Tag: XFL

The Masters Has Been Postponed. We Officially Have Nothing to Watch Anymore

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The Roni strikes again. This now makes the NBA, NHL, MLB, MLS, XFL, Fast and the Furious, March Madness, the Boston Marathon, and now the biggest golf tournament in the world all postponed and/or cancelled. I literally prayed to the golf gods and the twitter gods yesterday when a commercial for The Masters came on…while I worked from home amid mass hysteria.

What the hell are we all going to watch now? Everybody better start enjoying books real quick because there’s not much else left. I’m not a doctor or a scientist so I’m not going to question the decision because there is obviously a massive health crisis happening in this country right now. It’s probably for the best to just punt on the spring and we’ll all regroup for the greatest summer of TV programming ever created. Imagine the NBA Finals, Stanley Cup Finals, The Masters, MLB, and NFL Training Camp all going on at the same exact time? It will make Sweeps Week look like public access television in comparison.

With that being said I am left here to twiddle my thumbs and scroll through twitter all day and night. Theres only so many World Star videos a man can watch and I’m already pretty over the Toilet Paper heist stories. My advice is to watch *everything* in your Netflix queue, even that shit you don’t actually care about, but tell yourself you do because you’re cultured. Like that documentary on yoga thats been sitting in my queue for months. I’ve done yoga once in my life so why did I save a documentary on yoga in my queue? Because I had zero intention of watching it unless oh ya know the entire country shut down and every sports league ceased to exist for the foreseeable future.

If you need somewhere to start, check out The 300s Top 30 TV Shows of The Decade.

So that and mass amounts of video games will be played. The big guns at EA, Sony, Activision, Microsoft, Nintendo, Rockstar etc. would be wise to offer some discounts on their titles because I am liable to buy half a dozen vidyagames right now.

This is like the reckoning for all of our short attention spans. We’ve all been constantly stimulated by TV, internet, sports, and our phones 24/7 for the past decade and now we’re all being forced to entertain ourselves for the first time. Godspeed boys.

The XFL is Recruiting a Massive Free Agent: Guy Fieri

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Everybody knows that Guy Fieri is a taste maker plain and simple. The man has gone through the black hole of pop culture and come out on the other side only more popular. A guy that became famous for his wacky personality and bleach blonde hair on a Food Network TV show was ripe to be mocked in the age of twitter. Except he sort of owned it and because of that has endeared himself to the entire internet. Seriously, he’s even getting his own Funko POP figure!

And now the entire XFL is out hunting to secure Guy Fieri as the celebrity face of their franchise.

It’s part social media marketing, part legitimate business growth strategy; the guy has incredible visibility. I’ve seen him on TV at the NBA All-Star game and the Super Bowl in the last month alone. He’s even best buds with one Julian Edelman.

Plus who doesn’t love crushing a few eps of Triple D on a lazy Sunday afternoon?

By sharing and retweeting basically any meme out there about him, Guy Fieri has gone meta and come out more popular than ever. If marketing is about branding then Guy Fieri a marketing master because people know him and they know exactly what he’s about.

It’s actually a strategy Mike Bloomberg is now throwing his money behind in an attempt to become the next viral presidential candidate.

Who knew the key to the XFL’s success may have been hiding in Flavortown all along?

Miss Football Already? Well the XFL Kicks Off This Weekend!

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Two long years since its announcement, Vince McMahon is finally set to unveil yet another football league to compete with complement the NFL. Unlike the AAF, which flamed out in spectacular fashion, the XFL at least has the benefit of not competing directly with the NFL by kicking off after the Super Bowl.

The first XFL commercial I’ve seen has been *extremely* generous in it’s description of the talent playing in the league. With a roster led by the likes of former Ohio State QB Cardale “We didn’t come here to play school” Jones

and Connor Cook, who’s best known for unceremoniously snatching the Big Ten Championship game MVP trophy.

Not exactly the stuff of fantasy football dreams so expectations need to be tempered.

I will say however, I am pretty excited for some of the rule tweaks the XFL will utilize. Most of the rulebook is the same just with a focus on speeding up the game. There are a few minor tweaks like moving back the kickoffs and eliminating extra point attempts, but the biggest rule tweak I’m most excited for is the double forward pass.

Yup, something that is not legal in any level of football and would even get you flagged in a pickup football game is about to, hopefully, become a staple in XFL playbooks. Just think of the possibilities if you’re a team running the RPO with the ability to then throw a double forward pass. My mouth is watering just thinking of the ridiculous plays we’ll see on SportsCenter Twitter.

I think the biggest selling point for the league is actually this: what the hell else are you doing on Saturday afternoon? The XFL schedule will play two games each on Saturday and Sunday for the next 10 weeks until the playoffs start, assuming the league has not gone out of business by that point. If nothing else this makes for great day drinking background noise at worst and an entertaining 90 minutes at best.

I’ll give it a shot.

Chad Ochocinco is Trying Out for the XFL. As a Kicker.

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So Mattes and I were discussing the XFL earlier and the one question he asked me was, “will you watch?” My answer was the same as it was for that disaster that was the AAF: I’m going to try. Where the AAF was just bad NFL football, at least the XFL will be playing with some rule tweaks to make the game quicker and differentiate it from the NFL.

Now Vince McMahon does sees much more wary of turning the XFL into a circus act like it was the first time around so you don’t see many big name former NFL players in the league just to grab attention. It looks like they’re trying to build something semi legitimate so maybe he doesn’t want former wide receivers joining the league as kickers, but hey lets see what he’s got at least.

I mean it’s not a total gimmick either; the man has legitimately kicked field goals in NFL games before. Against the Patriots no less.

As a well known FIFA diehard Ochocinco is no stranger to striking and apparently he can boot the ball.

Unfortunately for Ocho, the XFL nearly eliminated the need for a kicker by removing extra point field goal attempts. They also pushed the kickoff back 10 yards from where the NFL and college does it so unless you’re kicking it 75+ yards you’re probably not getting many touchbacks.

All I know is football is more fun when Chad Ochocinco is a part of it so I’m pulling for him.

The XFL Announces the First Pool of Players in the Draft and It is…Underwhelming

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This is…disappointing. Did I expect Tim Tebow and Colin Kaepernick to carry the XFL flag out of the tunnel?  No, but maybe a couple of names I actually recognized. They couldn’t even get a guy like Trent Richardson after he failed in the AAF? And where’s Johnny Manziel for christs sake? This league was built for him…which I also said about him and the CFL and the AAF….but thats besides the point.

Oh and the great Landry Jones doesn’t count because he already signed with the league and per its rules the XFL will be assigning a QB to each team. Vince McMahon has seen how many NFL teams are complete disasters because they can’t find a QB so he’s trying to micro-manage that problem and nip it in the bud.

Okay, so not a vast and deep pool of talent, but lets see what we got here. If you are a college football nerd then you’re on your own because this list is ranked on dudes I actually recognized and remember watching at some point.

1.) Connor Cook – Easily the biggest name in this entire draft pool. Cook was a pretty damn good QB at Michigan State and was once even looked at as a potential starter in the NFL when the Raiders drafted him in the 4th round in 2016. Hell he even started a playoff game after Derek Carr got injured, but he never really caught on and bounced around the league for a couple years and got released a few times. You may also remember Cook for looking like a total dickhead snatching the Big Ten Championship game MVP trophy from Archie Griffin.

 

2.) Roberto Aguayo – One of the best kickers in NCAA history turned the biggest bust of a kicker in NFL history. Aguayo was a stud at Florida State (most accurate kicker in ACC history and 3rd in NCAA history) before the guy went OFF THE RAILS in dumpster fire fashion playing for the Bucs. So much so that I worry about the guy a little bit, so hopefully he gets back on track in the XFL. The Bucs literally traded up into the 2nd round for Aguayo before he missed a boatload of kicks and was unceremoniously cut.

3.) Devin Lucien – If this name sounds familiar its because he was a 7th round draft pick of the Patriots in 2016 who became a pre-season darling before failing to make the team.

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4.) Sealver Siliga – Another former Patriot! Siliga played 3 seasons for the Patriots making 13 starts with 5.5 sacks and 95 tackles.

5.) Darron Thomas – Thomas played QB at Oregon so thats the one and only reason he caught my eye. Thomas was actually a pretty good QB for the Ducks in the post-Dennis Dixon pre-Marcus Mariota era. Thomas led Oregon to the National Championship game in 2011, which they lost to Cam Newton and Auburn. I remember that game vividly because Mattes and I watched it in a Chilis like the scrubs that we are. You probably unfamiliar with his work because Thomas left Oregon early to enter the NFL Draft and got neither drafted nor signed as a free agent before kicking around the Canadian Football League, Champions Professional Indoor Football League, Arena Football League, Major League Football (which I’ve never even heard of because it never actually played a game), Indoor Football League, and even played for the Worcester Pirates in the National Arena League last year!

6.) HANDSOME Tanielu – What a name. Only reason he made the list.

 

Woo! The XFL Draft is sneaking up and then the inaugural  latest XFL season kicks off in February, 2020. Catch the fever!

The XFL Draft is Going to Be Like a Fantasy Football Draft On Speed

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PFT – The XFL will be making some noise next week, with a two-day draft that will allow the eight teams to fill out 71-man rosters. The draft happens on Tuesday and Wednesday, October 15 and 16.

Quarterbacks won’t be drafted, at least not all of them. One quarterback — presumably a perceived starter — will be “assigned” to each team by the XFL. The draft then will proceed with five phases: (1) skill-position players; (2) offensive linemen; (3) defensive front seven; (4) defensive backs; and (5) open draft, for all positions and specialists. The first four phases will result in teams choosing 10 players each; the last phase will continue until the 71-man rosters are filling.

Teams will have only 90 seconds to make their picks, via video conference with the XFL’s main office in Connecticut.

You know what my biggest complaint about live fantasy football drafts always is? That after the first 2 rounds every pick takes 7 minutes because Steve didn’t do his research. And by Steve, I mean me, because I don’t know who the freaking backup TE is in Jacksonville. Either way those live drafts are fun, but can easily take 4 hours, which is why online drafts are great. Even if you don’t know who you want to pick, tough shit because you’re getting someone. Now the NFL gives each team 10 minutes per pick in the first round and then 4-7 minutes per pick after that. Well the XFL is here to speed things along.

Each team will get a grand total of 90 seconds to make every one of their picks. LIGHTNING ROUND! Whether thats enough to make an intelligent business decision is none of my concern.

Vince McMahon promised change, speed, and entertainment. I don’t know if that necessarily translates into good football, but thats where the AAF failed; they didn’t bring anything new to the table. Sure the XFL made an official announcement that LANDRY JONES joined the league (former Steelers backup QB) as its first player, which probably speaks more to the quality of competition than I care to admit, but hey at least the XFL will be different. If that means I can bang out an entire XFL game in the time it takes to rewatch Happy Gilmore for the 100th time then I’ll check it out. What I’m not doing is devoting 2-3 hours to a subpar product. The XFL is fast food, which is fine. Theres a place in my diet for fast food every once in a while. Just don’t pretend to be something you’re not and I think 90 second draft slots are the first step in that direction.

Christmas Came Early, the XFL Team Names and Logos are Here

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So the XFL announced the names of every team and unveiled their official logos today, which is pretty exciting considering its August 21st and the Patriots are still playing fauxball.

February 2020 cannot come soon enough. The Patriots will be coming off their 4th Super Bowl title in six years after repeating as champs and then we can coast into Vince McMahon’s little football experiment. The AAF failed because it was financed and run by people who had apparently never run a business a day in their lives. Vince has been running one of the most successful entertainment organizations ever for the past 30+ years. If nothing else the man knows how to put on a show.

I was cautiously optimistic about this announcement because these expansion leagues always seem to have the WORST team names. (Looking at you, Atlanta Legends)

So how’d Vince do? Lets break em down.

Houston Roughnecks – First off, I absolutely LOVE the Roughnecks logo, an excellent shoutout to the Oilers of the old days. We have an early favorite folks.

Dallas Renegades – Obviously you have to put at least one team in Texas considering high school football games in Texas draw bigger than some professional teams. The name Renegades screams expansion team though, weak name. Give me something spicy.

LA Wildcats – This sounds like the name of the Rams’ cheer squad. Boooo

New York Guardians – Meh. They’re a silent New York Guardian, a watchful protector, a dark knight that will probably lose a bunch of games by the sheer fact of being too close to the Knicks/Jets/Giants/Mets.

St. Louis BattleHawks – I have no idea what a BattleHawk is, nobody does really, but I fuck with it. Bad ass name.

Seattle Dragons – Any time a new team pulls the ole reliable “Dragon” name off the shelf, I can’t help but go back to Papa Giorgio’s hilarious story of how the Islanders came to have a bastard dragon for a mascot.

Tampa Bay Vipers – I will say the name Viper has come back into vogue thanks almost entirely to one Oberyn Martell before he (spoiler alert) met his untimely demise. Plus its Florida so encountering a pack of Vipers is a very real possibility. Vipers are OK by me.

DC Defenders – Alliteration! Decent idea, but poor exectution. What are they defending? Are they defending Vince McMahon’s idea to launch a bootleg football league for the second time in 20 years? Are they the Marvel Defenders? Prop bet idea: What gets cancelled quicker? The Defenders on Netflix or the DC Defenders of the XFL?

Now I just have to decide which team to stan for so I would like to announce that my XFL fanhood free agency period has officially opened. Let the bidding commence.

The BIG3 Just Announced Its Team Rosters and Boy Oh Boy They Are STACKED

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The BIG 3 is returning for its third season this summer and it seems to only be growing as it released their team rosters today and they are STACKED.

Just in case you forgot, we are quite fond of the BIG3 here. We even had Mattes go cover a game in person last year. And that was before they stacked the deck with some big time names.

Top names playing in the BIG3 this year include Kendrick Perkins and Greg Oden on the same team to create maybe the biggest “What if these guys never got hurt” duo in basketball history. The Celtics win 2 out 3 NBA titles, the Trailblazers are still one of the best teams in the league, going to war with KD and whatever team he’s playing for at the time.

Mario Chalmers!

Brian Scalabrine returns of course and should probably have equity in this league if he doesn’t already because the White Mamba puts asses in the seats.

Agent Zero himself Gilbert Arenas joins the BIG3 this season and I could not be more excited. Arenas, before all his gunplay problems, practically invented the 28 foot pull up jumper that is so common today. Where you think Damian Lillard learned that move?

Lamar Odom is returning from the grave/the clutches of the Kardashians to play some ball and you gotta think that guy is happy to just be alive at this point. Good for him.

Mike Bibby, Ricky Davis, and Carlos Boozer just seem like a pretty solid, well built team. Plus, if they get into any scuffles Mike Bibby 2.0 will just start beating people up as all he’s done since retiring is lift anything and everything.

Stephen Jackson and Metta World Peace are teaming up to become the bad boys of the league. Coached by the goddamn oak tree himself Charles Oakley no less. Nobody is messing with that team.

The Power will be a trip down elite bench player memory lane for anyone my age with guys like Corey Maggette, Chris Birdman Andersen, Ryan Gomes(!) and Glen Big Baby Davis who somehow avoided going to federal pound me in the ass prison after a drug arrest.

Jason Terry is also playing this year, which raises the question is Jason Terry finally retired orrrr

Nearly spit my drink out when I saw Terry pulling up for 3 in a game for Milwaukee last season.

Former Celtics draft picks Joe Johnson and Big Al Jefferson will be joining forces to be the favorite team of any Celtics fan over the age of 30.

To round it all out we have Jermaine O’Neal, Amar’e Stoudemire and Nate Robinson, but I have to say it is an absolute crime that Ice Cube doesn’t have Nate Robinson and Glen Davis on the same team. Does he not remember the days of Shrek and Donkey??

They even got legit AF names coaching as well with Gary Payton, Rick Barry, Rick Mahorn, Charles Oakley, Kenyon Martin, Lisa Leslie, and Dr. freaking J just to name a few.

How about the BIG3 being the only new sports league to not only avoid going out of business, yet actually thrive? The AAF went out of business before I even needed to refill my car’s tank of gas, the XFL is looking to improve upon its high score of 1 season completed, meanwhile the BIG3 is just adding teams and big time names left and right.

Maybe we’ll send Mattes back out to another BIG3 game this year with a real mic so he can actually get Scal namedropping The 300s Podcast on tape.

The AAF Has Officially Folded. We Hardly Knew Ye

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SI – The Alliance of American Football will suspend football operations on Tuesday, reports ProFootballTalk. The league is just eight weeks into its inaugural season.

SI’s Albert Breer reported AAF team officials have a conference call with the league office at 1 p.m. ET. Breer reported there’s a perception inside the league that AAF majority owner Tom Dundon bought a bought a stake in the league for the gambling app being developed with one source saying, “Dundon got the technology he wanted and he’s now minus one rather large headache.” SI’s Conor Orr reported league heads were stunned and still working on a solution.

According to ProFootballTalk, the league is not folding yet but it is heading that way.

The writing has been on the wall for a while now as I’ve already written a few blogs over the past month about the AAF nearly going out of business and it’s barely Month 3 of the league’s lifespan. Welp, that’ll do it for the AAF apparently, who is heading the way of the dinosaur.

I won’t rehash the same things I said in my last blog on this, but here’s what I had to say on a league not having a plan to make it through even one season:

“Who is running these leagues? Obviously we’ve seen football leagues come and go over the past 20 years as the NFL has maintained its stranglehold on consumers’ attention without even lifting a finger. Most of these leagues fail because its just morons running the business side of things it would seem.

In marketing they say the average person needs to see an ad or a brand message seven times before it sticks. Now apply that to the AAF. How many AAF games do you think the average sports fan has watched? One? Maybe two? The AAF *had* to be prepared for slow adoption, otherwise it was a stupid business venture.”

But then there’s that tidbit from Bert Breer’s report that Tom Dundon, the Carolina Hurricanes owner that invested $250M to save the league last month, has basically sold the league not for its football but for it’s technological IP.

If thats true that is wild and I can imagine the other owners are bullshit. Those other owners probably feel swindled for paying to build up this football league only to have an investor come in and sell the whole thing for parts. But hey thats what happens when you sell majority ownership to a billionaire; you give up control. It’s fascinating just because I’ve never heard of anything like it. For all of its failings, the AAF was at least trying out innovative things, like the makings of a gambling app apparently.

Then on the other side of the Football Leagues Competing With the NFL coin is Vince McMahon who smells blood in the water now.

“Vince McMahon, who plans to give the XFL another shot next year, has sold $272 million worth of WWE stock, and company filings say that money will primarily go toward the XFL..McMahon has said he’s ready to spend $500 million over the first three years of the XFL to get the league off the ground, suggesting that even if the league struggles to gain traction at first, he’ll stick with it rather than pulling the plug after one season”

Vince seems to be pretty confident, cocky some would say, that he has fixed the issues that plagued the XFL the first time around. Despite the fact that a very similar concept just failed spectacularly, Vince has doubled down and is apparently ready to pour $500 million into the XFL.

Who knows if the XFL will be any more successful than the AAF, but I’ll tell you one thing, Vince will not fail because of a lack of marketing and promotion. Thats his bread and butter so don’t be surprised to see mass media promotions and gigantic billboards featuring Johnny Football, maybe Colin Kaepernick and whatever other fringe NFL players with a big name that they can find. Either way, this whole 2-3 year drama of new football leagues popping up and dying off will be a fascinating case study of monopolies in American business as the NFL crushes these competitors without even lifting a finger.

Speaking of Manziel, he’s the voice of reason and restraint here today, which was refreshing to see. My man is once again a free agent and as I’ve said before, it’s probably XFL or bust for his football career at this point.

Johnny Manziel Released, Barred from Playing in CFL for Violating His Contract. Sigh.

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ESPN – The Montreal Alouettes released quarterback Johnny Manziel on Wednesday, saying he “contravened the agreement which made him eligible to play” in the Canadian Football League. The CFL said Manziel is not eligible to sign with another team in the league, which had his full rights for two seasons.

“We are disappointed by this turn of events. Johnny was provided a great deal of support by our organization, in collaboration with the CFL, but he has been unable to abide by the terms of his agreement,” Alouettes general manager Kavis Reed said in a statement. “We worked with the league and presented alternatives to Johnny, who was unwilling to proceed.”

It is unclear what Manziel did to violate the agreement with the Alouettes and the CFL.

Manziel, 26, played for the Alouettes last season in an attempt to resurrect his career. In eight games, he completed 106 passes in 165 attempts for 1,290 yards, with five touchdowns and seven interceptions. Montreal traded two players and two first-round picks to Hamilton last July for Manziel’s rights.

Next stop XFL? I don’t know what Johnny may have done here, but it’s probably not a great sign that a guy with a long and checkered past filled with drinking and drug problems randomly gets cut on a Wednesday afternoon.

Manziel has not played well in the CFL either, which was disappointing with the lesser competition he was facing north of the border, but he did suffer a concussion early on last season so that couldn’t have helped. Normally I would say this is probably the end of the line for a player, but as luck would have it not one but TWO new football leagues have recently sprung up as options.

It might be a little late in the season for a quarterback to jump into the AAF seeing as its already Week 3 of a 10 game season, but hey bums like Christian Hackenberg are getting benched as we speak so  you never know.

However…the XFL begins play in 2020. You know Vince McMahon loves a star and the bad boy persona of Johnny Football could be the perfect poster child for the XFL’s inaugural season. With just under a year until XFL play begins it would give Manziel a full offseason to get in shape, learn the playbook and ingratiate himself with a new team. All of which is a moot point if he is dealing with some bigger life problems. Who knows, but the guy was so fun to watch at A&M, I hope he gets his life back on track, even if it’s XFL or bust at this point.