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Saturday marks the final game of the 2026 season for the United Football League. The UFL’s United Bowl III kicks off at 2PM CDT Saturday on ABC. Spring professional football’s championship game will take place in Washington, DC at Audi Stadium. The hometown DC Defenders (7-4) defend their 2025 UFL title against the upstart expansion Louisville Kings (also 7-4). Abundant sunshine and a steamy 90 degrees will greet the players and fans at Saturday’s championship game to end the UFL’s third season. There will likely be a good crowd of more than 15,000 in the stands (the stadium holds 20,000) and a television audience of more than 1 million watching on ABC. At some point soon, the UFL owners will meet to review the season and make decisions about the future. Let’s give a preview of what I think that meeting will entail. A review of the 2026 UFL season – the OK, the “Meh”, and the downright ugly The third year for any new business should show its owners that the venture is making positive strides. If the business is not already profitable, the annual losses should be getting smaller by the year as the business gains favor with the buying public. For the UFL, those primary measures are home team attendance (and revenues) and national television ratings. Let’s start with the Ugly. Home attendance dropped again in 2026 Each of the eight UFL teams played five home games in the 10-game regular season. The St. Louis Battlehawks (playing in a 60,000 domed football stadium) drew more than 23,000 per game to lead the UFL in home attendance once again in 2026. Despite the positive attendance, the cost for the lease at the Dome at America’s Center (formerly known as the Edward Jones Dome) in St. Louis is also likely the highest paid by the UFL. The expansion Louisville Kings came in second with more than 11,000 fans per home opener. Another expansion franchise, the Columbus Aviators finished third with 10,362 paying customers per home game in 2026. The other five UFL franchises failed to average 10,000 fans per game with the two Texas teams (Dallas and Houston) coming in last with 6,185 and 5,683 per game respectively. Birmingham (which plays in UAB’s home football stadium) and St. Louis played their home games in traditional football stadiums. The other six UFL franchises played the 2026 season in smaller soccer venues. Lease costs for these soccer stadiums are lower than the cost of most traditional football stadiums. Home television viewers are less likely to be turned-off by seeing small crowds if played in a 20,000 seat soccer stadium. The UFL home team attendance figures have declined in each of the league’s three seasons. The 2024 season produced an average of 12,800 fans. In 2025, the UFL dropped to 12,168 per game. This year’s 10,500 average marked a 14% decline from 2025. Ouch. It means that the public (even with affordable ticket prices of $20-30 available) simply is not very excited about the UFL’s on-field product. Now for the “Meh” – Television ratings in 2026 were relatively flat vs. 2025 I remember reading an article a few years ago which claimed that the UFL needed to draw more than one million television viewers per game in order to have a chance to turn a profit. Well, that didn’t happen again this year, either. The Friday night prime time game on FOX produced consistent numbers. The ratings showed a reliable audience of 600-700,000 viewers on Friday nights during the 7PM to 10PM Central time period. That may sound good until you know the rest of the story. The FOX Friday night audience for UFL games was mired in last place all season when compared to programming on competitors CBS, NBC, and ABC. FOX Sports (a part-owner of the UFL) cannot be pleased with their investment after three seasons. Ditto for Disney’s ESPN brand. The sports giant also owns a piece of the UFL. They televised one or more weekly UFL games via ESPN and/or corporate affiliate, ABC. The 2026 ratings for the Saturday and Sunday UFL games on ABC continue to show the highest viewership. At least four regular season games on ABC topped the one million mark during the first nine weeks of the UFL season. That meant only 11% of the first nine weeks of UFL games in 2026 produced a television audience of one million or more. If the league’s original goal was to reach one million viewers per televised game, the UFL continues to fall woefully short of that target. The “OK” – the spring football league continues to innovate and try harder UFL ownership includes the aforementioned FOX Sports and ESPN along with Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, his ex-wife Dany Garcia, Redbird Capital Partners, and billionaire Mike Repole. Repole bought his way into the UFL following the 2025 season. His ownership percentage and who he purchased it from have yet to be disclosed. It has been new owner Mike Repole who pushed to move UFL teams into smaller soccer venues in 2026. He also gave the green light to relocate UFL franchises away from San Antonio, Memphis, and Detroit in favor of Columbus (OH), Louisville, and Orlando for this season. Those three non-NFL cities produced slightly improved attendance figures and saved money with significantly lower lease costs. However, none of the three teams turned a profit based on their gate receipts. Despite his personal energy, Mike Repole’s promotional skills and tinkering with the UFL simply hasn’t paid off. League attendance went down in 2026 while television ratings were flat. The effort is commendable. The UFL’s massive annual losses, though, continue. What should the UFL owners do at their next meeting following the 2026 season? Let’s make an assumption that the UFL loses (just my guess here) $50 million in 2026. That would mark the third consecutive year of significant losses for the latest spring football experiment. Non-corporate UFL owners such as Dwayne Johnson and his ex-wife, Dany Garcia, should be ready to exit as owners by now. They cannot be pleased with losing millions of their own money every year. The cash losses by the UFL show no sign of abatement should the league continue into 2027. Johnson and Garcia lost big bucks with the XFL, too. They have now been losing even more money with the UFL for three seasons. Why should they stick around? Redbird Capital Partners might fly away at the next owner’s meeting, too. The private equity investor claims over $10 billion in managed assets. Redbird’s website currently displays the UFL as one of 36 different major investments for the company. The UFL’s continuing annual losses are a negative. Don’t be surprised if they, too, wish to move on at the next UFL owners meeting. FOX Sports may have a different perspective on the UFL. The NFL on FOX could end within the next five years at the end of the network’s latest contract. FOX Sports could, perhaps, envision the UFL becoming a potential future fall competitor for the NFL. The fledgling American Football League of the 1960’s did it. However, it took ten years for the NFL to eventually gobble-up their competitor. Let’s say that I’m wrong about FOX Sports’ long-term thinking on the UFL. They really don’t need the UFL for programming and might be ready to pull the plug at the next owners meeting. How are ESPN and ABC feeling about the UFL right now? Mounting annual losses by the UFL are (effectively) petty cash for Disney. The current spring positioning of the UFL season fills a major weekend programming need for ESPN and ABC. There aren’t a lot of major sports events available to fill air time on ESPN from April through June. An important item to remember is that the NFL sold its NFL Network to ESPN earlier in 2026 in return for a 10% ownership stake in ESPN. ESPN and ABC must now seriously consider doing whatever the NFL wants with respect to the UFL. They could vote to stick with the UFL or decide to shut it down for good this summer. That leaves the enthusiastic billionaire UFL investor Mike Repole. Repole jumped into the UFL dumpster fire with both feet last year. Most billionaires get rich by being very shrewd in business. I suspect that Mike Repole (if he sticks around for another year or more) sees the UFL eventually becoming a partner with the NFL down the road. He appears to be a risk-taker willing to swing for the fences. Should the NFL ever decide to invest in the UFL as a spring football partner, Mike Repole’s investment gamble could pay off handsomely. Than again, the NFL has plenty of its own billionaire owners, too. Their luxury cruise liner isn’t likely to throw a life preserver to Mike Repole or any of his other UFL ownership partners anytime soon. The UFL’s third year financial condition reminds me of a 1977 Harry Chapin song. “The Dance Band on the Titanic” featured some rather clever lyrics and an upbeat melody. In the musical version, the ship’s band was trying to create a musical diversion just as the massive boat began to sink. One line of the song says,“The iceberg’s on the starboard bow – Won’t you dance with me?” This next meeting of the UFL owners is likely to be a dandy. The post Previewing the upcoming UFL Owners Meeting appeared first on SwampSwamiSports.com.
Roger Marsh, executive director of the National Fellowship of Raceway Ministries, interviews Tim Bozarth of St. Louis, Missouri. Tim currently serves as chaplain at Tri-Cities Speedway and Federated Auto Parts Speedway at I-55 -- both short tracks in the St. Louis area. Tim also currently is serving as director of Gateway Racing Ministries, a newly created Raceway Ministries team that will be focusing on outreach to fans at World Wide Technology Raceway. In this interview, Tim shares insights from his vast experience as a short track chaplain; discusses with Marsh the beginnings and future plans for ministry at World Wide Technology Raceway; and shares his excitement about serving once again this year as chaplain for the Gateway Dirt Nationals, slated for December 1 - 3 inside the Edward Jones Dome in St. Louis.
Welcome to the Instant Trivia podcast episode 542, where we ask the best trivia on the Internet. Round 1. Category: Going National 1: Heel and cigar. Cuban. 2: Guard and chard. Swiss. 3: Toast and twist. French. 4: Linen and potato. Ireland. 5: Linen and potato. Ireland. Round 2. Category: Double D Words 1: Colby is a mild variety of this cheese. cheddar. 2: It follows step-, corporate and Jacob's. ladder. 3: Siddhartha Gautama's title. Buddha. 4: It can mean the mean, or the waist. the middle. 5: Pamper a person, or cook eggs gently in water without boiling. coddle. Round 3. Category: Nfl Home Stadiums 1: The Superdome. New Orleans Saints. 2: Heinz Field. the Pittsburgh Steelers. 3: Sun Devil Stadium. Arizona Cardinals. 4: Monster Park. the San Francisco 49ers. 5: The Edward Jones Dome. the Rams. Round 4. Category: In Your Cabinet 1: It's the "nighttime, sniffling, sneezing, coughing, aching, fever, best sleep you ever got with a cold... medicine". NyQuil. 2: For stomach pain, this brand now comes in cherry flavor and says, "pink tastes better than you think!". Pepto-Bismol. 3: This mouthwash company says there are "millions of reasons to rinse". Listerine. 4: For athlete's foot, boom! John Madden recommends "tough actin'" this; boom!. Tinactin. 5: OK, picture the sailor walking around...now, hear that whistling in the ads for this men's scent?. Old Spice. Round 5. Category: Exclamations! 1: Divine bovine!. Holy cow!. 2: It precedes "whillikers" and "whiz" and will cause your horse to turn right. Gee. 3: It can be an interjection by itself or be tacked onto the end of "gad". Zooks. 4: An appearance as if by magic may be accompanied by this, French for "see there". Voila!. 5: From the Dutch for "hold fast", it's a pirate's order to stop. Avast!. Thanks for listening! Come back tomorrow for more exciting trivia! Special thanks to https://blog.feedspot.com/trivia_podcasts/
In 2011 I had the honor of standing in the middle of the Edward Jones Dome with the Icon, Dennis Anderson. I thought this audio file was lost but after 10 years its resurfaced and I'm proud to share this audio with all of you that listen to RMTR! I hope you all enjoy this Special Edition! --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/retro-monster-truck-review/support
It's the season finale of N The Zone and the guests are announced plus the sponsors are mentioned and a special throwback monologue is delivered by The Livn Legend. This one was about Josina Anderson of ESPN and his encounter with her last year at the Edward Jones Dome.
This week on The Chicago Bears Review!!With a victory on Monday night football our Beloved are off the schnide and looking to add to their win column with they travel south to St. Louis to take on the schizophrenic Rams at the Edward Jones Dome on Sunday!!Which Rams team will show up to play? And will the Bears be able to beat them?Joe McAtee from SB Nation's Turf Show Times joins us for the Week Ten Preview episode of The Chicago Bears Review!!!
Steve Patterson, writer for urbanreviewstl.com, discusses the Larry Rice homeless shelter, further developments with the Edward Jones Dome and the legalization of marijuana in Colorado.
No more messing around. The 2014 NFL regular season is about to get started. For the Rams, that means opening the doors of the Edward Jones Dome to the Minnesota Vikings on Sunday. To preview the game and look at the Rams' first opponent of the year, we'll be joined by Ted Glover from Daily Norseman, the SB Nation community for fans of the Vikes. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices