NFL to Launch Historic Professional Flag Football League with $32M Investment

The NFL announced Wednesday that is investing up to $32 million into a new professional flag football league.

Organized flag football continues to grow in popularity and will make its Olympic debut at the 2028 Los Angeles Games.

While the NFL hasn't announced which group it will partner with for the venture, Bloomberg reported in October that the two finalists were "TMRW Sports led by Tiger Woods and Rory McIlroy and a consortium led by former running back Curtis Martin that includes sports investor Marc Lasry, according to people familiar with the discussions."

The NFL said in a statement at the time that there has been "tremendous interest from a variety of companies. We continue to make great strides to determine operational leads that will position us for long-term success."

It would not be surprising to see the flag-footballing venture debut before the 2028 L.A. Olympics.

"We're going to commit to creating a women's professional league and a men's professional flag league," NFL commissioner Roger Goodell said in October. "We've had a great deal of interest in that and expect that we'll be able to do that and launch that in the next couple of years."

"We're looking at this as something we think is going to be a great opportunity to continue to get people playing football, both men and women," Goodell added at the NFL meetings in May. "I think what we're looking for are creative partners, strategic partners—people who can bring value to us. Capital is less interesting to us."

As for the Olympic tournament, NFL players will be eligible to participate and a country's roster could in theory be completely comprised of such players, though they may only feature on player per NFL team.