The debut season of the rebooted XFL is set to kick off in February of 2020, and even more details have emerged about what to expect from the Vince McMahon-backed upstart football league. Michael David Smith at NBC Sports is now reporting that the league has let agents know what players in the XFL can expect to be paid in their first season.
The average salary, according to the report, will be $55,000. By contrast, the NFL’s minimum salary is $495,000. NBC Sports has more details on the memo sent to agents:
The memo states that players who are drafted and retained by XFL teams will become full-time employees as of December 4, 2019, and if they remain on a roster they will remain employed through May 31, 2020. Between the base salary, a bonus for being active on game days and a bonus for being on the winning team, the average player will make $55,000 a year.
You may wonder how that figure stacks up to other leagues around the nation. According to the MLS Players Association, the average player in Major League Soccer makes $138,140. And based on data released several months ago, the wrestling site Heel By Nature reports that the average wrestler in WWE’s development system NXT makes $80,000 annually.
The NBC Sports report does have one bit of data that might explain why football players might opt for a year of low-paying, physically intense games: the prospect that they’ll get noticed by an NFL team. Smith notes in the article that “the XFL has promised all players they’ll be free to leave for an NFL contract offer any time after the XFL Championship Game on April 25.”
In a few more months, we’ll see if that potential opportunity is enough to lure compelling talent onto the gridiron for the XFL’s new season.
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