Who Doesn’t Want 12 Months of Football

Who Doesn’t Want 12 Months of Football

Published: Saturday, Feb 8th 2020, 8:02pm

By: Stephen Safinuk (@Safimod)

Let me start this by saying, I love my CFL football. There is a reason I do a podcast/blog relating to CFL football, and it isn’t to get rich. It’s because CFL football is my passion. For me, CFL football will always be number one. But I love football – plain and simple. College Football, CFL, NFL, it doesn’t matter. If I’m flipping through the channels and I see a game on, odds are I’m stopping to watch – much to my wife’s chagrin. I spent a good portion of my free time either talking about football, writing about football, or watching football.

Having said that, other than CFL free agency in February, there is absolutely nothing football related between February and May and I hate it. This afternoon in Washington, that changed. Vince McMahon’s second attempt at professional football, XFL 2.0, kicked off with the DC Defenders at home to the Seattle Dragons. This weekend, we will see 12 hours of professional spring football, and I am here for it.

On the flip side, we are back to the CFL and NFL fans who seems to enjoy nothing more than crapping on anything that doesn’t fit their brand of football. I get it – you love the CFL. Or you love the NFL. Anything else is awful and needs to fail. We see it in the NFL snobs who look down at the CFL as a second tier league, and now we’re seeing it from both NFL and CFL folks alike as they look down their nose at the XFL.

My question is – why? If you don’t want to watch XFL football, nobody is going to force you to do that. But for those of us who love football, what’s so bad about another league running from February to May to tide us over until the CFL kicks off again? If the XFL isn’t your thing, or you’re “CFL or nothing” just turn the channel and let us enjoy 12 months of football. The XFL isn’t going to kill the CFL. In fact, quite the opposite in my opinion. A successful spring league might force the CFL to continue to work to improve year in and year out.

The XFL has some interesting new rules that certainly make things interesting. The new kickoff rules will be fun once teams get the hang of it. Adding a 3 point convert option after touchdowns could make things interesting late into the 4^th quarter. The two forward pass rule is one that would certainly be interesting in the CFL.

Is the XFL great football? No, not yet. Its game 1 of a brand-new start up league. But what it is, is football during our usual quiet time, and that alone makes it better. If you’re going into things already hoping it fails, solely because its not the CFL football – please stop. If you don’t want to watch, nobody will force you to watch XFL football. But for those of us crazy folks that can’t get enough football, let us enjoy 12  months of football in peace. The CFL will be back in May, but until then the XFL is the only game in town. Feel free to change the channel, I’m sure there is something else on for you to enjoy.

Go Vipers!