National Football League

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The **National Football League** is a professional American Football league. It was originally founded in 1920 as the American Professional Football Association. While the league has changed over the years, its largest change was after the 1967 AFL/NFL Merger with the American Football League. The league's teams currently play a seventeen game regular season, followed by the playoffs, in which the division winners and the three teams who failed to win division but managed a better record then the remaining conference teams (ie Wild Card teams) play in a bracket until the NFC and AFC championship games, and eventually, the Super Bowl.

## History

### Founding (1920-1931)

The league was founded on August 20, 1920 at a Hupmobile dealership in Canton, Ohio. Five Ohio-area football teams, the Akron Pros, Canton Bulldogs, Cleveland Tigers, Columbus Panhandlers, and Dayton Triangles. On September 17th of that same year, four Illinois teams (the Chicago Tigers, Decatur Staleys, Racine Cardinals, and Rock Island Independents), two Indiana teams (the Hammond Pros and Muncie Flyers), two New York teams (the Buffalo All-Americans and the Rochester Jeffersons), and the Detroit Heralds of Michigan. During this period, teams would often play teams outside the league, collegiate teams, and would fold or relocate very commonly. The teams championships were decided based off the best win-loss record, which was problematic as teams would not necessarily play the same number of games. The league was highly chaotic.

### League Firsts (1931-1936)

Prior to the 1933 season, two major team owners (George Preston Marshall of the then-Boston Redskins and George Halas of the Chicago Bears) pushed an organization of the NFL. The league was organized into an Eastern and a Western division. In the Eastern Division, their were the Philadelphia Eagles, Brooklyn Dodgers, New York Giants, Boston Redskins, and the Pittsburgh Pirates, and in the Western Division their were the Chicago Bears, Portsmouth Spartans, Chicago Cardinals, Green Bay Packers and Cincinnati Reds. These teams would continue to rapidly evolve, relocate, fold and be replaced, although the Bears, Eagles, Packers, and Giants remain unchanged today, while the Pittsburgh Pirates renamed to the Pittsburgh Steelers, the Portsmouth Spartans relocated and renamed to the Detroit Lions, the Boston Redskins relocated and renamed to the Washington Commanders, and the Chicago Cardinals relocated to the Arizona Cardinals.

In 1936, the first NFL Draft was held.

### Rival Leagues (1936-1946)

The largest rival league of this period was the All-American Football Conference. However, the league twice folded, but three AAFC franchises moved into the NFL that still survive in some form or another today, the Cleveland Rams, the San Francisco 49ers, and the Cleveland Browns. Additionally, the league's Baltimore Colts also joined the NFL before folding, however the NFL created an expansion team four years later by the same name.

### Effective Monopoly (1946-1960)

In the post-war era, the NFL operated as a monopoly as it's popularity grew. Additionally, the 1958 NFL Championship Game helped boost the league's popularity, having had the nickname "the Greatest Game ever played".

This period also saw NFL reintegration, undoing much of what George Preston Marshall had pushed for. In 1946, the Rams and the Browns both integrated, becoming the first teams to do so. Gradually, every team integrated until finally the John F. Kennedy Administration forced integration on the Redskins, the final team to integrate.

### NFL/AFL Rivalry (1960-1967)

Lamar Hunt, a Dallas-area businessman, had long wanted to invest in the NFL. He attempted to buy the Cardinals but was unsuccessful. Wanting to own a professional team in Dallas, he partnered with several others to form the American Football League. The league began play with the Minnesota Vikings, Dallas Texans, Buffalo Bills, Houston Oilers, New York Titans, Denver Broncos, and Los Angeles Chargers. The Vikings would later accept an offer to join the NFL, and they were replaced in the AFL by the Oakland Raiders. In 1966, the League added the Miami Dolphins and two years later the Cincinnati Bengals. In response, the NFL added the Dallas Cowboys. The Texans then moved to Kansas City and became the Kansas City Chiefs.

In 1966, the NFL began talks of a merger, which later went through and recieved Congressional approval. The first NFL-AFL world championship game, later known as the Super Bowl I, was played on January 15, 1967, between the NFL Champion Packers and the AFL Champion Chiefs. The Packers defeated the Chiefs 35-10.

### Transition Period (1967-1971)

*Main Article: AFL-NFL Merger*

The structure of the NFL had to change with the integration of the AFL. The solution that was created was the formation of two conferences, the National Football Conference, composed of the previous NFL teams, and the American Football Conference, composed of the previous AFL teams and the Pittsburgh Steelers, Cleveland Browns, and Baltimore Colts, who choose to join the conference. The league also added four teams, the New Orleans Saints in 1967, the Cincinnati Bengals in 1968, and the Seattle Seahawks and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in 1976. The Atlanta Falcons and Miami Dolphins were not counted in these numbers as they were officially created before the merger. A common draft was also introduced.

### First Golden Age of the NFL (1971-1983)

The 1970s began initially with a very strong team in the Dolphins, who went to three Super Bowls and won two. The NFC saw strong teams in the Dallas Cowboys and the Minnesota Vikings, but the 70s would be dominated by a single team- the Pittsburgh Steelers- who won four Super Bowls and became famous for the Steel Curtain, an incredibly strong defense.

1981 saw a new dynasty light fire. The San Francisco 49ers were lead by quarterback Joe Montana to the 1981 NFC Championship Game against the Cowboys in a game that became known as "the Catch" due to the game-winning pass in the final minute by Montana that resulted in a touchdown. The 49ers went on to defeat the Bengals in the Super Bowl in their first of four Super Bowls under Montana and his successor, Steve Young.

### Troubles (1983-1987)

Troubles began in the NFL with the formation of the rival league in the United States Football League. The USFL was able to pull high-caliber talent such as Herschel Walker, Jim Kelly, and Steve Young. While the league eventually defeated the opposition in the pyrrhic loss in the case of USFL v. NFL, it dealt with a lockout in 1987.

### Second Golden Age of the NFL (1987-2002)

The Second Golden Age of the NFL saw the dominance of the Cowboys and the 49ers for much of this period, although the Green Bay Packers and Denver Broncos began to build up solid lineups.

### League Modifications to Current Form (2002-Present)

In 2002, the NFL expanded to have four teams per division, four divisions per conference, and added the Texans. In this period, the New England Patriots have been dominate with the advent of quarterback Tom Brady, widely considered the greatest NFL quarterback of all time. Also of note where dominate teams put together by brother-quarterbacks Peyton and Eli Manning in the Colts, Broncos, and the Giants, the dominant team lead by Russell Wilson in the Seattle Seahawks, and most recently the Kansas City Chiefs lead by Patrick Mahomes.

## Franchises

### Current

#### American Football Conference

##### AFC East

* Buffalo Bills
* Miami Dolphins
* New England Patriots
* New York Jets

##### AFC North

* Baltimore Ravens
* Cincinnati Bengals
* Cleveland Browns
* Pittsburgh Steelers

##### AFC South

* Houston Texans
* Indianapolis Colts
* Jacksonville Jaguars
* Tennessee Titans

##### AFC West

* Denver Broncos
* Kansas City Chiefs
* Las Vegas Raiders
* Los Angeles Chargers

#### National Football Conference

##### NFC East

* Dallas Cowboys
* New York Giants
* Philadelphia Eagles
* Washington Commanders

##### NFC North

* Chicago Bears
* Detroit Lions
* Green Bay Packers
* Minnesota Vikings

##### NFC South

* Atlanta Falcons
* Carolina Panthers
* New Orleans Saints
* Tampa Bay Buccaneers

##### NFC West

* Arizona Cardinals
* Los Angeles Rams
* San Francisco 49ers
* Seattle Seahawks

## Seasons

*Italics indicates team is now defunct. A (!) denotes a contested champion.*