Vince McMahon’s second attempt at launching the XFL seemed to be on the right track when the league’s 2020 season back in February. Unfortunately due to the coronavirus pandemic the season was cut short after just five weeks on March 8. On April 10 the league suspended all operations and laid off its employees, then filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy three days. And while McMahon deals with a wrongful termination lawsuit stemming from firing former commissioner Oliver Luck days before the bankruptcy filing, the WWE Chairman might already be making moves to buy back the league from Delaware bankruptcy court.
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A new report from The Athletic‘s Daniel Kaplan dropped on Tuesday, which explained that XFL creditors “seem to believe” McMahon is maneuvering to make that move. According to Kaplan, XFL president Jeffrey Pollack has contacted stadiums in St. Louis and Seattle (home to the Battlehawks and Vipers, respectively) about reinstating lease agreements with the team’s venues.
He also pointed out that a committee of creditors had objected Alpha Entertainment’s (the company McMahon launched separate from WWE to run the league) proposal to pay $3.5 million in season ticket refunds. The committee pointed out that the refunds could be used as a sign of good faith with season ticket holders, who could theoretically buy who season ticket packages if the league were revived again
“This is an unnecessary expenditure designed to buttress the Debtor’s argument that an abbreviated sales process is required and is being sought to further the efforts of the debtor’s controlling equity holder/secured lender, Vincent McMahon (“McMahon”), to acquire the debtor at a fire-sale price,” the committee wrote in its reponse. “The debtor cannot possibly know at this time whether issuing refunds to season ticket holders will preserve the value of the debtor estate’s or benefit any creditor, other than possibly McMahon.”
Other indications that the league might not be dead for good include the XFL’s headquarters in Stamford remaining open and certain executives, including Pollack, still getting paid a salary.
Should the XFL be relaunched (again), it would have to reconstruct the league from the ground up. Several players have already signed new deals to play in the NFL’s upcoming 2020-21 season, including Houston Roughnecks quarterback P.J. Walker (now with the Carolina Panthers), St. Louis Battlehawks quarterback Jordan Ta’amu (Kansas City Chiefs), Roughnecks defensive back Deatrick Nichols (New Orleans Saints) and New York Guardians defensive back Dravon Askew-Henry (New York Giants).
