Word: nfl
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...launched since the three-season flop of the United States Football League (USFL) in the mid-'80s. The XFL is a joint venture by the World Wrestling Federation and NBC that debuted last Saturday night. It is trying to sell itself as a more violent version of the NFL (no fair catches, taunting encouraged) with more sex (cheerleaders in revealing outfits), but that's not really the product it has. After all, the only way to make football more violent than the NFL is to find MVP linebackers who were actually convicted of murder. As far as sex is concerned...
...gambling that access will substitute for talent on the teams, which are made up of NFL has-beens and college players who never made it. Why would anyone want to know so much about people they don't care about? TV execs stopped asking that question around the second episode of Survivor...
...USFL did. By owning all the teams and offering all the players the same $45,000 one-year contract with a one-year option (quarterbacks get $50,000; kickers, $35,000), he can control his costs; the entire XFL payroll is less than half that of a single NFL team. And the league needs only to deliver a mediocre 4.5 Nielsen rating to make its 10-week 8 p.m. Saturday time slot on nbc a success, as long as it attracts the overvalued young male demographic. Networks are increasingly willing to play cable station with their off-peak hours...
...even if NBC is just doing this because it is still bitter about losing the NFL to Fox, it is still a cheap drunk. "If we had signed the deal to stay with the AFC, we would have lost $150 million to $160 million a year," says NBC Sports chairman Dick Ebersol, who made McMahon an offer just hours after the WWF announced the league's launch. "So worst-case scenario to us would be a third of what we would have lost...
Even if the XFL fails, it will undoubtedly do a favor for pro sports. Given that the Super Bowl halftime show got better ratings than the game itself, the NFL will be thrilled to have a new league do some experimenting for it. "If they're smart, they'll steal a lot of it," says Linda McMahon, Vince's wife and business partner. "We're putting a brand-new product out. If a guy gets his tooth knocked out, you're going to see it." Those two must have had some first date...