Tuesday was a big day in the UFL: Three new teams were announced – not only their locations but their nicknames and logos. New owner Mike Repole made the media rounds, including a press conference in Orlando, one of the relocated cities, and an appearance on Barstool Sports. While a lot was announced, a lot is still yet to come in the weeks and months that will follow, leading up to kickoff at the end of March. Here are some of the newsworthiest highlights from a newsworthy day.
Relocations , logos official
Columbus had already been announced as one of the teams to move (and season tickets have already been selling on the league’s website). The Aviators were the long-rumored name for that team, as ownership had previously taken out a trademark on it, and Aviators they will be. It’s a unique nickname and the color scheme is promising, probably the best of the three new franchises unveiled on Tuesday.
With Orlando back in the mix for spring football, there was a question as to whether they’d revert to the Guardians or be completely re-branded. They went with a complete re-brand, ushering in the Storm. It sounds a bit minor league on first blush and the logo isn’t anything to get excited about. The orange color scheme will make the franchise stand out, though.
Louisville will be the Kings, incorporating Repole’s horse racing ownership into the logo. They’ve inherited the former Orlando Guardians color scheme of dark and neon green, which, to me, is a strange mix for a city like Louisville. The logo looks cool though and I’m bullish on the uniform potential for Orlando and Louisville.
More re-branding than anticipated
While the new teams, logos and nicknames were expected, the re-brand went further than just those three. Other teams got makeovers as the Arlington Renegades are back to the Dallas Renegades, the original name of the team in 2020; the Houston Roughnecks stayed in Houston but have taken on the USFL Gamblers name after ditching it for the Roughnecks in the merger; and the UFL logo itself was slightly revamped.
More is on the way as each team’s uniforms will be redesigned as well, per the league’s press release. “Dallas Renegades” rolls off the tongue better than “Arlington Renegades” and incorporates a wider region of the state. The change of Houston’s move is the most curious: It feels like it was done to appease USFL fans (or members of USFL management inside the UFL) after they lost Michigan and Memphis and were down to just the Stallions remaining from the relaunch of that league.
There’s also the idea that perhaps Houston was changed so that the league could move San Antonio’s staff – including head coach Wade Phillips – over to the Houston franchise, where Phillips has a long coaching history. Repole mentioned wanting to situate coaches in cities where they have a history, and Phillips posted on “X” welcoming the Gamblers back into existence. That would move Roughnecks coach Curtis Johnson and his team to one of the new franchises.
Smaller stadiums, more success?
One of the keys to Repole’s business plan for the UFL is to put the teams in smaller stadiums. The league exited the cavernous domes of Ford Field in Michigan and the Alamodome in San Antonio, as well as 50,000-seat Simmons Bank Liberty Stadium in Memphis in favor of more intimate settings in Columbus, Louisville and Orlando. Houston and Dallas also moved out of their old digs to smaller capacity soccer stadiums.
Repole has noted that the empty seats make for a poor television viewing experience, as well as a live experience that is lacking. While the tighter quarters should make it more appealing to attend as a fan, there’s simply been no correlation in ratings over the last several years to indicate empty stadiums have negatively affected TV viewership.
If that were the case, St. Louis Battlehawk games would significantly out-draw Memphis Showboats home games, for example, and the data just doesn’t support this. Is it one factor that could improve ratings? Sure, but it’s not going to be the silver bullet.
Goodbye USFL, XFL Conferences
The last vestiges of the pre-merger days are over: The USFL and XFL names have been erased as conferences; in fact, there won’t be any conferences at all. Instead, the top four teams in the league will advance to the playoffs. That will solve some of the issues that have cropped up over the years, like teams with better records being left out of the playoffs. It might eliminate some rivalries and intrigue in jockeying for playoff position, however. Ultimately with just eight teams, conferences didn’t seem all that necessary. Legacy USFL and XFL will live on; their names no longer will. For some, that’s the true end of an era.
UFL returns to Fridays
After last year’s disastrous Friday night ratings on Fox, there was a real question as to whether the league would return to that day and time in 2026. The UFL’s press release mentions that the upcoming season will begin on Friday, March 27, indicating they will run it back on Fridays.
Fans in our off-season survey overwhelmingly approved of the Friday night games. Something to watch in this regard: Nielsen has changed the way they’re tracking ratings, which so far has had a positive effect on the numbers for sports programming. It isn’t all good, as pro wrestling is down using this new method. So it remains to be seen if the UFL will benefit from this change next winter.
Kickoff timeline remains the same…for now
For 2026, the UFL will stick to its late March opening weekend, but Repole seems open to moving up the start date. He mentioned the need to keep it this way for another year for venue purposes. It sounds like leadership is willing to change that for 2027. There are benefits and drawbacks to this from a television schedule point-of-view; from a player perspective, anything that allows them to get into NFL training camps earlier will be looked upon as a positive, and that’s what a potential earlier start time in 2027 would do.
Attracting local players, coaches could be a goal
In his Orlando presser, Repole mentioned a desire to have teams focus at least in part on acquiring players with local ties, as well as hiring coaches with the same. It just shows how wide Repole’s reach is that he’s speaking about football operations issues, not just marketing (though in this case, they go hand-in-hand).
The XFL/UFL has resisted the temptation to do any kind of territorial protections for its teams, citing the imbalance of quality college football teams surrounding the markets and the desire to do all it can to promote parity amongst its franchises.
Part of the problem has also been the regionalized nature of the UFL where you have large swaths of the country unaccounted for in divvying up talent by region, and then some teams that are so close to each other it could create boundary issues (such as the three teams that were in Texas).
It’s possible the UFL incorporates territorial selections in its upcoming draft or even in free agency (similar to the CFL’s negotiation list). It’s also possible this can is kicked down the road to the 2026 off-season when there’s more time to give this proper consideration.
The XFL in 2020 did attempt to hire head coaches with ties to the cities, though again, it’s hard to measure the impact of that on the league’s pocketbook. I doubt people went to Lumen Field to watch Jim Zorn coach, for example.
What it does is get the league in the door of the local media. It’s an easy story for the local TV news or newspaper to write up a college player that has come home to play in the pros. Any ink like that helps get the word out about the league, which is something they still desperately need, even heading into year three.
Local marketing the focus, again
It’s a song and dance UFL fans have heard before. This time, they’re hearing it from someone new and hoping the tune changes. Ever since the XFL’s relaunch in 2023, league brass has talked about making an impact in local markets. The need was there initially due to the housing of all teams centrally in the Arlington hub.
As ticket sales have slowed from that season onward, every off-season has been a time where management has noted the less-than-desirable attendance and vowed to do something about it.
So far, little has been done other than talk. The hope is Repole has the resources and know-how to truly make an impact on the ground in these cities. The problem is, kickoff is now five-and-a-half months away, and not a single ticket has been sold in one-quarter of these locales (and maybe a few more than that in Columbus), and some are just now hiring staff. Perhaps they’ll get a pass this year due to the reorganization that has taken place.
After this season, there are no more excuses.
1 Comment
by 4th&long
Mark – Good article
I didn’t get the impression that Roughneck>Gamblers rebrand was done to appease the USFL fans. It seems more of a reset for a damaged brand in a city that certainly has potential but has stumbled. The Gamblers name played 2 years on TV in new USFL and 40 yrs ago and is infamous for the start of QB great Jim Kelly. Plus the are incorporating the Shell colors into the new branding. Though Iliked the 2022-23 colors, this works.
As far as Wade, love the guy buthis health and age make him a bad HC candidate. Perhaps as a DC in the suite calling plays would work because this isn’t air conditioned… The UFL needs to do what’s best for the UFL not Wade I’m afraid.
Thanks for acknowledging that attendance hasn’t shown an impact on TV viewership – I know I beat that dead horse but it’s true. However, it may get local and national media to comment positively and improve the live game day experience for sure.
Yes the references to the XFL/USFL are gone. Makes sense, look at the marketing “One League, Eight Teams”. Clearly trying to focus on the one brand and the teams and not have 2 sub brands and some divided fandom.
Like the return to Fridays, and them looking into earlier start cautiously. There are pluses and minuses.
I like having local players to increase local support. Clearly Repole does – he’s looking at the biz side and not the “fairness” or evenness. And he’s right, survive and thrive more important than exactly equal across teams.
As far as local marketing. I never had much faith in DG and even Russ. But I do in MR, so regardless of 2025 etc… I do expect a better job on that in 2026.
Only misgiving is the “help players get to next level” crapola etc… Fans don’t care, they want good FB. Stick to that side of the messaging.
Overall, I’m all in on MR so far!