WWF Wrestles With Football

Professional football is returning to the Coliseum--but don’t expect to see Kurt Warner, Terrell Davis or any other big-name stars.

It’s not the NFL.

It’s the XFL.

And what is the XFL? It’s a new professional league, set to open play in February 2001, according to Vince McMahon, owner and chairman of the World Wrestling Federation. The XFL is his baby.

And, no, the games’ outcomes will not be scripted, he says.

“The WWF is 100% entertainment,” McMahon said Thursday at a news conference in New York. “But the XFL is 100% sports.”

The eight-team league will also have teams in New York, Miami, Orlando, Washington and San Francisco, with two more cities to be announced.

Each team will play a 10-game season, the top four teams qualifying for the playoffs.

“Why football?” asked McMahon, who converted professional wrestling from a lowbrow, oft-mocked pursuit into a lowbrow, oft-mocked multimillion-dollar business. “Some have suggested the NFL is the ‘No Fun League.’ The XFL will be the extremely fun league. This will be a blast.”

McMahon, predicting that the XFL will turn a profit within three years, said his league will succeed by attracting the young viewers already tuned into the WWF, along with the football fans suffering post-Super Bowl withdrawal.

He also promised innovative television coverage, from helmet cameras to sideline and locker room access, but said WWF stars such as Mankind, “Stone Cold” Steve Austin and the Undertaker will be involved only as fans.

Rules will be adapted to accent faster play.

Ron Lederkramer, assistant general manager of the Coliseum, said the league has an oral agreement with the Coliseum for the L.A. team to play its home games in the stadium.

“We’re very happy about it,” Lederkramer said.

Others, however, are not sure.

“I’m pretty much calling it a joke,” Ryan Schinman, president of CMB Entertainment, an entertainment and marketing firm, told the Associated Press.