Post by Coach Campbell on May 20, 2007 18:00:33 GMT
The American Football League (the 4th)
1960-1969
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By the late 1950's, pro football was gaining popularity exponentially. The sport, once described as "three yards and a cloud of dust" for its unimaginative, up-the-middle running on every play, was evolving into the most dynamic of team sports, and American audiences became captivated as modern-day legends like Johnny Unitas and Jim Brown literally changed history before their eyes.
Lamar Hunt, son of Texas billionaire H.L. Hunt, wanted in and was willing to pay to get in. However, the hard-line (and aging) owners of the National Football League weren't about to let a mid-20 year old heir into their league. So, Hunt decided to form his own league instead. The AFL was born.
There had been two other American Football Leagues before Hunt's brainchild. Each one had miserably failed, and the leagues were swallowed up by the NFL on the NFL's terms. The first such league was formed by the "Galloping Ghost" Red Grange himself. Grange started AFL I because the NFL (and more specifically Giants owner Tim Mara) would not give him a franchise in New York. Grange, a true modern-day legend in the 1920's, used the sheer power of his name alone to start a 9 team league that began play in 1926. The league was a miserable failure, as only a fraction of the original franchises finished the season. The NFL swallowed up the upstart league a year later. AFL II began play in 1936, and suffered much of the same fate as AFL I. The lack of notoriety and income contributed to an AFL I-style fate. The Cleveland (later Los Angeles and St. Louis) Rams were the sole survivors from this experiment. Other rival leagues after these two included AFL III and the AAFC
Enter Lamar Hunt. Hunt and his group of owners knew exactly why other rival leagues had failed: money. That wasn't to be a problem for this group, though. Along with Hunt, the other seven owners were by and large wealthy.
That's not to say that this latest competitor of the NFL didn't experience its fair share of problems. Things were rocky from the very beginning. The Minneapolis ownership group defected to the NFL before the start of the 1960 season, and had to be replaced by Oakland and Al Davis. Attendance was so poor in Los Angeles and Dallas that those teams were forced to move to survive (to San Diego and Kansas City respectively). Fan support was just as desolate in other cities such as New York, where sometimes less than 10,000 would arrive for a Sunday afternoon game.
Money soon became the main talking point about the AFL (IV). Rebel leagues before and since, such as the AAFC and the USFL also had owners with deep pockets, but failed. In the instances of the AAFC and the USFL, the owners DID have sizeable bank accounts, but unlike the owners of the AFL, they weren't willing to spend it. Hunt and his group of owners were rich enough and willing enough to spend far more money than any of their counterparts, before or after. That's what made the AFL different. That and a big damn television contract.
Big business like a football league DOES require boat loads of cash, but it also requires something else that other leagues found unattainable: a national audience. The reason rival leagues don't sprout up every day is because success is a vicious cycle: they need interest in their league, but they need name recognition to gain interest, a national audience to gain name recognition, and interest to gain a national audience. With this type of circular logic, how does a group like the AFL go about "breaking in" so to speak?
The answer came from NBC, the broadcaster who had just lost the NFL television contract (again). NBC recognized the growing popularity of the NFL's product, but couldn't afford to out-bid CBS for the NFL's rights. NBC gave the AFL millions, which was important, but not as important as the viewer ship the broadcaster provided.
Before long, the AFL, who already had past NFL stars such as George Blanda, began competing for young college and free-agent talent with the NFL. The rival leagues began drafting underclassmen as "futures" (holding the right to the players in future years, when they became eligible), and even started dedicating entire drafts to futures. Player salaries, especially for those rookies, began to skyrocket at an alarming clip.
The rivalry between the leagues was so fierce and costs were so high that the two combatant leagues almost destroyed each other. Finally a peace summit was called, and a merger was brokered. This merger, unlike those of previous AFL's or the AAFC, was not to be settled on the NFL's terms. This merger was to be exactly that; a merger.
The agreement took a while, but major points were hashed out. The leagues would hold a combined draft and a "world's championship game" (later renamed the "Super Bowl") for the 1967 season. Also agreed upon was the fact that the league would be separated into two conferences (AFC/NFC), with the AFL teams in one conference and the NFL teams in the other. This new combined league would be known as the National Football League.
The one major sticking point was that there were 16 NFL teams, as opposed to 10 AFL teams. In order to have equal conferences, three NFL main-stays would have to move over to the other side. Historically, Art Modell, then owner of the Cleveland Browns, gets credit for overcoming this last hurdle. He convinced his good friend Art Rooney (Pittsburgh), as well as the owner of the Baltimore Colts, to move over if he would move his club over. Some claim that Modell was trying to get to the Super Bowl by going to the seemingly weaker conference. In any case, the deal was done, and both leagues would survive.
The history of the AFL lives on today, as the original "AFL West" (Denver, KC, Oakland, SD) remains intact to this day. Original owners such as Hunt, Davis and Bud Adams among others still operate their clubs over 40 years later. Historical moments such as Namath's Super Bowl guarantee and the Dolphins perfect season were AFL originals.
The AFL also played an important role in the development of the game. High-powered passing games and flamboyant touchdown celebrations were the result of the AFL. Many, many rule changes incurred as part of the merger or shortly thereafter, and the style of play in the AFL.
1960-1969
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
By the late 1950's, pro football was gaining popularity exponentially. The sport, once described as "three yards and a cloud of dust" for its unimaginative, up-the-middle running on every play, was evolving into the most dynamic of team sports, and American audiences became captivated as modern-day legends like Johnny Unitas and Jim Brown literally changed history before their eyes.
Lamar Hunt, son of Texas billionaire H.L. Hunt, wanted in and was willing to pay to get in. However, the hard-line (and aging) owners of the National Football League weren't about to let a mid-20 year old heir into their league. So, Hunt decided to form his own league instead. The AFL was born.
There had been two other American Football Leagues before Hunt's brainchild. Each one had miserably failed, and the leagues were swallowed up by the NFL on the NFL's terms. The first such league was formed by the "Galloping Ghost" Red Grange himself. Grange started AFL I because the NFL (and more specifically Giants owner Tim Mara) would not give him a franchise in New York. Grange, a true modern-day legend in the 1920's, used the sheer power of his name alone to start a 9 team league that began play in 1926. The league was a miserable failure, as only a fraction of the original franchises finished the season. The NFL swallowed up the upstart league a year later. AFL II began play in 1936, and suffered much of the same fate as AFL I. The lack of notoriety and income contributed to an AFL I-style fate. The Cleveland (later Los Angeles and St. Louis) Rams were the sole survivors from this experiment. Other rival leagues after these two included AFL III and the AAFC
Enter Lamar Hunt. Hunt and his group of owners knew exactly why other rival leagues had failed: money. That wasn't to be a problem for this group, though. Along with Hunt, the other seven owners were by and large wealthy.
That's not to say that this latest competitor of the NFL didn't experience its fair share of problems. Things were rocky from the very beginning. The Minneapolis ownership group defected to the NFL before the start of the 1960 season, and had to be replaced by Oakland and Al Davis. Attendance was so poor in Los Angeles and Dallas that those teams were forced to move to survive (to San Diego and Kansas City respectively). Fan support was just as desolate in other cities such as New York, where sometimes less than 10,000 would arrive for a Sunday afternoon game.
Money soon became the main talking point about the AFL (IV). Rebel leagues before and since, such as the AAFC and the USFL also had owners with deep pockets, but failed. In the instances of the AAFC and the USFL, the owners DID have sizeable bank accounts, but unlike the owners of the AFL, they weren't willing to spend it. Hunt and his group of owners were rich enough and willing enough to spend far more money than any of their counterparts, before or after. That's what made the AFL different. That and a big damn television contract.
Big business like a football league DOES require boat loads of cash, but it also requires something else that other leagues found unattainable: a national audience. The reason rival leagues don't sprout up every day is because success is a vicious cycle: they need interest in their league, but they need name recognition to gain interest, a national audience to gain name recognition, and interest to gain a national audience. With this type of circular logic, how does a group like the AFL go about "breaking in" so to speak?
The answer came from NBC, the broadcaster who had just lost the NFL television contract (again). NBC recognized the growing popularity of the NFL's product, but couldn't afford to out-bid CBS for the NFL's rights. NBC gave the AFL millions, which was important, but not as important as the viewer ship the broadcaster provided.
Before long, the AFL, who already had past NFL stars such as George Blanda, began competing for young college and free-agent talent with the NFL. The rival leagues began drafting underclassmen as "futures" (holding the right to the players in future years, when they became eligible), and even started dedicating entire drafts to futures. Player salaries, especially for those rookies, began to skyrocket at an alarming clip.
The rivalry between the leagues was so fierce and costs were so high that the two combatant leagues almost destroyed each other. Finally a peace summit was called, and a merger was brokered. This merger, unlike those of previous AFL's or the AAFC, was not to be settled on the NFL's terms. This merger was to be exactly that; a merger.
The agreement took a while, but major points were hashed out. The leagues would hold a combined draft and a "world's championship game" (later renamed the "Super Bowl") for the 1967 season. Also agreed upon was the fact that the league would be separated into two conferences (AFC/NFC), with the AFL teams in one conference and the NFL teams in the other. This new combined league would be known as the National Football League.
The one major sticking point was that there were 16 NFL teams, as opposed to 10 AFL teams. In order to have equal conferences, three NFL main-stays would have to move over to the other side. Historically, Art Modell, then owner of the Cleveland Browns, gets credit for overcoming this last hurdle. He convinced his good friend Art Rooney (Pittsburgh), as well as the owner of the Baltimore Colts, to move over if he would move his club over. Some claim that Modell was trying to get to the Super Bowl by going to the seemingly weaker conference. In any case, the deal was done, and both leagues would survive.
The history of the AFL lives on today, as the original "AFL West" (Denver, KC, Oakland, SD) remains intact to this day. Original owners such as Hunt, Davis and Bud Adams among others still operate their clubs over 40 years later. Historical moments such as Namath's Super Bowl guarantee and the Dolphins perfect season were AFL originals.
The AFL also played an important role in the development of the game. High-powered passing games and flamboyant touchdown celebrations were the result of the AFL. Many, many rule changes incurred as part of the merger or shortly thereafter, and the style of play in the AFL.