[177258]

I don't really know anything about it apart from a few adverts promoting it on WWF programming back in the day but can anybody answer a few questions for me? My very basic knowledge of it if any, is that it was Wrestling and American Football mixed together

Was it real?
What were the rules?
What was the major factor in its failure?
How was wrestling incorporated into the game? (If at all. I'm not sure)

If anybody thinks they know how it could be been successful if it was possible, then I'd like to hear your thoughts.



Sent from Verticalsports.com Free App

 

[Paladine]

From what I remember it had no wrestling aspect at all. It was legit football, but more focused on entertainment. They did alot of work establishing cheerleader teams and using the sexiest girls they could find. Most of the promotion ads showed footage of the girls training and dancing from what I remember.

It just went against NFL and no one could pull that off. Not even vinnie mac...

Sent from Verticalsports.com Free App

 

[chargebeam]

They talk about it in the McMahon DVD. Pretty absurd stuff. I missed it all cause I didn't care about football at the time.

 

[WWE]

It was real, I believe it was actual players who wanted to make it in the NFL. McMahon recruited them and it was like regular NFL, but with Vince's vision

 

[chargebeam]

Holy crap at the opening intro.

 

[TSE]

XFL was a colossal failure because it only marketed towards 18-40 year old men and tried incorporating "sports entertainment" elements into it which made it feel less like a sport.

 

[Rick_James]

I don't really know anything about it apart from a few adverts promoting it on WWF programming back in the day but can anybody answer a few questions for me? My very basic knowledge of it if any, is that it was Wrestling and American Football mixed together

Was it real?
What were the rules?
What was the major factor in its failure?
How was wrestling incorporated into the game? (If at all. I'm not sure)

If anybody thinks they know how it could be been successful if it was possible, then I'd like to hear your thoughts.



Sent from Verticalsports.com Free App

Yes, it was real, it was damn real. Actually it started out with a huge amount of viewers, I don't know the exact number but I remember that first week A LOT watched it. I'll try to answer some of these questions.

There were rules, I'm not big on football in the first place, but the rules were slightly different here, and I remember if you did something like score a touch down you could get on the mic and talk shit for 30 seconds or something too. The idea before hand was that this was "more dangerous than regular football" because of the rules, but there were so many, a lot of fans criticized this fact as saying it was no different.

I think a major factor in it failing was Vince being too vocal about it being "real football", when the NFL players were obviously superior, the critics tore into the league big time. By the end of the season there were regularly news columns about the whole thing being a joke. There were a few players that did transition into the NFL though, but not many.

As for wrestling being incorporated.... not really, besides that touch down rule where you could talk on the mic lol. The WWE did cross promotion though, I remember Jericho wearing one of the guys jerseys.... all I can remember is the guy's jersey said "He Hate Me" lol.

Not sure how they could've been more successful, again, Vince being so vocal about the whole promotion despite inferior players lead to the critics being *brutal*. A lot of the games weren't that good though either, it's hard to say they should be modest though, knowing McMahon in particular, but when starting a league you want a lot of publicity under normal conditions.

Been a long time since then obviously, but hope some of this helped.

 

[Deptford]

LETS GO LIGHTNING CLAP CLAP CLAP CLAP CLAP

 

[dxbender]

It was real, but because of it's association with WWF(even though WWF was popular at the time) many people just assumed it was fake/scripted.

The players were real football players, but none were good enough for NFL(the quality was probably less than AFL-CFL level).

The wrestling aspect of the XFL was that we had WWF people(commentators/announcers mostly) who were the commentators and stuff for the XFL.


XFL was obviously horrible idea, and I still wish that one day the McMahons do buy a sports team. An entire league was way too much for them, but buying a sports franchise..maybe it'll happen one day? Shane McMahon seems like the person most fit of the McMahons to own a sports team.

 

[chargebeam]

And they wonder why the XFL crashed...

 

[Yato]

One of the few players I remember from the XFL.

 

[OldschoolHero]

Tommy Maddox was also a qb for the league. He was the Steelers starter for a couple years after the xfl folded.

 

[Quasi Juice]

Think about how much money that must have cost. Jesus.

 

[Guy LeDouche]

He Hate Me. :ti

 

[dddsssccc]

It folded for the obvious reasons of finances. The league was just losing too much money. I remember that from watching the Sportscenter report about it being cancelled.

I remember seeing one player basically German suplex another player when tackling him and I guess it was legal. There was no flag on the play at least. It was funny stuff.

I think we could use something like the XFL today. Not exactly the same but something similar. The rules in the NFL are so ticky-tac and there's a portion of the football fan base that are frustrated and miss the old school, physical, violent style of football.

 

[dobbies]

About 10 or so players went on to the super bowl I read. I don't pretend to know too much about football rules (I'm irish) but from what I hear some of the rules foreshadowed future things that would happen in the nfl.

A lot of the hate was unwarranted. I remember Vince getting attacked for a cheerleader segment, then a Cowboys incident that was exactly the same was hailed a year later or something.

 

[Attitude 3:16]

The arrogance and ego of the Vin Man to take on a business he knows nothing about lol

The first show pulled in a 10.4 rating I believe though.

 

[RKing85]

I will forever cherish my Birmingham Bolts jersey and my LA Extreme football.

 

[Hotdiggity11]

It was big the first half of the first season. I remember my dad being elated for it because it was promoted as more old fashioned smash mouth football. Of course, like many, he quickly drifted away from it. One of the big problems was most of the competitors were just those who didn't make the NFL and so this was their alternative. One of the big appealing factors of the NFL is that they get all the stars that come from the college ranks. You didn't know anyone on the XFL teams and so it made it near impossible to have favorites until it could stay into existence for a few years [Which didn't happen].

 

[Brickhouse]

It set some kind of record for a ratings drop between Week 1 and Week 2. Lots of hype and curiosity. Very few people liked what they saw.

The most insane part of this idea was that it went from conception to action in barely over a year. That is not nearly enough time to do something right and it was no surprise to anyone when it came off as half-assed.

Between Vince's attention being divided and replacing Chris Kreski with his talentless daughter and her Conan reject writers in creative, it's no wonder the week-to-week quality of WWE dropped sharply around the time the XFL kicked off.