Whether either of the two minor football leagues playing this year will get fans to care remains to be seen. But with the latest edition of the XFL kicking off this weekend, some of the new rules make for some interesting strategic discussions.
One such discussion took place on the Houston Roughnecks’ sideline on Saturday night, while they had a 30-12 lead in the fourth quarter. In the NFL, that would be a three-possession lead, but in the XFL it was only a two-possession lead: The XFL has three-point conversions, where the offense snaps the ball at the 10-yard line and gets three points for running or passing it into the end zone, so a team trailing by 18 could tie the game with two touchdowns and two three-point conversions.
Roughnecks coach Wade Phillips was cognizant of that with his team in field goal range, and he decided to kick a field goal to make it a three-possession game.
“We’re 18 points ahead. We go to 21, they’ve got to score three times,” said Phillips, on the XFL broadcast where coaches where microphones and their comments are aired live.
Houston made the field goal and won 33-12.
