The 2025 UFL season is less than two weeks from kicking off on March 28—the follow-up campaign of the merged XFL-USFL league sees an interconference battle with the St. Louis Battlehawks squaring off with the Houston Roughnecks in the UFL’s first Friday night telecast on FOX.
There have been some changes around the margins for several of the UFL’s eight teams. However, a year after the USFL and XFL condensed from 16 teams to 8, there is a lot less turnover and more continuity heading into the 2025 season.
The constant in Spring Pro Football since 2022 has been the Birmingham Stallions. They have won three straight league championships, the first outdoor pro football team to accomplish that feat in the United States since the Green Packers of the ’60s. The Kansas City Chiefs fell short of matching that accomplishment in their Super Bowl LIX loss to the Philadelphia Eagles.
Skip Holtz’s stellar Stallions squad is looking to win its fourth straight title, and the oddsmakers predictably have them as the UFL’s best bet to win it all. BetMGM, FanDuel, DraftKings, and others are all on board with Birmingham as the clear-cut favorite.
BetMGM has Birmingham as the odds-on UFL favorite, with St. Louis having the next-best shot to usurp them. The DC Defenders, who made the XFL Championship game as a 9-1 team two years ago but missed last year’s postseason with a 4-6 mark, are a preseason darkhorse to hoist the UFL trophy. Last season’s runner-up, San Antonio, has the same odds at +600.
Predictably, Memphis and Houston, the two teams that combined for three wins last season, face the longest odds of doing the unthinkable.
2025 UFL Championship Winner
Birmingham Stallions: +225 (bet $10 to win $32.50 total)
St. Louis Battlehawks: +375 (bet $10 to win $47.50 total)
D.C. Defenders: +600 (bet $10 to win $70 total)
San Antonio Brahmas: +600 (bet $10 to win $70 total)
Michigan Panthers: +650 (bet $10 to win $75 total)
Arlington Renegades: +1100 (bet $10 to win $120 total)
Memphis Showboats: +1400 (bet $10 to win $150 total)
Houston Roughnecks: +1800 (bet $10 to win $190 total)
2 Comments
by Ken Granito
The top 10 things to help ensure a great UFL season.
10. The St. Louis Battlehawks should go out and sign Carson Wentz. I know it seems he has a good number of landing spots in the NFL, but how does Wentz feel about going onto any team feeling he is the largest question mark himself. He needs to have some success. The Battlehawks would provide the perfect place to regain that. They have the receivers, the fanbase and he would get to again be the professor in the room helping younger players meet their potential. The Battlehawks continue to make mistake after mistake the latest leaving themselves with 3 UNPROVEN quarterbacks and even if they bring in an experienced QB this late in the game it would not ensure the success it would have ten days ago. In 2023, this type of QB situation is what derailed the Generals from making the playoffs, not realizing until late in the campaign Dakota Prukop was the answer. IF he were the QB all season the Generals would have made the postseason, with a growing QB and arguably the best defense in the league. Of course, if Max Duggan or Chevan Cordeiro takes the team by the horns and leads the team to the championship than I am wrong here and I must take this remark back. They have the weapons and a fanbase all they need is someone to take the bull by the horns. 😉 I just feel going in with 3 unproven quarterbacks was just another questionable move in the league’s best locale.
9. The league can allow Vinny Papale to be a true free agent so someone can sign him so the league will once again be Invincible. Hey, maybe Darius Victor too, so he can save lives.
8. The Pete Kendall move was a great move, however maybe it should have been the weekend the quarterbacks were supposed to have their their mini-camp and the offensive lineman could have held out too. Basically, great signing and it will definitely help the league. The timing could have been better if it were at the beginning of camp. PS I love Pete Kendall.
7. Casual football fans and even league nay sayers in UFL locales should look at their calendars and see if they could buy even the cheapest seats. At this time the league offers seating in the $20 range which are low in the stadium. This is able to be done, because the league offers good seating at a discount, because the league only opens certain seating sections while others open so this offers fans a great seat at a great price. Think about it. 84 UFL players are now in the NFL including a couple of notable ones. It may be time to see what almost NFL talent is like at not near NFL prices. Just a thought.
6. Join a UFL Fantasy league. I know players from the USFL 2022 season and one of the reasons that is so is due the USFL Fantasy. Baseball has too many games to follow, but the UFL is nice and easy. Leagues are starting up, even filling up. Strike while the iron is hot. Any Mauler would know it’s hot right now. Yeah I know……really bad.
5. On offense run the ball. On defense stop the run. As there are always ebbs and flows in football. The offense since 1978 has been going more and more to a pass first variety. This has gotten to the point whereby defensive lineman that used to fight for inches to hold that line now often find themselves 8 yards in the opponents backfield giving up yards of field position in hopes of getting a sack or a holding penalty. As this propensity has continued and teams replace interior from run-stuffers with more agile DTs, the offense finding that 5 yards right up the gut is a great way to move the chains, especially as the balance helps keep QBs healthy.
4. Bryce Perkins needs to keep his Rocky Balboa attitude all the way to the MVP and the playoffs. Who knows maybe a few things break right and a UFL Championship. The Panthers are built on defense. If they mesh their defensive style with a great field position game and a balanced attack, don’t be surprised to see the Panthers in the thick of things. If Perkins is able stay even keeled, even as he gains experience. Remember he was 3rd string under Coach Sean McVay in LA. Having both Matt Stafford and John Wohlford go down to injury, two offensive linemen, plus losing a 3rd in the game, Cooper Kupp and Allen Robinson out the Rams came in to a nationally televised game for a Rams teams at 3-7 against the Kansas City Chiefs it did not look good. However, the offense led by Perkins found some rhythm and playing within his coaching performed well keep the Rams in the game until the Chiefs finished them methodically late in the second half. This had me excited for him to be signed by the Panthers last year. Safe to say in a dual and sometimes 3 quarterback system, Perkins excelled and I am very much so. I see Perkins winning the job in Michigan and is a MVP candidate. If Perkins continues to make his reads, he will only grow as a quarterback and leader.
3. Hoping Abram Smith comes back fully healthy helping make the Defenders one of the stronger squads this year. He may not be in the NFL right now, but Abram Smith was a real running back before his injury. IF he is able ta attain that again, Jordan Ta’amu will have a more balanced attack. Along with a hopefully better defense, the Defenders can join the Brahmas in a battle atop the XFL division. As a talented Battlehawks squad might initially hit some growing pains, it would be great to see the Defenders find its place allowing for DC to again support its Defenders in a way that shows the UFL is more than a one trick pony.
2. If the UFL has all its ducks in a row in at least one of the expansion sites, they should report it right before the start of the season. This would help people in the locale and across the country to get pumped. To do this they need to get the feel of the players. Overall they should be happy with this as this will help the league and that can only help the players. First, two expansion teams would mean that the players that are about to be cut would largely have a landing spot and make next year’s teams. Of course this will change with the new graduating class, this allows for 25% more UFL jobs than there are this year. This should ONLY help the players. Some people might look at it as rubbing this is the face of the players who feel everything else seems more important than their pay. I get that appearance, but the league needs to grow, to get more people in new areas watching. If there is a new team in say Seattle, there might be some people who say “cool” and start watching. I always feel that sometimes you need to invest in your own future and this is what the league is doing. As the league grows financially there will be more money for players, I guarantee it.
1. To the league, it’s players, the coaches and the fans. Have fun! Work hard! Don’t live outside your means, but find ways to enjoy this Spring. You do that stuff and you will win. Hoping life finds you enjoying the UFL at least once this year. Football is the greatest! I left out sport, because it might not be only a sport. Follow me. The tradition, yet the constant changing. It’s the truest team activity, whereby strength, speed, agility, skill (touch), brains, experience, sportsmanship, trust and, if you believe, faith all come together like no other activity. So yes it’s a sport, but it may just be the most complete activity you can do in life. The players, play it, the coaches, coach it. Coaches and players might be successful, to some level, with only some of those attributes. The person who attains all of them will be set for life. As a fan you have the best reality show in the history of shows. You can follow players chasing their NFL dream or teams chasing their UFL Championship dreams, or those of us like me that imagined playing the sport they love on TV for millions to see. Some people don’t see the romance of football, however I did see Dakota Prukop and his very pregnant wife, who came to see him play, in the heat, so very close to their own personal gametime. I saw Kyahva Tezino make his first interception in 2022 and run to the stands, find his mom and give her the ball. Maybe I needed to add love to the list. The idea is to enjoy the game this Spring. Football is so much more than a show.
by DANALUS ALWINIUS OLIFER
Man you read my mind on Wentz I wish the NFL would use the NFL like MLB does with the minor leagues–or even their practice squad players so they’re game ready. Also the main failure is that the league has too few teams at least the USFL of the 80s at it’s height I believe had 22-24 teams with NFL caliber or players like RB Herschel Walker QB Doug Flutie RB Craig James–though that will never happen again–but this 8 team limit is aggravating they need more teams and in cities THAT DO NOT HAVE AN NFL team like the Arena Football League did at it’s height. Plus this two feet in for receptions is ridiculous and it wouldn’t be too bad to use the a two play attempt or some system where you can run or throw for 1 pt or 2 pts and eliminate the kicking of the extra point. Yeah the rushing numbers are bad and throwing all the time has led to poor statistics and few 100 yard games at WR or RB and 400 never it seems at QB. Please contact me. UFL fantasy football anyone?