The United Football League announced today that their inaugural television partner is going to be Versus. All of the games will be televised in high definition and available nationally – see the press release for more information. Versus reaches at least 75,000,000 viewers and some estimates have placed their audience at higher than 90,000,000.

I do not see how this can be seen as anything other than a coup for the UFL. After the XFL debacle and with the current National Football League television contracts no national broadcast network would attempt to cover a start up league. Further, with the relevance of broadcast networks and their audience rapidly dwindling I do not view a broadcast contract as a necessity any longer for a league to achieve legitimacy. It would be nice, certainly, but a large cable network has just as much of an impact.

I would view this contract as very similar to the United States Football League’s contract with ESPN back in the early 80′s. ESPN was at the time a growing cable network, the USFL was an unproven league playing in a strange season with different rules starting during an economic downturn and going against the National Football League. Fast forward two decades and the UFL is an unproven league playing in a strange season (ie- in the fall which no upstart has done lately) with some different rules and ideas launching during an economic downtown and going against the NFL.

Versus is a rapidly growing network covering the Stanley Cup, NHL, Pro Bull Riding, Tour de France, and college sports. They bid on NFL rights and would had received them if it were not for the NFL Network needing content according to many folks.

The press reactions have begun to come in – including via NBC New York which says:

You’re forgiven if the United Football League hasn’t made much of an impression on you at this point. The league hasn’t got any players, the teams don’t have names and, this you’re probably aware of, there’s a pretty viable professional football league already kicking around the country. You’ll be more familiar with it come October, though, thanks to a television deal announced today.

…

The timing of this announcement coincides with word that Comcast may be dumping the NFL Network from two million homes in April. There’s not much future for any league that tries to battle the NFL head on, but the backing of a cable giant and a modest plan are working in the UFL’s favor.

Make no mistake about it – the Versus deal helps stamp the United Football League as a player on the sports scene. Follow this up with 4 impressive Coaches and things will really be rolling.

Then it is up to the league to brand the teams well and to promote the league enough that people tune in. If they do that we will be discussing a 6 or 8-team full scaled league for 2010 – and my bet is that they will market it, enough fans will show up, and UFLAccess will be covering the United Football League for years to come.

Reminder: UFLAccess will hold a live chat tonight at 9 PM Eastern in our chat room. Also check back later in the day for our new logo and color scheme as the UFLAccess redesign continues.