The XFL is up and running and a lot of credit for the revival of the league has to go to WWE and Hollywood superstar Dwayne Johnson. Being a football lover, Johnson rescued the bankrupt league by investing $15 million and it would be fair to say that his efforts are paying dividends.
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While there is limited capacity in the stadiums where the games are being played, fans still turned up in good numbers in week one to support their favorite stars. As it turns out, not only aesthetically, but rule-wise too, the ones in-charge of the XFL have really worked hard in establishing the league as a separate entity from the National Football League.
XFL Games are shorter in comparison to NFL games
The idea is to a create a separate space for XFL, rather than challenging the NFL which is actually good for both, the players as well as the fans who are always in need of more football action. This is why, in XFL, a 35-second play clock is used instead of a 40-second one like in the NFL.
Moreover, the clock continues to run during incomplete passes and out of bound plays before the 2-minute warning. In addition to this, the clock also stops on first downs after the 2-minute warning. The idea behind all this is to encourage more offensive plays and make the make more fast paced.
Due to all this, the average game time during week 1 of the XFL was 2 hours and 49 minutes. If we talk about NFL, an average game used to go over 3 hours and 12 minutes and although attempts have been made to bring this number down, we still are quite far away from getting an average game done and dusted before 3 hours.
XFL & NFL Halftime duration
The trick adopted by the XFL to gain more eyeballs involves slowing the game down as the halftime approaches. The clock stops during incomplete passes, first downs, and out of bound plays in the final 2 minutes of each half. This is being done to enhance the thrill factor in the final minutes.
Moreover, in XFL games, we get a 10-minute halftime break, 2 minutes less than what a typical NFL game has. Many fans reckon that by saving 2 minutes, the league isn’t really making a huge difference. However, it is important to note that every second counts when the idea is to deliver a crunch game in a limited time frame.
Moreover, XFL has implemented not one but several rules to save time and if each one of them ends up saving a few seconds, the ultimate target would be achieved without taking the essence of the game away.
