There I was
peddling away on the exercycle Saturday afternoon when I happened upon the
Seattle Dragons/D.C. Defenders’ season opener of the XFL. Let’s just say near mid-February football
didn’t exactly hold my interest.
Eight teams with
416 players will try to make their way without me through a ten-game regular
season and two-game postseason, with half the teams qualifying. Everything wraps up April 26, barring any
earlier collapse. At the risk of
sounding way too judgmental, how sad.
The odds for
anyone jumping from the XFL to the NFL are at best 416-1; outside of providing
a treasure trove of sports’ trivia, the XFL is unlikely to leave much of an
impression once it goes the way of all non-NFL football leagues. The World Football League gave us the “dickerod.” What will it be for the XFL?
About the only
thing the existence of the XFL proves is that de facto semi-pro football can
draw a crowd—17,163 at the Dragons-Defenders’ game—and, more importantly, a
television audience, at least at the outset; between them, ESPN and Fox are
committed to broadcasting all regular-season and playoff games. Why not broadcast independent-league
baseball, then? The quality of play is
pretty much the same. Maybe baseball
fans know better than to watch an inferior product. Maybe football is less a sport than an
addiction.
According to the
Sporting News website, the X in XFL stands for “Nothing at all.” It’s a safe bet the same holds true for the
other two letters.
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