By Jason Powell, ProWrestling.net Editor (@prowrestlingnet)
The launch of the new XFL delivered lower television ratings for week one than the previous relaunch. The first game produced 1.54 million viewers for a Saturday afternoon game on ABC. The Saturday night game delivered 1.14 million viewers on ESPN. Sunday afternoon’s ABC game produced 1.57 million viewers, and the Sunday night game on FX averaged 918,000 viewers.
Powell’s POV: The weekend XFL numbers were down at least 50 percent from the previous XFL relaunch three years earlier, according to SportsMediaWatch.com. Worse yet, the site notes that the viewership count for the previous relaunch did not include out-of-home-viewing. I was shocked by the lack of marketing push for the latest version of the XFL. Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson and Dany Garcia have their work cut out for them as they try to make the twice failed league successful.
I had no idea it was on
Bad football, people are starting to get sick of Dwayne, and the USFL is paying more so most of the best players for the spring leagues are going to start playing in about 6 weeks.
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. The masses don’t give a shit about minor league football. I watched a bit of the first game and they had some names that I recognized. In fact, more than I anticipated. But I don’t care about newly made teams that I have zero connection to playing inferior football. FWIW, I did watch every season of Last Chance U on Netflix when that was around. They told the stories of players I’d never heard of and made me care about them.