News The "New" UFL Kicks Off The 2024 Season Beginning March 30th and March 31st (1 Viewer)

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Spring football arrives in 2024 with the new branded UFL opening training camps beginning Saturday, March 2nd, 2024. The new league is a merger of prior separate leagues including the XFL and the USFL. The UFL will have stronger financial backing than the past leagues including the backing of Fox Sports, Disney, and ESPN. The XFL had 8 teams and the USFL had 8 teams. The UFL will have only 8 teams with 2 Conferences, the USFL and the XFL, each having 4 teams. The 8 team league will play a 10-game schedule. Some interesting names as Head Coaches are Curtis Johnson of the Houston Roughnecks, Wade Phillips of the San Antonio Brahmas, Mike Nolan of the Michigan Panthers, and Bob Stoops of the Arlington Renegades. The league headquarters is based in Arlington, Tx., where each team will hold their training camps and practices during the season. They will travel to their home markets for games.

Fox Sports and Disney/ESPN are both broadcast partners. All 43 UFL games will be televised on ABC, Fox, ESPN, FS1 or ESPN2 and streamed on either ESPN+ or the Fox Sports app.

The season will start March 30, with four teams (two from each conference) advancing to the playoffs, which start on June 9. The UFL championship game will take place June 16 in a city to be announced later.



A link to the 2024 UFL schedule is below:

UFL 2024: What to know about rebranded spring football league​

Welcome to the UFL! Laying out the new(ish) league heading into the 2024 season

The XFL and the USFL have merged into the UFL, and training camps are about to start. Here's how the league got to this point and what to expect.

www.espn.com

 

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League play opens this weekend.

The opening-week schedule (all times Eastern):

Saturday, March 30

Birmingham Stallions at Arlington Renegades (1 p.m., Fox)
St. Louis Battlehawks at Michigan Panthers (4:30 p.m., Fox)

Sunday, March 31

D.C. Defenders at San Antonio Brahmas (noon, ESPN)
Memphis Showboats at Houston Roughnecks (3 p.m., ESPN)

 

[Artifactual]

UFL to keep traditional kickoff among inaugural season rules​

Welcome to the UFL! Laying out the new(ish) league heading into the 2024 season

The XFL and the USFL have merged into the UFL, and training camps are about to start. Here's how the league got to this point and what to expect.

www.espn.com

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  Kevin Seifert, ESPN Staff WriterFeb 13, 2024, 01:00 PM ET

The new United Football League has discarded the most prominent rule innovation generated by the recent spring football movement. The UFL's kickoff will resemble a traditional formation rather than the novel version used in the XFL, the league confirmed Tuesday in announcing on-field rules for its inaugural season.

The XFL kickoff had drawn the attention of NFL decision-makers who are hoping to revive their own kickoff format. But in a statement to ESPN, UFL football operations chief Daryl Johnston said that a traditional kickoff is something "some of us felt was important" during the XFL-USFL merger negotiations that ultimately formed the UFL.

"Our doctors provided us with player safety data that was very similar, concluding that choosing one version over the other did not have a significant impact on player safety," Johnston said.

UFL kickers will line up at the 20-yard line, a position that will limit and possibly eliminate the potential for touchbacks, similar to how the USFL played it in 2022 and 2023.

 

[SigFreudianSlip]

I've been unable to get into this any time I've tried but I'm going to try again. Sucks that the Breakers are gone tho.....

Thank ya for this very informative thread.

 

[Thunderchild]

So, if I read that article correctly, no New Orleans team!?

If that's correct, then this new league becomes useless to me.

 

[St. Widge]

So, if I read that article correctly, no New Orleans team!?

If that's correct, then this new league becomes useless to me.

To be fair the USFL New Orleans team was a New Orleans team in name only. They were never in New Orleans and didn't advertise or have a team presence in New Orleans. They played and practiced in Mobile just like all the other teams that represented cities in name only. It's one of the reasons I had no interest in the new version of the USFL. It seemed disingenuous and like they should have just named the teams without pretending they had anything to do with specific cities.

 

[Grumpy Old Manatee]

UFL to keep traditional kickoff among inaugural season rules​

Welcome to the UFL! Laying out the new(ish) league heading into the 2024 season

The XFL and the USFL have merged into the UFL, and training camps are about to start. Here's how the league got to this point and what to expect.

www.espn.com

• 
  
  Kevin Seifert, ESPN Staff WriterFeb 13, 2024, 01:00 PM ET

The new United Football League has discarded the most prominent rule innovation generated by the recent spring football movement. The UFL's kickoff will resemble a traditional formation rather than the novel version used in the XFL, the league confirmed Tuesday in announcing on-field rules for its inaugural season.

The XFL kickoff had drawn the attention of NFL decision-makers who are hoping to revive their own kickoff format. But in a statement to ESPN, UFL football operations chief Daryl Johnston said that a traditional kickoff is something "some of us felt was important" during the XFL-USFL merger negotiations that ultimately formed the UFL.

"Our doctors provided us with player safety data that was very similar, concluding that choosing one version over the other did not have a significant impact on player safety," Johnston said.

UFL kickers will line up at the 20-yard line, a position that will limit and possibly eliminate the potential for touchbacks, similar to how the USFL played it in 2022 and 2023.

All UFL kickers will line up at the 20 yard line at the same time? Seems rather confusing…

 

[Saint Greg]

So, if I read that article correctly, no New Orleans team!?

If that's correct, then this new league becomes useless to me.

Yep. I’m not following it with no New Orleans.

 

[Thunderchild]

To be fair the USFL New Orleans team was a New Orleans team in name only. They were never in New Orleans and didn't advertise or have a team presence in New Orleans. They played and practiced in Mobile just like all the other teams that represented cities in name only. It's one of the reasons I had no interest in the new version of the USFL. It seemed disingenuous and like they should have just named the teams without pretending they had anything to do with specific cities.

True, and I can see your point. But it was a representative of New Orleans which was fine with me. The intentions were to eventually move those teams to their respective cities when finances allowed. This new league doesn't even have that.

 

[4T L4ST]

Geaux Defenders!

I was bummed to see New Orleans Breakers didn't make the cut but will be attending some Defenders games this season.

 

[Artifactual]

So, if I read that article correctly, no New Orleans team!?

If that's correct, then this new league becomes useless to me.

Yep. I’m not following it with no New Orleans.

No Team For New Orleans, At Least Not Initially.

To be fair the USFL New Orleans team was a New Orleans team in name only. They were never in New Orleans and didn't advertise or have a team presence in New Orleans. They played and practiced in Mobile just like all the other teams that represented cities in name only. It's one of the reasons I had no interest in the new version of the USFL. It seemed disingenuous and like they should have just named the teams without pretending they had anything to do with specific cities.

The set-up for the UFL will be similar, at least in the beginning.

All teams will conduct training camp and practice during the week in Arlington, Tx. Players will most likely live in the DFW and surrounding areas. The teams will travel each week to the "Home" city playing sites. The article in the OP explains it all.

You won't see players in the local communities of their designated "Home Cities" because they won't live there. Not in local restaurants. Not at local hospitals. At best they may do some type of event when in town the day before the game. After the games are played, they will return to Arlington, Tx.

Although this is a merger with better financial backing, to be fair this is an upstart league. It will have to set its roots first before expanding in size and traditional ways. The NFL started out in limited numbers and players were part time with most having full time jobs in the real world.