About Underdog Sports Leagues

Underdog Sports Leagues was started with a simple idea: provide laid back leagues for everyday players that are safe and fun. While USL never turns away real athletes or people who take sports seriously, most of our members are not superstars or blue chippers, but rather everyday Underdogs who want to play a game or two, meet some people, and go talk about the game afterwards at the local watering hole.

Before athletes became rappers and movie stars, and before A-Rod and the number 252 became a part of the American vernacular, there were a couple of cavemen who knocked a rock around in a field with sticks for one reason: it was fun. Sports might be a way of life, a religion, or a huge business enterprise, but at its core we at USL believe that sports should be enjoyable – the “agony of defeat” is for athletes with sponsorships, not everyday players. If you are a person who plays sports with a laid back attitude, and realizes that even if that cool looking ref totally misses a call (rare) life will still go on - you sound like an Underdog and we welcome you to give USL a try.

Signs that you are probably an Underdog:

• You spend more time coming up with nicknames for your teammates than coming up with plays to run.
• Your pre-game preparation consists of remembering where you left your glove and cleats.
• You remember half the lines from Office Space and Caddy Shack but often forget what your team record is.

• Whenever you move to a new apartment you always have at least 2 or 3 cardboard boxes marked “Sports Trophies 1997-99” on the outside.
• You often run late to games because negotiations between your agent and a major sports apparel company in Oregon ran longer than expected.
• Your response to a teammate dropping a big pass is to make a notation on your clipboard that they run extra sprints during your next scheduled team practice – at 6:30 AM.

Lame League Move #1 – No trained Staff – Forget about not having a well trained staff on the field for your game, lots of leagues go further and make you provide players on your team to hang around and ref or ump once your game is over. No worries here – you will never need to assign players to ref other games – we figure you came to us to play, not to learn how to officiate.

Lame League Move #2 – Cheap rates, lots of add-ons – Ever had to buy your own softballs, bring your own flags, or buy some uniforms from a league just so you could play in it? How about spending time calling in your scores to an answering machine? Not going to happen - we figure you should spend your time on the field, not buying equipment or making phone calls. As part of USL membership, you get access to all of our equipment, and its pretty darn good if we do say so, ourselves. We’ll provide you cool uniform contacts if you want to check them out, but never as a barrier to entry.
Lame League Move #3 – Captains Meetings and Maitre D’s – The only meeting you’ll need to attend for playing in our league is when you meet up with your team at the bar after the game. There are no captains’ meetings or rules meetings, only parties and events. In addition, you don’t have to be a descendent of Ty Cobb to get into the league. USL leagues are first come first serve every season. Even if you’ve never played with us before you still have a shot to get into a league – ‘this ain’t no country club.’
Lame League Move #4 – The ‘never ending [league] story’ – Ever bowled in a 33 week bowling league? Ever played in a Softball league that seemed to last longer then the MLB season? We know that you have other things to do and you want to go out of town and have a life, even if you like sports. Most of our seasons are fairly short (6 to 8 weeks) so you can play some games and not have to block off your schedule for the next 6 months.
Lame League Move #5 – “Individuals need not apply” – Just because you don’t know 12 other people doesn’t mean you shouldn’t play in a league – USL welcomes all players, and small groups of friends. It may be a bit more work to find you a team, but that’s what we are here for. You might even find that we have gotten pretty good at creating new teams of individuals with similar skill levels and backgrounds.