Born from the merger of the XFL and USFL two years ago, and owned by FOX Sports, Redbird Capital Partners, Dany Garcia, Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson and investor Mike Repole, the United Football League enters its third season in 2026 with eight teams, three new franchises, and a set of rules designed to make the sport faster, more open and harder to look away from.

Field goals from 60 yards or more are worth four points. You can't punt once you cross the 50. Twelve players are mic'd up every game. Coaches' play calls go out live. If something happens on the field, you're going to hear about it.

On Saturday at Toyota Stadium in Frisco, Texas, the Dallas Renegades hosted the Houston Gamblers in the league's opening weekend. Quarterback Austin Reed threw for 376 yards, a new UFL regular season record. Dallas scored the first pick-six of the season in the opening quarter and were 23-3 up by halftime. Reed found wideout Greg Ward for a 66-yard touchdown on the opening play of the second half. Houston managed a 93-yard kickoff return, but by the fourth quarter, it was done.

Working the sideline through all of it, running from end zone to end zone with a microphone in his hand, was Jake Butt.

Jake Butt and his sideline producer Kyle Woo. Kyle helps Jake navigate getting players, coaches and listening to what the producer needs for the broadcast.

If you watched Butt play college football, you'd understand why he ended up here. At the University of Michigan, he was the best tight end in the country. He set the all-time receiving record for the position in Ann Arbor, won the John Mackey Award as a senior, made consensus All-American, and was voted team captain by his teammates. He was the kind of player NFL scouts built their boards around. A projected first or second-round pick heading into the 2017 draft.

Then, on December 30th, 2016, in the Orange Bowl against Florida State, Butt caught a 16-yard pass in the second quarter and went down. His right ACL, the same knee he'd already torn once during spring training at Michigan in 2014, was gone again. He dropped from the top of the draft to the fifth round. The Denver Broncos took a chance on him at pick 145.

He never got the chance to prove them right. After missing his entire rookie season recovering from the Orange Bowl injury, Butt appeared in three games in 2018 before tearing his left ACL during a non-contact drill at practice. A third ACL tear. What he describes as "close to ten" knee surgeries across both knees. He was 26 years old when he announced his retirement in the summer of 2021, having played just eight NFL games across four years on the books. He later described the recovery from that third tear as "the hardest thing I've ever been through."

Jake Butt watching the UFL action from the Dallas Renegades sideline

A college career that promised everything, and a professional one that injury refused to let happen.

So he picked up a microphone.

It started with the Big Ten Network, where Butt moved into color analysis for college football broadcasts. The job suited him. He could still talk about the game the way he'd always understood it, from the inside. An opportunity with FOX Sports followed, first covering the USFL in 2023, then the newly merged UFL from 2024 onwards. Now 30, he's part of FOX's core broadcast team for the league alongside Joel Klatt, Curt Menefee and Brock Huard.

His title is sideline analyst. Not sideline reporter. He'll correct you on that. The distinction matters. Reporters relay information. Analysts break it down. And Butt breaks things down the way only someone who's lined up and run routes at the highest level can.

"It takes some bravery to go over the middle knowing there's a safety there ready to rip your head off," he says. He's not being dramatic. He's being specific. He played tight end. He knows what it costs.

The UFL gives him something the NFL and college broadcasting never could: access. Real, unfiltered, mid-game access.

"Let's say there's a critical fourth-quarter touchdown and one of the tight ends makes a catch," he says. "I'm right there and I can break it down not just with the tight end but the quarterback on either side of me, or the offensive coordinator, the head coach. Every little detail that went through their mind. Unfiltered."

Jake Butt speaking to Renegades star Steven Jones Jr. about an interception for a touchdown he made.

"You do not get that in the NFL. You do not get that in college. I think that's probably the number one separator and what makes this league so unique."

The teams, the coaches, the players are all aligned on this, Butt says. Everyone in the UFL understands that part of what makes the league work is letting the audience in. Not a sanitized post-game press conference. Not a 30-second touchline grab. Proper, detailed, in-the-moment conversation about what just happened and why.

He talks about preparation the way a player would. Coach meetings in the days before kickoff. Studying rosters, themes, storylines. Getting to the stadium before the coaches and the players. Introducing himself to the new faces, asking about roster changes, strategy shifts, what they're focusing on early. Then working with his play-by-play and color team to figure out what to watch for in warm-ups.

"With this being an opening weekend it's a little bit different," he says. "You don't have past game film. There's a lot of newness. New coaches. New players. Some of this is just coming in with an open mind."

Speaking to the quarterback in the team bench area after the touchdown just scored

Six of the eight UFL head coaches are new for 2026, including Rick Neuheisel in Dallas. Three of the franchises didn't exist until this year. For Butt, that means the sideline conversations are more fluid than ever, coaches working through the new rules in real time.

"It's not always just the players," he says. "We'll have access to the coaches too. Strategically, what's going through your mind? The inability to punt once you cross the 50-yard line, that's unique to this league. There's going to be fluid conversations throughout the game. These coaches are figuring this out on the fly."

One thing he's keeping a close eye on this season: kickers. The four-point field goal rule for attempts of 60 yards or more has changed the math entirely. "I want to see who's got the leg to do that or not," he says.

He would know. One of his favorite moments from the job centers on a kicker. Jake Bates, then with the Michigan Panthers, was a kickoff specialist in college who'd never kicked field goals competitively. First game of the 2024 season. 64-yard attempt to win it. He nails it. Gets iced. Goes back out and nails it again. All of it at Ford Field in Detroit.

Jake speaking to American Singer Song Writer and Guitarist Ty Myers who is performing at halftime of the game.

"You could feel it," Butt says. "I'm interviewing him and I'm thinking, this young man's life just changed. It was in the Detroit Lions' stadium, and I mean, the story is remarkable."

Bates signed with the Lions shortly after. He's one of a growing number of UFL players who've gone on to NFL careers. But the moments matter on their own terms too. That's what Butt keeps coming back to.

"You can sometimes see, especially as the season develops and players start to come into their own, you're like, what we're seeing in real time and the conversations we're having, this will be looked back on. You're watching people become who they're going to be."

Then there's what happens in his own head when the red light comes on.

"My heart's racing a little bit," he admits. "I'm playing it back in my head. What happened on that play? What's the right question to ask? Because I'm there to serve the players. How can I get in and get out and ask the right questions to lead them to give some color to the fans back home?"

There's a consciousness to it, he says. Not every score needs a sideline interview. A one-yard touchdown probably doesn't warrant one. But a pick-six does. A 66-yard bomb on the opening play of the second half does. He's in constant conversation with his producer, making sure what they're putting on air adds to the broadcast rather than drowning it.

"Hey, is this a story worth telling?" he says. "There's intention behind it. Let's make sure what we're giving is going to add to the show."

It's the question of a former player who understands timing. When to go over the middle. When to hold back. When the moment is big enough to step into.

There's also the physical side nobody talks about. Butt covers serious ground during a game, running sideline to sideline for three hours straight. He's planning to track his distance this season. Five or six miles a game wouldn't surprise him.

"I cover a lot of ground in these games," he laughs. "You're running sideline to sideline, up and down."

For a guy who gave everything to the sport and had it taken away by injury, there's something fitting about that. Still running. Still chasing the next play. Still right there where the action is, in the place that feels closest to what he lost. Not behind a desk in a studio. Not in a booth above the crowd. Down on the field, close enough to hear the pads, close enough to feel it.

"The only thing that can even compare to playing football is talking
about football," he says. "Specifically games. My adrenaline starts
pumping close to how it was when I was a player."

Three torn ACLs. Close to ten surgeries. Eight NFL games. And now, every
weekend, he's back on the sideline. Different role. Same heartbeat.

The UFL airs live on FOX, ESPN, ABC and FS1 throughout the spring season.

Full game highlights are available on the UFL's YouTube channel.