A Bookie's Dream: Football Year Round With Two New Leagues
Bookmakers in the States may have something to look forward to after the Super Bowl besides March Madness with the introduction of two new football leagues, the reboot of Vince McMahon's XFL and, newly announced Tuesday, the Alliance of American Football, backed by the likes of Founders Fund, Slow Ventures, Peter Chernin’s Chernin Group, Adrian Fenty and Charles King’s M Ventures, Keith Rabois, Peter Thiel, and former NFL all-pro Jared Allen. The league is the brainchild of Charlie Ebersol, son of longtime NBC Sports Executive Dick Ebersol. The AAF is slated to begin in February of next year, immediately following the Super Bowl.
CBS has partnered with the new league and will air two games on the network's primetime slot, along with other games on the CBS Sports Network.
The league is boasting increased safety for players, as well as a live-streaming application.
The XFL also plans to broadcast games immediately following the Super Bowl, but that league won't kick off until 2020.
The AAF season will run 10 weeks and will have 50-man teams and hopes to draw fantasy football players as well.
"Fifty-nine million people play fantasy and 20 million people play only fantasy football," Ebersol. "We have to be able to take advantage of the people who just stop playing fantasy when the NFL season ends."
He added: There are 28,000 Division I football players. Only 1,700 have NFL jobs. We're looking for those Kurt Warners working in grocery stores, and we think we will find them."
The eight teams in cities that will be announced in the next three months will start by having regional drafts, protecting eligible players who played in the local community for their college days.
Along with good football and names the local market knows, Ebersol said a hallmark of the league will be no TV timeouts and 60 percent fewer commercials, as well as an innovative approach to broadcasting.
Bookies have to be thinking ahead: What are the odds of both leagues merging and ultimately expanding?
- Don Shapiro, Gambling911.com
