XFL CEO and commissioner Oliver Luck was recently interviewed on The HawkCast Podcast by former Green Bay Packers linebacker AJ Hawk. Here are the highlights:
His initial meeting with Vince McMahon: “I didn’t know Vince. I think I may have met him at one point along the way sort of in passing. One of his folks asked me if I’d be willing to take a meeting with Vince. I said, ‘Sure.’ He’s a fascinating guy, hugely successful, built a remarkable publicly traded company: the WWE.
“I’d be happy to take a meeting, so as I sat with him, I realized he was dead serious about building this league in what I consider to be a proper appropriate fashion with an emphasis on family and affordability and that type of thing. He was committing serious capital to this project and that’s important to every project.”
Where XFL will be headquartered: “WWE is located in Stamford, CT right outside of New York City, Fairfield County, and we will be headquartered right next door, literally.”
Re-Imagining football: “We’re trying to re-imagine the game. This is really instructions from Vince. He said, ‘I want you to get the best minds you can and re-imagine the game of football.’ I said, ‘Vince what does that mean?’ He said, ‘I want a fast-paced game.
“I want a high octane kind of a game, lots of plays, almost like the hurry up college offenses you see. I want fewer stoppages because people don’t like all the breaks, whether it’s TV time outs or whatever. I want more rhythm, more flow of the game.’”
Players standing for the National Anthem: “Vince feels strongly about that, so that will be one of those things that will differentiate us from the NFL. Remember, unlike the NFL we will not have a union when we start. There won’t be collective bargaining….we could say to a player , ‘Hey there is a clause in the contract that says I hereby agree to stand for the National Anthem.’
“Period. End of story. That won’t have to be collectively bargained. My position would be as long as a player knows before hand that that’s part of the contract then that’s a workplace rule and we can enforce that workplace rule.
“If you go into a contractual situation, knowing what the workplace rules are, you’re obligated to follow those rules, otherwise there will be consequences.”
H/T WrestleZone for the transcriptions
