The UFL made it through a third season, which is a lot more than most other spring football leagues over the last four decades can say.
It certainly feels like there is a lot more hope and optimism when it comes to how the league is looking for the future thanks in part to what co-owner Mike Repole has brought to the table over the last year. Being assisted by UFL president and CEO Russ Brandon, the UFL seems to have all the right pieces in place to make this league more successful than any other spring football league.
Before the United Bowl game between the DC Defenders and Louisville Kings, Brandon and Repole had a chance to talk to reporters at the UFL Media Day to share their thoughts on the 2026 season, looking back at the last two years, and how the future looks for the league.
Russ Brandon on Where UFL Needs to Improve
UFL NewsHub had a chance to ask Brandon about how he can keep the momentum going of the successful 2026 season and where the league needs to improve. He first wanted to first clarify the concerns about ticket sales as well as let everyone know that he is not content with where things are at in all aspect of the league.
"When we talk about improvement, never satisfied in anything that we do. I saw a report today that ratings were up and ticket sales were down. That was wrong. Every metric on our ticket sales are up from last year. Okay, uh, ratings are up. You know, to see seven games over a million, those are real numbers. To see games touching three million in peak are real numbers. See two games to 1.5 million are real numbers. I don't need to tell you what other leagues do, big leagues, established, okay? But there's never an ounce of satisfaction, especially me. It's a bad trait. I'm never happy and I'm never satisfied. So it's not a great way to live. But it is certainly, you know, until every single seat is sold in every single building, you know, we have a lot of work to do. We talk about local, local, local. That's sort of our motto internally. And Louisville is a great example of that. We need to do an even better job of that. As well. And, you know, across every single line of our portfolio, we need to look to improve. So very happy with the trajectory of where we're heading, but we all know we have a lot of work to do."
Mike Repole Opens Up About 2025 Attendance and Potential Relocation
UFL NewsHub asked Repole about the concerns fans have regarding markets like Dallas, Houston, and Birmingham that struggled with attendance late in the season after he had big goals for the league in 2026 and what was his honest assessment of attendance across the league and the potential of relocation. Repole never brought up relocation in his response as he did talk about being happy, but not satisfied as well as hinting at potential venue changes that could happen.
"I worry about all eight markets. So, every market needs to improve. The biggest thing I would have to worry about is you can have the right fans, you can be in the right cities, but you also need the right venue. You know, San Antonio had the right fans and was the right market. The Alamodome just didn't work. Michigan, same thing, right fans, right venue. Unfortunately, Ford Field didn't work. So, you know, when you look at markets, I mean, Birmingham has a stadium that has 47,000. I don't know who voted on that. Stadium for Birmingham for 47,000. I bet you if they had to do it again, it would be 15,000. You know, Houston has a nice soccer place, unbelievable, Shell Energy, incredible. Dallas has a great venue, another great venue. They have a lot of sports in that city, but so does DC, and the attendance here has been great, fan base has been And then honestly, we have to do— we had a big focus on local marketing this year. And Russ would say, local, local, local. He's short 3 locals. It's local, local, local, local, local, local. We have to do a better job because it's one thing to get a national audience to watch, but you can't get a national audience to come to DC. Well, maybe for this United goal we did, but not for a regular game. And yeah, I mean, listen, you guys have been around the sport longer than me. I think many of you guys have seen the difference between last three years and this year. I didn't see last three years. I can only see this year. And I'm happy. Not gonna celebrate and I'm far from content. So I'm, uh, you know, we have a long way to go."
Russ Brandon on Uncertainty After 2025 Season
There was an interesting moment at UFL Media Day where Brandon was open about his concerns after last season and how things might have turned out very different for the future of the league if Repole hadn't been on board with being a co-owner.
"I think the thing that's cool is that when we had this press conference a year ago I— we were going into an offseason of uncertainty from the standpoint of where were new markets going to be. Mike was coming on board but was not on board yet, as you know. So when we went through that, we had a lot of things to get done in a short amount of time. You know, the fact that we launched 3 new markets in January and have had the success in Columbus, Orlando, and Louisville that we've had is nothing short of remarkable. But it's a half-baked cake at this point."
Russ Brandon on Future 10th UFL Team
The announcement of the Oklahoma City UFL team coming in 2028 has UFL fans excited about who could be the 10th team coming in two years. While Brandon did not quite answer the question, he did hint at some news coming soon.
"You know, nothing at this point. Stay tuned for sure."
Mike Repole on His Thoughts with Start Time to UFL Season in the Future
There has been discussions about when the UFL season should start since the XFL used to start the week after the Super Bowl and USFL waited until April for their first game. Repole shared his thoughts on how the NFL and college football schedules and their final games being pushed back having an impact on when the UFL season could start in the future.
"Probably closer to the end of the NFL season. But if you guys obviously track that, the NFL season's looking at an 18th week, and maybe the Super Bowl being moved back another week, and the college championship is maybe going to be moved back. So a lot of these things, you know, we're not here to overlap with those. So I think that even if we stayed where we're at, we're going to get closer to the end of both seasons because they're going further along. And again, I think that's an opportunity. I think that, that just shows you how much people love football, you know. Um, I think the NFL is doing eight or nine or 10 international games this year like crazy. Um, they're adding an extra week, talking about two more expansion teams, you know. It's great for football, it's great for the NFL, it's great for great for college football, and it's great for the United Football League."