UFL: The Debut

You may not have noticed, but another football league debuted Thursday evening.

The United Football League took the field, as the Las Vegas Locomotives defeated the California Redwoods 30-17 in the league’s first-ever game.

For those of us that watched, it was definitely a big upgrade over the last former independent league (XFL). There were also a lot of familiar NFL faces: quarterback J.P. Losman, running back Marcel Shipp, running back DeDe Dorsey and head coach Jim Fassel to name a few.

In bouncing around Web this morning and last night, I wasn’t able to find a great deal of exposure given to the league, which cannot be considered promising with it being in it’s first year and the economy being what it is.

Nonetheless, I’m hoping the four-team league succeeds.

Since NFL Europe closed up shop and the Arena League isn’t playing this year, the NFL could use an “unofficial” developmental league for players, and NFL-hopeful players should get another chance to showcase their skills.

Here are some more items/thoughts about the league’s first game:

The Las Vegas Review-Journal reports UFL officials were hoping for a crowd of 15,000, but the actual attendenence wasn’t even a third of that, even though the announced attendance was 14,209 fans.

Mike Freeman, of CBSSports.com, believes someone gave the UFL a shovel and told them to start digging their own grave by pitting them against the MLB playoffs and college football on Thursday night...

Michael Lombardi of The National Football Post, recommends the UFL play their games in the spring when people are starved for football action…

The next UFL game has the Florida Tuskers playing host to the New York Sentinel this Saturday. Tune in or DVR it; there really is no such thing as too much football, but I will agree with Lombardi in the thought that maybe earlier in the year would be better timing...Give it a shot, who knows, maybe we’ll be playing UFL fantasy leagues in the future, too!

Oh, if you’re interested in more details on the league itself, check out ufl-football.com and their 2009 media guide can be found at: http://www.ufl-football.com/press/2009/10/08/ufl_2009_media_guide