XFL: Round 2?

E5 Yaz

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QB "assignments"

● DALLAS RENEGADES: Landry Jones
● DC DEFENDERS: Cardale Jones
● HOUSTON ROUGHNECKS: Philip Walker
● LOS ANGELES WILDCATS: Luis Perez
● NEW YORK GUARDIANS: Matt McGloin
● ST. LOUIS BATTLEHAWKS: Jordan Ta'amu
● SEATTLE DRAGONS: Brandon Silvers
● TAMPA BAY VIPERS: Aaron Murray
 

bsj

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QB "assignments"

● DALLAS RENEGADES: Landry Jones
● DC DEFENDERS: Cardale Jones
● HOUSTON ROUGHNECKS: Philip Walker
● LOS ANGELES WILDCATS: Luis Perez
● NEW YORK GUARDIANS: Matt McGloin
● ST. LOUIS BATTLEHAWKS: Jordan Ta'amu
● SEATTLE DRAGONS: Brandon Silvers
● TAMPA BAY VIPERS: Aaron Murray
I dont get this at all. Why not just make round 1 of the draft the 8 QBs and let them draft who they want?
 

Ale Xander

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I dont get this at all. Why not just make round 1 of the draft the 8 QBs and let them draft who they want?
QB's are allocated for ticket/merchandise/ratings (geographic) reasons

ie. Landry Jones played in Oklahoma for Stoops goes to closest team to OK (Dallas) and Stoops
Aaron Murray is from Tampa and played "nearby" @ Georgia, so he goes to Tampa.
Luis Perez is from San Diego/Chula Vista, (and is Hispanic) so he goes to LA.
 

joe dokes

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Unless they play in the desert in August, this league wont even rise to the level of hot garbage:

https://profootballtalk.nbcsports.com/2019/11/22/xfl-distributes-non-negotiable-player-contracts/

First, the document is, according to an XFL memo accompanying the contract, “non-negotiable.”

Second, the contract specifies a weekly salary of $1,040 per week, with an anticipated gross amount of $27,040. It also promises a $1,685 payment for each game played, and $2,222 for each win.

Third, the players get no royalties for merchandise sold by the XFL, including presumably jerseys and other items bearing their names.

Fourth, the document permits the player to leave for the NFL, but only after the end of his team’s season. The XFL’s championship game will be played on April 26, one day after the NFL draft concludes.

Fifth, the contract includes a broad waiver of rights to pursue legal claims in court, with an argreement to arbitrate disputes and a promise to enter into no class actions.
 

Kliq

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I for one am shocked that a company run by Vince McMahon would be so unfriendly to its talent.
 

kenneycb

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It's a great headline but nothing seem too egregious IMO. Going point by point:

1. These are all second-rate football players, so they have no negotiating power/leverage as is. Their leverage is to not play, so this saves a lot of time on haggling for details. Probably also a necessary thing to get 500+ players signed.
2. Nothing to really comment on. No idea what market value is for sub-NFL football.
3. Nobody is going to be buying merchandise with players' names on it, so this is much ado about nothing. This will be a negligible revenue source. There will not be a lot of kids in the stands with Landry Jones Dallas Renegades jerseys on.
4. This seems like a reasonable stipulation put in place to protect mass defections midseason
5. I don't know enough to comment on whether this is egregious or not.
 

Awesome Fossum

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Yeah, that's such an uncharitable framing. I know dunking on Vince is fun, but is the suggestion that they shouldn't standardize the player contract for most players? The AAF used a standardized contract and couldn't even make it through Year 1.

I'd really like to talk XFL, but I think this might be the wrong forum for sincere discussion. Can we move this to General Sports?
 

Gdiguy

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How is #4 enforceable? Unless the NFL agrees to enforce it, there's plenty of states that have basically made non-competes (which this is effectively) unenforceable
 

kenneycb

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Also how is it different in MLS? They have a union but, absent that, probably the most equivalent example of major sports in my quick thought. But very well could be wrong on that.
 

Marciano490

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Can you name some aside from California? I'd be very interested to learn more.
Most states, at least where I've had cases, allow them to the extent they're very limited in time and scope. I can't think of a jurisdiction that would make someone sit out a full year in an industry where there are very limited employment alternatives.
 

kenneycb

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I don’t think it’s sitting out a full year though. It runs from January to the draft. Unless they give a specific time to sign a contract, they have a lot of flexibility relatively speaking. So maybe they miss out on two months but I would argue it’s better than doing random tryouts.
 

Marciano490

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Well, we're not talking about a full year. The XFL season wraps in April.

I'm not a lawyer, but I know that the first time around, the XFL tried to sign a guy under contract with the CFL and lost in Arizona court.

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/sports/cfl-wins-court-case-with-xfl/article1044325/
Regardless, the NFL isn't going to do anything that even has the faintest whiff of anti-competitive behavior.
That was decided on jurisdiction related to the enforceability of a contract executed in Canada. It’ll have no precedential value.

I was wrong about the enforceability though. If their season only runs Feb-Apr, I think that would be upheld.
 

joe dokes

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My point in posting that wasn't the legality, morality, or business smartness of it all. It just seems that's a structure guaranteed to result in lousy football.
 

InstaFace

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Right, no player who's already on an NFL contract, or likely to receive one for the upcoming year, will be playing the XFL anyway. So this is almost by-definition a 2nd division full of wannabes, some of whom will distinguish themselves enough to earn that. But they'll earn that as a result of the XFL league season, which concludes in April. So there is absolutely no deterrence for any player not already likely to sign an NFL deal to sign up for the XFL, despite the (obviously) lesser terms they're getting on the XFL's contract.

I'm sure future years will have *some* flexible terms that are negotiable, particularly for the players likely to be stars, or QBs, to try and entice "names". But as a way of going in with a maximum of flexibility and minimum of cost, I don't see how this is anything but the right approach for them financially and contractually. I'm trying to imagine a player whose situation would cause them to reject these terms from the XFL, but who would accept better ones were they offered - maybe Kaepernick? He might get nontrivial merchandise sales. Some former NFL stars who for some reason want to lace them up and who still have individual brand value might fall into that same bucket... I dunno, Tebow? But that list would be quite small, I'd say.
 

joe dokes

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What structure would you use?
I dont know. I dont think there is a "structure" that would allow a football league to succeed with tenth rate pro players playing something that looks like pro football.
IMO, it can't look like football, because then it will just look like shitty football. The only way something like this has success is with gimmicks that would cause NFL owners to stroke out.

Kickoffs from the 20 yard line because returns are exciting. Running out of bounds intentionally is a penalty. A team can accept any penalty by taking the play, taking the yards, or taking a player from the other team off the field (like a power play).
Multiple forward passes are legal. Everyone is an eligible receiver. Canadian-style men in motion. Fantasy scoring.

OTOH--If I was Vince McMahon, the way its drawn up is exactly what I'd do so I could pocket a bunch of money up front and watch other people lose theirs.
 

EdRalphRomero

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I'd like to see them go in a different direction. Eliminate the forward pass. Yeah at first blush it will be less exciting, but man just pile on the giants of the gridiron. Run the wishbone. Get some nostalgia for a brand of football we never saw mixed with pulling in interesting players who don't fit the physical prototype of the NFL so they can still be great at what they do in the XFL.
 

Awesome Fossum

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Johnson was also I believe the first pick last year in the AAF draft and like, two weeks later the Redskins signed him and he started games down the stretch.
You are correct. Never played a down for the AAF.

But as a way of going in with a maximum of flexibility and minimum of cost, I don't see how this is anything but the right approach for them financially and contractually. I'm trying to imagine a player whose situation would cause them to reject these terms from the XFL, but who would accept better ones were they offered - maybe Kaepernick?
Right. And I would clarify that 11 "assigned" quarterbacks did not sign the standard contract and did negotiate something different.

OTOH--If I was Vince McMahon, the way its drawn up is exactly what I'd do so I could pocket a bunch of money up front and watch other people lose theirs.
I'm not following. How is Vince pocketing money up front?
 

Kliq

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Nah, Vince spent a bunch of his own money starting this thing and the whole reason he believes that it is going to work (and where the AAF failed) is that he is willing to lose more money at first without folding the league. This is a legacy ploy for him since he believes that his only major failure in business has been the XFL and this is a way to correct that mistake.
 

Marciano490

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QB "assignments"

● DALLAS RENEGADES: Landry Jones
● DC DEFENDERS: Cardale Jones
● HOUSTON ROUGHNECKS: Philip Walker
● LOS ANGELES WILDCATS: Luis Perez
● NEW YORK GUARDIANS: Matt McGloin
● ST. LOUIS BATTLEHAWKS: Jordan Ta'amu
● SEATTLE DRAGONS: Brandon Silvers
● TAMPA BAY VIPERS: Aaron Murray
By the way, these... these are not great names.
 

axx

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Perhaps related, the Arena Football League filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy today. They managed to succeed (for awhile?) where the other leagues didn't.
 

IdiotKicker

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I love the kickoff and punt stuff. Allows the plays to remain in the game without allowing for the high-speed collisions between blockers and defenders that are so dangerous.
 

steveluck7

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its interesting that so many of these tweaks are in the name of player safety when XFL v. 1.0 was all about the violence and being decidedly less safe than the NFL
 

Senator Donut

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I really like overtime and especially the kickoff rules. My only complaint is that the major and minor touchbacks are not very intuitive, but keeping kickoffs in the game without the full speed collisions seems pretty brilliant.
 

OurF'ingCity

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Really like the elimination of the PAT and think the 3-tiered extra point(s) system makes sense in theory but it doesn't really make sense that you get 1 point for going from the 2 and 2 points from the 3 - is anyone ever going to choose the 1-point, 2-yard option unless that is all you need to win? 2 points from the 5 or something like that seems more appropriate.

The revised ineligible man downfield rules are also good and something I wish the NFL would adopt (and I'm not JUST saying that because of Mason's penalty against the Titans).
 

CFB_Rules

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I wonder how they plan to handle onside kick situations. Also, for free kicks that hit the ground, how will the players know to wait 3 seconds before moving? Will there be a buzzer or something?
 

Vinho Tinto

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its interesting that so many of these tweaks are in the name of player safety when XFL v. 1.0 was all about the violence and being decidedly less safe than the NFL
Besides being roughly 20 years ago, when Vince McMahon was in the middle of his "Attitude" era boom with WWF/E, he smartly took some time to plan this out instead of repeating the slapdick operation that was the XFL 1.0. Specifically, he did something very boring and hired Oliver Luck to be the league's CEO and Commissioner. Luck has a track record as an executive for both pro and college football and was a strong choice to get the league running. If you look at the list of coaches in 2001 and compare to the list for 2020 it is night and day in terms of name recognition and talent (They hired Bob Stoops!).

Like virtually everyone, I'm hyper skeptical that this will last 5 years; but as a football fan I'm thrilled that Vince is willing to burn an insane amount of money to make this a reality.
 

8slim

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I like all of those rule changes. The PAT stuff seems a little gimmicky, they'd be better off just eliminating that 1 point conversion, and just have the 2 and 3.
 

joe dokes

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I like all of those rule changes. The PAT stuff seems a little gimmicky, they'd be better off just eliminating that 1 point conversion, and just have the 2 and 3.
If you're going to go gimmick, go all the way, like another 6 points for a conversion from outside the 40.

IIRC, the WFL eliminated the PAT, but going for 2 was the only option.
 

Awesome Fossum

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Really like the elimination of the PAT and think the 3-tiered extra point(s) system makes sense in theory but it doesn't really make sense that you get 1 point for going from the 2 and 2 points from the 3 - is anyone ever going to choose the 1-point, 2-yard option unless that is all you need to win? 2 points from the 5 or something like that seems more appropriate.
I think that was mis-reported. The 2-point is from the 5.

After a touchdown, the team has the option of running a play from the 2, 5, or 10-yard line, worth 1, 2, or 3 points respectively.
https://www.xfl.com/rules#989804ad0ac87a5aa046c5ba
My beef with the PAT is that it gives you a lot of ugly scores like 8-6, 12-8, etc. Just doesn't feel right when the game, by all rights, should be 7-7 or 14-7. Sounds stupid (is stupid), but it rubbed me the wrong way with the AAF.

I'd go flat 7 for a TD and let teams wager points to create the 2- and 3-point conversions if they so choose. So if you "go for two", you get 8 if you convert and 6 if you fail; if you "go for three", you get 9 if you convert and 5 if you fail.
 
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DourDoerr

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Like that one of my pet peeves - the coin toss - is being eliminated. Linking home field to opening possession and OT is by far the fairest handling over the course of a season (I pretty sure I've advocated for this change at least once over the years in BBTL). Plus, the certainty of possession in a looming tie game might influence a home team's last possession (if, say, their defense was tired and seemed a dubious option in OT).

Agree that the KO sounds like a good idea too.
 
My rule change: player who scores the touchdown has to kick the extra point.
I think I've heard it suggested before that any player who is on the field when the touchdown is scored should have to kick the extra point; that would be an interesting addition to the XFL rules, allowing you to kick a one-point XP with a non-specialist kicker in addition to going for 1, 2 or 3 from 2/5/10 yards out. (That's basically how kicking works in rugby, of course - someone already on the field has to kick the conversions and penalties that are scored.)