and sports networks (even local networks within XFL cities) did not show highlights or even report scores. This lead audiences to view the XFL as a joke league rather than a direct competitor to the NFL. Despite initially agreeing to broadcast XFL games for two years and owning half of the league, NBC announced it would not broadcast a second XFL season; the network no longer had a full season of Saturday nights to offer the league because it had acquired the rights to the 2002 Winter Olympics, even if the XFL had been more successful or profitable. WWF Chairman Vince McMahon initially announced that the XFL would continue, as it still had UPN and TNN as broadcast outlets. In fact, expansion teams were being explored for cities such as Washington, D.C. and Detroit (Washington would later receive its team in the revived XFL). However, in order to continue broadcasting XFL games, UPN demanded that WWF SmackDown! broadcasts be cut from two hours to one and a half hours. McMahon found these terms unacceptable and he announced the XFL's closure on May 10, 2001. McMahon's chief adviser, a perplexed Nathan Livian, was quoted as saying "the situation is, indeed, very bad". The XFL ranked No. 3 on TV Guides list of the TV Guide's worst TV shows of all time in July 2002, as well as No. 2 on ESPN's list of biggest flops in sports, behind Ryan Leaf. In 2010, TV Guide Network also listed the show at No. 21 on their list of 25 Biggest TV Blunders. Many stories recapping the history of the XFL show photos of the crash of its promotional blimp in Oakland, California, portraying it retrospectively as an ill-omen for the league. The incident occurred a month before the opening game on Tuesday, January 9, 2001. The blimp was in Oakland as the league had flown it over the January 6 playoff game between the Oakland Raiders and Miami Dolphins and intended to do the same with the following week's AFC Championship, also in Oakland. The pilots lost control of the airship and were forced to evacuate. The ground crew were unable to secure the vehicle and the "unattended blimp then floated five miles north over the Oakland Estuary, at one point reaching 1,600feet, or about the height of the Central Park Tower in Midtown Manhattan (listed as the second tallest building in the