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Following the shuttering of the Alliance of American Football, and its crappy way of going about it, all sorts of stories are beginning to trickle out about the currently defunct league.
One the more interesting tales about the AAF in relation to the forthcoming XFL part deux, was told by Fox Sports Radio’s Clay Travis who claims that the AAF went to none other than Vince McMahon seeking help.
According to Travis, he was told “the AAF went to Vince McMahon, hat in hand, and said, ‘Will you please buy our league? We don’t have the money to continue for year two.’ Vince McMahon had his people meet with the AAF, look over all of their books, look over everything that they had to bring to bear, and said thanks, but no thanks you’ve got nothing I’m not already going to have, and he stepped out of the way and let that league go into the gutter knowing that they would be done by the time he came back and launched his league.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hKu5GnPt46E?start=136
In related news, the XFL said in a statement regarding the AAF news, “We have said all along the success or failure of other leagues will have no impact on our ability to deliver high-quality, fast-paced, professional football. The XFL is well-funded, we have time before kick-off to execute our business plan, and we will soon announce a national broadcast and cable TV schedule that makes it easy for fans to find our games consistently every weekend when we launch next February. There is no doubt that avid football fans want more and we’re excited to get going in 2020.”
The XFL, for its part, and unlike some of the AAF teams, will be operating in places that are all also NFL cities, plus McMahon himself just added another $272 MILLION to the XFL’s coffers by selling 3.2 million shares of WWE stock.
According to AdAge…
This marks the second time McMahon has cashed in a big chunk of his WWE holdings. The wrestling magnate in December 2017 sold 3.34 million shares worth around $100 million; in that particular 8-K filing, the WWE reported that McMahon had said that he had “no current plan to sell additional shares of the company’s stock,” and that he intended to stay on as its chairman and CEO “for the foreseeable future.”
The same language was used in Wednesday’s SEC filing.
After that first significant selloff, McMahon went on to unload another $22.9 million block of shares a year later, which translated to about 1 percent of his overall stake in the WWE. All told, McMahon has sold nearly $400 million in WWE shares in order to fund the XFL, putting him in shooting range of his pledge to devote $500 million to the revival effort.
Vinny Mac ain’t playing.
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