UFL Kicking Off 2025 Season With Labor Fight Still Simmering

The United Football League’s 2025 season is set to begin as scheduled Friday, even without a labor deal in place between the spring football entity and its players.

The offseason for the UFL, the first full one for the league after an early 2024 merger of the revived XFL and U.S. Football League, had originally been intended to build on a series of viewership and awareness gains last year. Recent weeks, however, have been colored by a series of rising issues, with players pushing for increased salaries and year-round health-care coverage.

The rising threat of a players’ strike grew to the point that media partners Fox and ESPN began to make alternate broadcast plans if games were lost. In the final hours, though, before the 2025 league debut Friday in Houston with a primetime game between the Roughnecks and the St. Louis Battlehawks, game activities and other league functions were proceeding largely as normal. 

“The teams are preparing as we speak, and an interruption is not expected,” said an industry source. 

The United Football Players Association, which represents the UFL players, confirmed later Friday that it will play in the opening games. The union, however, is appealing directly to key league investor Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, arguing that the UFL has “refused to bargain with us in good faith.”

“From what we’ve seen, it’s clear the UFL is willing to invest in everyone but the players—the guys who are suiting up every week and putting their bodies on the line,” a union letter to Johnson read in part.

Fox, also a 50% equity holder in the UFL, will air the kickoff game Friday, and the network’s various broadcast, cable, and social platforms actively promoted the game during the morning and early afternoon—including live, on-air interviews with a variety of league coaches and executives. UFL president and CEO Russ Brandon was among that run of publicity, appearing on Fox and Friends early in the day, where he made no mention of the ongoing labor situation. 

Instead, he touted what he sees as a fast-rising level of talent among the players, growing fan interest in the league, and the support of the network that is the UFL’s largest shareholder. 

“We’re very fortunate to have the entire Fox team around this, and they’ve really just elevated what we’ve become,” Brandon said. 

In addition to the labor matter, the UFL is looking to establish itself as a fixture of the spring sports calendar. This will be the fourth consecutive year with spring football being played between the UFL, now in its second season, and its predecessor leagues.