The UFL And the NFL – – By The Numbers

I think it’s time to check in on the UFL in its second season.  The eight teams have played three games apiece; the regular season is 10 games in length and the post season adds another two weekends.  When the UFL season ended last year, folks involved in the league could point to some positive signs for the fledgling spring football league.

On the surface, things are not looking quite as rosy as might have been predicted.

• Last year, TV audiences on the various networks that carried UFL games were around 800,000.  That is not a “knock your socks off” number, but it is a respectable number for a new league trying to sell a product that has not sold well in the past.
• This year, TV audiences are down in the early season to about 650,000.  That is still not a terrible showing, but it is down in the vicinity of 20%.
• The St. Louis franchise was the bellwether of the league last year; for the home opener of last year’s season, the Battlehawks played in front of 40,000 fans; this year, the crowd was 32,000 – – another 20% drop.

True, this is a part of the sporting calendar that provides stiff competition for the UFL.  March Madness and the MLB Opening Day excitement surely took some of the air out of the UFL balloon.  Now those things are in the past along with The Masters so perhaps the UFL can regain some of the eyeballs that it has “lost” so far in Season Two.  We shall see …

One of the cornerstones of the NFL’s dominant place in US sports is the widespread interest in betting on NFL games.  I do not get any sense that gambling on UFL games is taking hold and growing a fanbase motivated to focus attention on the product.  This could be a long haul for the UFL.

Meanwhile, the NFL just chugs along generating revenue.  According to a report in Sports Business Journal, the NFL’s revenue for its last fiscal year (ended in March 2025) was more than $23B.  About 20 years ago, the NFL said its objective was to be a $25B a year business by the middle of this decade.  It certainly looks as if they are on-target to meet that objective.

From reports in Sports Business Journal you might conclude that it would take an utter moron to own an NFL team and lose money.  Consider these two numbers:

1. Each NFL team will share equally in the TV revenue, the national sponsorships and the NFL licensing revenue.  For this fiscal year, that share will be about $415M per team.
2. The largest single expenditure for a team is the salaries they pay to the players.  For the upcoming 2025 season, that number is capped at $279.2M.

So, before a team sells its first game ticket and before it collects its first parking fee and before it sells local broadcast rights and before it gets a piece of the concessions, the owners have at least a surplus of almost $136M.  Cue Sonny and Cher:

“And the beat goes on …”

It is the recognition of those sorts of revenues and costs that makes people like us stop and take a deep breath when team owners ask for – – and receive – – public subsidies for stadiums and practice facilities.  I am not talking about government expenditures for things like roads around the stadium; I mean owners asking for the various levels of government to pay to build the facility itself.  Right now, the focus of that sort of posturing and negotiating is in the State of Ohio where the Browns want to build a new facility in suburban Cleveland and the Bengals say they need an upgrade to their facility.

Without going into detail, the Browns would like about $600M in bonds from the State and another $600M in bonds from the County to cover about half of the cost of a new playpen.  The Bengals say they need $380M from wherever the source for their needed renovations.  Recently, those dealings got some ice water thrown on them when the Governor of Ohio – – Mike DeWine (R) – – said in a radio interview that he opposed such an expenditure.  It’s never a good idea to ask for money from the State and to have the Governor oppose the idea but, in this case, it was a bit more pointed.  That radio interview was aired right after the Ohio House of Representatives passed a bill to authorize such a bond issue.

DeWine’s term as Governor runs through 2026; he is term-limited and must be replaced in January 2027.  Perhaps we will see a classic game of “kick the can down the road” there so that the Browns and Bengals can try to coopt whoever is the new Governor of Ohio two years from now.

Finally, I think it is appropriate to close today with these words from Mark Twain:

“We have the best government that money can buy.”

But don’t get me wrong, I love sports………