions with each team playing 24 to 26 games from September 27, 2025, through March 8, 2026. The league finished last season with seven teams but the Flint Lumberjacks did not return and the league added four new teams called the Ridgetown Royals (Chatham, Ontario), Thousand Island Raiders (Clayton, NY), Motor City Muskies (Lincoln Park, MI) and the Wooster (OH) Bulls. Ridgetown was recently added to replace the new Jamestown (NY) Railriders team that was announced last month but ran into arena issues. Last season's Kalkaska Battlers (Gaylord, MI) were renamed the Northern Michigan Warhounds for 2025-26.
SOCCER
Major League Soccer: MLS has been considering a change to its regular season calendar from a February-to-December schedule to a fall-to-spring schedule to match the international soccer calendar, but the league commissioner recently stated any schedule change would not come until after the 2026 World Cup tournament. The league is not going to rush its decision as it considers all of the factors involved in this major scheduling change.
Major League Indoor Soccer: The MLIS announced the creation of a new men's amateur indoor soccer league called the Major League Indoor Soccer Extended, or MLISX. The MLISX will provide players, coaches and officials a chance to compete and work toward promotion to the MLIS. In the near future, the league will be announcing teams for the inaugural 2025-26 season.
USL League One (United Soccer League): The USL awarded a franchise in the Division-III USL League One to a group called USL Eugene in Eugene (OR) where a team will start playing at a new 3,500-seat soccer stadium in 2026. A co-founder of the USL Eugene is the managing partner of the Eugene-based Lane United FC team in the pre-professional USL League Two.
Liga de Expansión MX: The Mexican second-tier men's professional soccer league known as the Liga de Expansión started the Apertura, or opening phase, of the two-part 2025-26 Apertura/Clausura season this week. The league again features 15 teams aligned in a single-format and each team will play 14 games through November 19, 2025. There was one change since the end of the 2024-25 season. The Club Deportiva Irapuato (Guanajuato) was promoted to the Liga de Expansión from the Liga Premier while the Club Celaya (Guanajuato) was relegated to the Liga Premier from the Liga de Expansión.
OTHER
Major League Rugby: The men's professional rugby union (15-player) MLR, which recently completed its 2025 season with 11 clubs, underwent some changes involving three of its clubs. The league's New Orleans-based NOLA Gold, which has been with the MLR since the inaugural 2018 season, announced it will not participate in the 2026 season. The MLR's San Diego Legion and the Rugby Football Club Los Angeles (RFCLA) have merged to create the new California Legion club that will compete in 2026 and host home matches across San Diego, Orange County and Los Angeles. The league's Utah Warriors and Miami Sharks are reported to be seeking funding to continue operating for the 2026 season.
Dan Krieger is the creator of the Weekly Sports League & Franchise Report, which has been tracking the changes in t205he sports world's leagues, teams, and nicknames since April 2007.
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The opinions expressed in this article are those of the writer(s), and do not necessarily reflect the thoughts or opinions of OurSports Central or its staff.
