Today, on Sunday Surmising, we going to look at “professional” football in the form of the United Football League—whatever that is. Interesting, too, how it has 75 percent of the old “USFL” in its name. You know, that league which actually put up a serious challenge to the NFL in the mid-1980s before letting some idiot named Donald J. Trump lead a suicidal charge into oblivion. We knew when we were age 14: Trump sucked.

But we digress.

The UFL has some sort of contract with ESPN, since the network loves promoting spring football. It has eight teams—none west of San Antonio—all seemingly in the television markets akin to the traditional B1G and SEC fan bases, with the only “northern” franchises located in “D.C.” and “Michigan” right now. It is touted as a “high minor level” league right now, in its second season after merging two other failed leagues.

Allegedly, its 2024 championship game drew 1.6 million viewers, which is not a lot. Maybe the second title game will collect more viewers. Who knows? We bring this up today as the college-football model is once again imploding in ways we do not care to even explain. This is why we can’t have nice things: corruption and greed. But the UFL represents something possible for the NCAA and the NFL to both thrive again.

Spring football.

While MLB, the NBA, and the NHL all have seemingly endless seasons, the NFL and NCAA football seasons are short, in comparison. Serious football basically runs from September to January, with slight oversteps. Meanwhile, baseball garners attention from February to November now, really, while the NBA and the NHL also enjoy 10-month pre-occupation status from diehard fans. Is this why the NFL pimps its draft so much?

Possibly.

The solution, as we have mentioned many times, is for the NFL to form real spring minor league football for anyone age-18 or older who wants to get paid to play ball. After the Super Bowl winds down in mid-February, which is where we’re headed with that 18-game season idea, these minor leagues could step into the void from March to August and dominate the lives of football fans everywhere who want to eat it all up.

Then, the college ranks could return to its adjusted “amateur” model once again, where “student athletes” really exist, graduate, and get compensated better than they used to but still in a way that makes sense (the scholarship plus a monthly stipend of moderate amounts). Let the pros go pro, and let the colleges return to sanity, with non-competing seasons that will let any rabid football fan eat all year long: college, pro, and all.

Football is a uniquely American sport, for sure; expanding the “flag” version of the game to the Olympics will be short lived, we expect, for reasons explained elsewhere. Give Americans what they want: football all the time. College fans always will watch their schools play on Saturdays in the fall; pro fans always will watch their favorites play on Sundays in the fall. Give them something else in between all spring? Bingo.