# 1920 Rochester Jeffersons season

The 1920 Rochester Jeffersons season was the franchise's inaugural season in the American Professional Football Association (APFA) and thirteenth as an American football team. The Jeffersons entered 1920 coming off a six-win, two-loss, two-tie (6–2–2) record in the New York Pro Football League (NYPFL) where it lost the championship game to the Buffalo Prospects. Several representatives from another professional football league, the Ohio League, wanted to form a new national league, and thus the APFA was created.
Ownership, roster, and coaching nearly stayed the same for the 1920 season. The team opened the season with a 10–0 victory over the non-APFA All-Buffalo. The only time the Jeffersons played a game against an APFA team was week six, when they lost to the Buffalo All-Americans. The team ended with a 6–3–2 record, which was good enough for them to finish sixth place in the final standings. The sportswriter Bruce Copeland compiled the 1920 All-Pro list, but no players from the Jeffersonss were on it. As of 2012, no player from the 1920 Rochester Jeffersons has been enshrined in the Pro Football Hall of Fame.
The Jeffersons' 66–0 defeat of Fort Porter remains the largest regular season shutout victory in league history, albeit being against a non-league team.

## Offseason

The Rochester Jeffersons finished 6–2–1 in their 1919 season. It lost the NYPFL championship to the Buffalo All-Americans. After the 1919 season, representatives of four Ohio League teams—the Canton Bulldogs, the Cleveland Tigers, the Dayton Triangles, and the Akron Pros—called a meeting on August 20, 1920, to discuss the formation of a new league. At the meeting, they tentatively agreed on a salary cap and pledged not to sign college players or players already under contract with other teams. They also agreed on a name for the circuit: the American Professional Football Conference. They then invited other professional teams to a second meeting on September 17.
At that meeting, held at Bulldogs owner Ralph Hay's Hupmobile showroom in Canton, representatives of the Rock Island Independents, the Muncie Flyers, the Decatur Staleys, the Racine Cardinals, the Massillon Tigers, the Chicago Cardinals, and the Hammond Pros agreed to join the league. Representatives of the All-Americans and Rochester Jeffersons could not attend the meeting, but sent letters to Hay asking to be included in the league. Team representatives changed the league's name slightly to the American Professional Football Association and elected officers, installing Jim Thorpe as president. Under the new league structure, teams created their schedules dynamically as the season progressed, so there were no minimum or maximum number of games needed to be played. Also, representatives of each team voted to determine the winner of the APFA trophy.

## Regular season

Scheduling for the Jeffersons was extremely ad hoc. Little over two weeks before the start of the 1920 season, team manager Leo V. Lyons was still putting out feelers for a "good heavyweight opponent" for the home opener. Gene Dooley and his "All-Buffalo" squad met the call but were not heavy enough to go toe-to-toe, falling 10–0 to the Jeffs on a rainy Sunday afternoon in Rochester's Baseball Park.
The Rochester Jeffersons were essentially a regional team, playing local opponents, with 10 of their 11 games in Rochester. The Red Eleven's solitary road game was played in Buffalo — a little over 70 miles away. The Jeffs played opponents solely from upstate New York, including grid squads from Rochester, Buffalo, Syracuse, Tonawanda, and Utica — the last-mentioned being the furthest distance away from Rochester, about 135 miles.
Following the Jeffs' second game of the season, a frolicking 66–0 smash up of a lesser opponent, four Rochester fans approached head coach Jack Forsyth and asked permission to organize a Jeffs rooters' club. Forsyth approved the plan, leaving the details to be worked out by the interested fans themselves, while agreeing to serve as treasurer.

## Schedule

| Game | Date | Opponent | Result | Record | Venue | Attendance | Recap |
| 1 | October 3 | All-Buffalo | W 10–0 | 1–0 | Rochester Baseball Park | 2,000 | Recap |
| 2 | October 10 | Fort Porter | W 66–0 | 2–0 | Rochester Baseball Park | | Recap |
| 3 | October 17 | Utica Knights of Columbus | T 0–0 | 2–0–1 | Rochester Baseball Park | | Recap |
| 4 | October 24 | Syracuse Stars | W 21–7 | 3–0–1 | Rochester Baseball Park | | Recap |
| 5 | October 31 | at Buffalo All-Americans | L 6–17 | 3–1–1 | Canisius Villa | 7,500 | Recap |
| 6 | November 7 | Utica Knights of Columbus | W 27–7 | 4–1–1 | Rochester Baseball Park | | Recap |
| 7 | November 14 | All-Tonawanda Lumberjacks | L 0–6 | 4–2–1 | Rochester Baseball Park | "largest since opening day" | Recap |
| 8 | November 21 | Rochester Scalpers | W 16–0 | 5–2–1 | Rochester Baseball Park | "largest of season" | Recap |
| 9 | November 25 | All-Tonawanda Lumberjacks | L 3–14 | 5–3–1 | Rochester Baseball Park | 2,500 | Recap |
| 10 | November 28 | Rochester Scalpers | W 7–6 | 6–3–1 | Rochester Baseball Park | "good-sized crowd" | Recap |
| 11 | December 5 | at Rochester Scalpers | T 0–0 | 6–3–2 | Edgerton Park Arena | | Recap |
| Note: Non-APFA opponents in italics. Thanksgiving Day: November 25. |||||||||

## Standings

1920 APFA standings :
| viewtalkedit | W | L | T | PCT | DIV | DPCT | PF | PA | STK |
| Akron Pros† | 8 | 0 | 3 | 1.000 | 6–0–3 | 1.000 | 151 | 7 | T2 |
| Decatur Staleys | 10 | 1 | 2 | .909 | 5–1–2 | .833 | 164 | 21 | T1 |
| Buffalo All-Americans | 9 | 1 | 1 | .900 | 4–1–1 | .800 | 258 | 32 | T1 |
| Chicago Cardinals | 6 | 2 | 2 | .750 | 3–2–2 | .600 | 101 | 29 | T1 |
| Rock Island Independents | 6 | 2 | 2 | .750 | 4–2–1 | .667 | 201 | 49 | W1 |
| Dayton Triangles | 5 | 2 | 2 | .714 | 4–2–2 | .667 | 150 | 54 | L1 |
| Rochester Jeffersons | 6 | 3 | 2 | .667 | 0–1–0 | .000 | 156 | 57 | T1 |
| Canton Bulldogs | 7 | 4 | 2 | .636 | 4–3–1 | .571 | 208 | 57 | W1 |
| Detroit Heralds | 2 | 3 | 3 | .400 | 1–3–0 | .250 | 53 | 82 | T2 |
| Cleveland Tigers | 2 | 4 | 2 | .333 | 1–4–2 | .200 | 28 | 46 | L1 |
| Chicago Tigers | 2 | 5 | 1 | .286 | 1–5–1 | .167 | 49 | 63 | W1 |
| Hammond Pros | 2 | 5 | 0 | .286 | 0–3–0 | .000 | 41 | 154 | L3 |
| Columbus Panhandles | 2 | 6 | 2 | .250 | 0–4–0 | .000 | 41 | 121 | W1 |
| Muncie Flyers | 0 | 1 | 0 | .000 | 0–1–0 | .000 | 0 | 45 | L1 |
† Awarded the Brunswick-Balke Collender Cup and named APFA Champions. Note: Tie games were not officially counted in the standings until 1972.