USFL 2022: Michigan Panthers Preview (And Legal…

USFL – Welcome to the first of our USFL team previews! Twice a week until the season starts, we’ll be introducing you to the eight individual teams, talking you through the players you may remember or think you might remember, and talking about their overall chances. We’ll also be catching you up with any news as the league continues what has become quite a bumpy launch leading up to the planned April 16 kickoff.

Our plan for these is normally to start with the team first—today, it’s the Michigan Panthers—but the news has been big enough this week that we should probably start with that first. Because just like the last time the USFL was in the news, they’re being sued.

Newsbreak

We have said several times that the new USFL has no real connection to the old USFL; they just secured the rights to the trademarks and logos. And now it turns out that, well, they may not have done that either.

The new USFL is being sued by The Real USFL LLC, a group of owners/executives from the 1980s league led by former Jacksonville Bulls general manager (… and Pro Football Hall of Famer…) Larry Csonka. They allege that that the new league does not have the right to use the original USFL names and logos or to market themselves as the successors to the original teams. FOX and Brian Woods, the owner/president of the new league, claim that the old USFL had abandoned its trademarks after being defunct for over 30 years, while the old USFL points out that no, they have been licensing names and logos ever since the league failed in the 1980s—on T-shirts, for books, for films, and so forth. And they point out that they have continued to do this even since FOX first applied for some USFL-related trademarks back in 2011. They are seeking an injunction to stop the league from using the USFL name logos and related trademarks until the case is eventually resolved. It’s important to note that this will not stop the new league from playing—there’s no real threat, at the moment, for there not to be spring football this April. But all of a sudden, whether the league will indeed be called the “USFL” or be able to use the team names they hyped up or the logos or uniforms they have unveiled is in question; the initial hearing is on March 16.

FOX, for their part, dismisses the entire thing as frivolous and completely without merit; a pale attempt to extort some money out of the new league at the 11th hour. They point out that they registered nearly 100 trademarks between 2011 and 2014, and that Woods’ old Spring League has been managing some of these trademarks for years. The Spring League did have a team called the Generals in their last season, though it’s worth noting that they were not billed as the “New Jersey Generals” or as part of the USFL in any way.

So did FOX get ahead of themselves and start a new league without permission to do so, or are some ex-USFL execs looking for a way to make a quick buck out of the league one more time? That’s the question. There does seem to be a strong case for the old USFL that the new league engaged in false advertisement and association. I am not a lawyer, but FOX has many lawyers, and it’s notable that FOX has gone back and scrubbed mentions of the league “returning,” or “retaining rights,” or “relaunching,” or “bringing back” anything from their initial press releases, and added disclaimers saying that the new league is in no way affiliated with the old one. They certainly made no attempt to make that distinction at the time, bringing in guys like Doug Flutie to hype up the league and using old photos and footage of the 1980s league in their announcements and hype packages. If I were to start a new gaming company called Atari, and launched it with pictures of Pitfall! and Adventure, I would have a hard time arguing that oh, I had no intention of people thinking I was that Atari.

The trademark issue is thornier. You do have to maintain trademarks by actually using them, and FOX will argue that there were long enough gaps in the aftermath of the USFL collapsing that those trademarks were legally abandoned—there wasn’t a big market for USFL nostalgia in, say, 1991. But to re-register a trademark, you have to both re-establish use and be associated or linked with the original mark owner—and just because the US Patents and Trademarks Office approved some of FOX’s trademarks in 2011 does not mean that FOX actually had the rights to do so; they basically just check to see if anyone else has any active trademarks before issuing rights, and let any disputes in regards to common law trademarks and the like be handled in the legal system. I am massively oversimplifying US intellectual property law here, but suffice it to say that it’s not clear who is in the right here.

I suspect it will not matter who is in the right here, and this will go away after FOX writes a significantly large check. But we’ll find out more in a few weeks.

It hasn’t been all bad for the new USFL, mind you. We mentioned back in our season preview that no states had legalized gambling on the new league. Since then, the USFL has cleared regulatory hurdles in 15 states, so one of the reasons for the league to actually exist has come to fruition.

And if there’s going to be gambling, you’re going to want to know who you’re gambling on. So lets transition out of legal mode and back to football mode and talk about a football team which may or may not legally own the rights to the name “Michigan Panthers.”

Michigan Panthers

Coaching Staff

The Panthers have arguably the most notable head coach in the league in Jeff Fisher. Fisher hasn’t been a head coach on any level since 2016, though he has stayed active in football as an advisor since then. But before that, he was one of the more prolific coaches in NFL history—a 142-120 record as coach of the Oilers/Titans from 1994-2010, and then a 35-41-1 record as coach of the Rams from 2012-2016. His Titans made the playoffs six times, including a trip to Super Bowl XXXIV where they ended up a yard short of beating the Greatest Show on Turf Rams. I’m using the term “prolific” instead of “successful,” as those six playoff trips are the only winning seasons Fisher had in the NFL. Fisher was fired with 165 losses in his NFL career, tying Dan Reeves for the most losses in NFL history. You have to have a certain level of baseline competence to stick around long enough to lose 165 games! Any top 10 list that includes Tom Landy and Don Shula and George Halas and Chuck Noll and Bill Belichick can’t be all bad!

There’s no news yet about any sort of staff that Fisher will bring with him. It’s safe to say the Panthers will run a 4-3 defense of some description because that was Fisher’s bread-and-butter in the NFL. In 2020, we ran a piece talking about the Jeff Fisher All-Stars, the best players Fisher ever coached. That gives you a good idea of the sort of players and schemes Fisher liked to run. It’s safe to say that none of his Panthers are going to make a run at that list, but at least it gives you an idea of the roles involved.

Offense

The Panthers’ first pick at quarterback, and the first pick in the new USFL draft, was Shea Patterson. Patterson started his college career at Ole Miss before transferring to Michigan in the wake of Ole Miss’ postseason ban. He went undrafted in 2020, but did end up making the Montreal Alouettes’ roster in 2021 as a backup. He had some action as a short-yardage specialist in Montreal, rushing for 18 yards on 11 carries. His running ability is one of his high points, as is his ability to extend plays against pressure and improvise. I suspect that he was the first overall pick to establish a link between the Michigan Panthers and the University of Michigan more than anything else—our own Derrik Klassen was not impressed by the pick.

The other quarterback on the roster has the highest pedigree of any player in the new league: former NFL first-round pick Paxton Lynch. Lynch was, of course, terrible for the Broncos, with a -18.8% DVOA in 83 pass attempts as a rookie representing his best mark. He made the Saskatchewan Roughriders roster last season, but not only did he never get into a game, he actually fell to the QB4 role and was sent down to the practice squad by the end of the year. He asked for his release so he could sign with the USFL.

The strength of the Panthers at the skill positions is at wide receiver, where they boast three players with NFL experience. Quincy Adeboyejo made the Ravens roster as a UDFA out of Ole Miss in 2017, mostly because he could run a 4.42 40 at 6-foot-3. He’ll be the Panthers’ field-stretcher. Lance Lenoir joined the Cowboys as a UDFA out of Western Illinois in 2017 and actually stuck around for a couple years as a special teams player. Lenoir is Western Illinois’ all-time leader in basically everything receiving related and had significant success as a returner too, in case the USFL actually has kickoffs or punts. Jeff Badet took the long road to the NFL—undrafted in 2018, Badet went to the XFL’s Dallas Renegades, where he finished with 16 receptions for 108 yards. That was enough to get him a spot on the Washington Football Team roster as a COVID replacement. Badet ran a 4.27s 40 at his pro day, and has always been more athlete than receiver, with the book on him being to give him the ball on short passes and jet sweeps and let him run forward. Has the USFL found their Deebo Samuel? (No.)

Badet also has a unique sense of style.

.@JeffBadet__‘s Allen Iverson “Practice?!” visor is 𝐮 𝐧 𝐫 𝐞 𝐚 𝐥 pic.twitter.com/dKomX7KmH7

— XFL (@XFL2023) January 7, 2020

The Panthers have a ton of speed and gadgety-type players out there, and some quality at the other skill positions as well (Reggie Corbin is a solid route-running running back for this level, Stevie Scott is a bulldozer, et cetera). I’m less sold on their offensive line—Telton Saltes and Josh Dunlap have bounced around some practice squads, but that’s about it—but there’s enough juice here to imagine at least a fun, up-tempo offense. And, frankly, that’s what a minor league like this needs—some creativity and gadget plays to draw attention once the novelty wears off. Whether or not the Panthers can actually get any value out of that depends a little on who Fisher brings in to run his offense, so stay tuned on that, I guess.

Defense

The Panthers drafted one defender with NFL experience: cornerback Jameson Houston, who spent some time as a COVID backup for the Eagles in 2020. He actually hit the transactions page, too, as he was sent with a 2023 sixth-round pick to Jacksonville for Josiah Scott. The Jaguars determined the draft pick was the more valuable commodity and released Houston before he played a snap. Honestly, though, you could do worse in the secondary than the pair of Houston and Tino Ellis, who went undrafted out of Maryland in 2020—Ellis has excellent hands as a former receiver and is more aggressive than successful in coverage, which leads to big plays one way or the other.

The front seven boasts some names you may recall from previous spring leagues. Cavon Walker ended as the XFL’s all-time sack leader with 4.5, while Frank Ginda was a leading tackler with both the AAF’s Fleet and the XFL’s Guardians, not to mention leading all of NCAA in tackles as a junior at San Jose State. Add in Jaquan Bailey, Iowa State’s all-time leader in sacks and tackles for a loss, and you at least have a player or two at every level of the defense to work with.

They also have Taiwan Jones listed as a linebacker, which confused me for a while before I realized it wasn’t that Taiwan Jones, last seen playing special teams for the Buffalo Bills; it was the other Taiwan Jones, the former Michigan State and New York Jets linebacker. Whenever you can add the second-best player in NFL history who sounds like the lead in an Aslyum mockbuster of the Indiana Jones franchise, you have to pull the trigger.

The Panthers are currently the betting favorites to win the inaugural USFL title at +325, which is slightly higher than the second-place odds of The USFL Will Not Complete The Season at +350. A lot of that is riding on Fisher’s reputation and the first overall draft pick, and the Panthers wouldn’t be my choice if I had to bet on things right this moment. But there’s definitely more talent here than on your average USFL roster, and I would expect the Panthers to be competitive right from the word go.