Steve Fezzik, the famed professional sports handicapper, has recently spoken regarding the future of the UFL, which was recently formed with the amalgamation of two previous leagues, the XFL and USFL.
Fezzik appeared on the “Ross Tucker Football Podcast” and mentioned as per Awful Announcing, regarding the league, whose season began on March 30th and will end on June 2nd, “The league is going to fail. I say that emphatically and I have the reason, Ross. We all watch football, we’re creatures of habit. So we watch football all year long and then the Super Bowl comes along. And then we’re like ‘Where’s my football? It’s Saturday, it’s Sunday, the weather’s terrible outside, nothing’s going on, the NBA games don’t mean anything, there’s no tournament going on in college basketball, I need my football.’ So it’s the perfect time, mid-February, to launch a spring football league when it’s still wintertime.”
“The league is going to fail…I say that emphatically and I have the reason…”@FezzikSports explains why he thinks the UFL is doomed on the EVEN MONEY podcast: pic.twitter.com/sW1zWzsFX1
— Ross Tucker Podcast (@RossTuckerPod) April 9, 2024
He further continued, “You make it regional, you make it teams in Texas and the Southeast. Great. That works. But you know what doesn’t work? Launching during mid-to-late March. March Madness. Baseball starting. NBA and NHL playoffs right around the corner. We have limited bandwidth. We can’t handle it and we’ve already gone five or six weeks without watching our football on Saturday or Sunday, so we’re not inclined. We’re not, like, ‘Hey, it’s 10 a.m., it’s noon on Sunday, I wanna watch my football game. And I think because of that, people moved on. They moved on to other sports and I think you’ve got to capture that audience with good stories in February, and if you don’t do that by mid-March, you’re done-zo and there’s too many other sports going on.”
@FezzikSports Kicking off a week after the Super Bowl was one of many reasons the XFL outperformed the USFL in 2023. Since the two leagues merged, govt. regulatory approval slowed down the process and forced this Mar. 30 start. Expect the move back to a mid-Feb kickoff in '25.
— Matty Fresh (@MattyFreshTV) April 9, 2024
U do realize the merger was finalized Dec 31. There was no way they could have been able to start in mid Feb this year. They have said that in ‘25. When to start will be discussed
— Ken Gill (@ArenaFanKen) April 9, 2024
"We have limited bandwidth, we can't handle it." Speak for yourself… I love hockey but even I wouldn't say the NHL and especially not the MLB are enough to monopolize sports attention spans in the Spring. Would love to have you out to a Harrisburg Stampede game @RossTuckerNFL
— Toby Valora (@sniffytobias) April 9, 2024
Never seen someone so excited and 'emphatic' about players and coaches losing their job and not having opportunities
— jc (@JackieCaliban) April 10, 2024
— Bama205 (@latreyton) April 9, 2024
The football community also shared their reactions to what Fezzik stated regarding the newly merged UFL. The point was also made that the league’s merger was not finalized until December, making it impossible for things to align.
However, the stance taken by handicapper indicated the slot through which the UFL could maximize attention and potential to rise. With the new season underway, it remains to be seen if and how much success the new merger has gained.
