The UFL’s first season went well. Better than the 2023 seasons of the two leagues that came together to create the UFL.
Via Sports Business Journal, the UFL’s 40 regular-season games on ABC, Fox, ESPN, ESPN2, and FS1 averaged 816,000 viewers. Last year, the USFL averaged 601,000 viewers, and the XFL averaged 622,000.
The key is that the UFL had a larger presence on broadcast TV. Six games (all on broadcast TV) had audiences in excess of a million.
That’s a great start, and it suggests that maybe this spring league will do better than those that came before it, all of which failed. While there were various reasons for it (including COVID), they failed. The UFL seems to be doing well.
The postseason starts this weekend, with San Antonio at St. Louis and Michigan at Birmingham. The winners meet on June 16 in St. Louis.
There’s still room for growth. Certain business decisions (like not keeping the XFL kickoff and not having St. Louis host a game in Week 1) held the league back. Good business decisions will better position the league for success.
The best thing the league does is officiating. There’s transparency and a full commitment to technology. The sooner the NFL borrows that approach, the better off the NFL will be.
