NFL team's average value? $957 million!

Having established yourself as a fantasy football guru, are you interested in trying out your talents with your very own NFL franchise?

Well according to a Forbes Special Report, the average NFL team would set you back $957 million. By contrast, only one Major League Baseball team is valued above that -- The New York Yankees at 1.026 billion. No other team is worth more than $617 million. The Dallas Cowboys are the most valuable team in sports, worth an estimated $1.5 billion.

The value of the NFL's television deals remains huge, with 75% of Americans saying they watched a game on TV last season. NFL teams are also the most profitable sports franchises, perhaps driven by the league's cost controls that some would deride as anti-competitive.

Seeing the value these teams have, entrepreneurs including Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban are exploring the possibility of setting up a new football league to rival the NFL.

On his blog, he has written that the NFL "not designed for a competitive environment. Competition for top players, even if the UFL gets just a few, increases prices at the top end for all teams. Every star will get paid more, but still have to fit under the cap. That forces teams to use more low cost players, at the expense of signing the middle of the roster. That gives us access to quite a few very, very good NFL players ..."

As long as there's no competition, the NFL's value is huge. But will its structure and salary cap system make it vulnerable to a well-funded upstart?