The reboot of the USFL is scheduled for April.
It appears the United States Football League is going to get as much TV exposure as possible for a league that is a startup business. There isn’t much information available about the league which could kickoff in April other than NBCUniversal will carry 21 USFL games in 2022, with eight on NBC, nine on USA Network and four on Peacock. FOX will have 22 games, 12 on the FOX broadcast network and 10 on cable TV’s Fox Sports 1. Right now, there are no players or coaches signed. There seems to be a central football organization that will sign players, coaches and other personnel and assign them to the league’s eight teams. It appears the new league will play all of its games in Birmingham, Alabama although the league has yet to confirm that which is a bit strange in that games are scheduled to start in about 12 weeks and tickets need to be sold.
The eight teams that will hit the field will be playing for the glory of cities and states that will not house them. Well, Birmingham will house the Birmingham Stallions, the Houston Gamblers, the Michigan Panthers, the New Jersey Generals, the New Orleans Breakers, the Philadelphia Stars, the Pittsburgh Maulers and the Tampa Bay Bandits brand names have been revived. The Houston Gamblers franchise was supposed to merge with the New Jersey Generals for the 1986 season. The New Orleans Breakers failed in 1984 after failing in Boston in 1983 and the team finished out USFL history in 1985 in Portland, Oregon. The Philadelphia Stars, the best run USFL outfit, moved to Baltimore in 1985. The Pittsburgh Maulers lasted only one year, 1984. The Tampa Bay Bandits franchise was well run by John Bassett. The league won its antitrust lawsuit with the NFL in 1986 but a jury gave them one dollar in damages forcing the USFL to close up shop.
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