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- The XFL and CFL reveal they’ve opened talks to “work together”
- The CFL has suffered badly due to COVID-19 – could a merger with the XFL help?
- But what might the XFL get out of it?
Wow – the CFL and XFL today publicly announced a potential partnership. Well, sort of. But still.
Folks, in the immortal words of Good Ol’ JR – business is about to pick up.
In a shared statement, the Canadian Football League (CFL) and Extreme Football League (XFL) announced that they had “agreed to work together”.
Could talks turn into a full-blown merger? You bet, a merger could be on the table, given the released statement places no restrictions or boundaries on what the partnership could entail.
Read the full statement here.
What might it mean?
It’s very early stages of course, with little information given from the joint CFL and XFL statement but a merger could happen. The CFL, to some fans, might seem like a joke but it does have heritage – being founded in 1958. Future NFL stars like Warren Moon and others made their names in the CFL also.
Interestingly, the XFL had committed to returning in 2022 however, according to ESPN’s story on today’s news “planning for the XFL’s 2022 season is on pause pending the outcome of conversations with the CFL.”
This gives an indication of how seriously the XFL is taking this exploration of talks (and potentially mulling a merger) and how it might reshape the XFL for 2022. Meanwhile, the CFL plans to start its regular season by May 2021. Given the current Covid-19 situation, this may seem an ambitious target to say the least.
Today’s announcement also hits upon something XFL chairwoman and owner Dany Garcia has spoken about previously of turning the former-Vince McMahon run league into a global brand. Could Canada and the associated heritage of the CFL offer the quickest way to achieve this?
Why now for the XFL and CFL?
An interview CFL Commissioner Randy Ambrosie had with ESPN might offer some insight (from the CFL’s perspective anyway, not the XFL’s). In May 2020 as the pandemic raged he said: “Unlike large U.S.-based leagues, our biggest source of revenue is not TV, it’s ticket sales.”
Ambrosie was also forced to defend requesting a whopping combined $150 million in assistance from the Canadian government to offset the effects of a Covid-cancelled season. He said that the CFL was “as much a part of Canadian culture as we are a part of the Canadian sports landscape.” The Canadian government subsequently turned down a slimed down $30 million loan request down.
The CFL completely cancelled the 2020 season in August 2020. The XFL folded in 2020.
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What are the potential benefits fo the XFL and CFL?
For the both leagues it might also, on a very basic level, offer a chance to share some of the heavy costs of running a league as well as some obvious synergies.
Both don’t follow the standard American Football rules – both the XFL and CFL have their own interpretation of the rules. Could this mean a joint experimentation with the rulebook to standardise the game?
Whereas the CFL relied heavily on fan attendance the XFL was trying to build this when it relaunched in 2020 for the second time. The interest from some cities, especially St. Louis showed the XFL could succeed (read more about this here) but these were outliers compared to wider attendance in the league. The CFL already has an established base which could help the XFL to instantly expand to new territories with a plugged in fanbase already there. The CFL has averaged no fewer than 20,000 attendees each game for every season since 1963. That’s not to be sniffed at.
Meanwhile, could a joint venture help to build better rosters of players through a combined effort, making a CFL and XFL league (or leagues) a real, viable feeder league for the NFL? The idea being that a joint effort would have more resources to build a sustainable league (especially for the XFL). It looked like some XFL stars might have actually joined the CFL too.
The final factor is that X factor (excuse the badly made pun). A merged, or joint league venture brings genuine intrigue and interest from regular fans – at a time when both the CFL and XFL need it most due to the Covid-19 pandemic messing up well laid plans for both leagues.
My final thought on this – what must Vince McMahon be thinking of a potential CFL and XFL merger?
What I wouldn’t give to know the Chairman Of The Board’s opinion on this one.
