Category: History and More

As we enter the roaring 20s, the thought of a new professional gridiron organization coming along and challenging the National Football League seems absurd. With 32 franchises, an international footprint and a seemingly endless supply of money, the NFL is more than an 800-pound gorilla – it’s King Kong.

The World Football League (1974-75) didn’t have the cash to pose a real threat to it, and the United States Football League (1983-85) didn’t have enough owners with the sense to stick to a spring schedule so it could maintain a degree of major league status.

But 50 years ago today the league’s last real challenger played its final title game – not because it couldn’t beat the NFL, but because it joined it.

When the Kansas City Chiefs defeated the Oakland Raiders, 17-7, on January 4, 1970, the book closed on the little league that could – and did. Oh, there was an AFL all-star game on January 17, but this marked the last high stakes competition played by an association that swiftly proved it could stand shoulder to shoulder with big brother.

Formed in 1959 and starting play in 1960, the AFL got the NFL’s attention quickly. And once it became obvious that its owners were willing and able to outbid the older league for top talent, a union made the most business sense.

So in 1966 reps from each entity met and decided they’d combine, forming one major league in 1970 with room for expansion.

Until then, they’d maintain separate schedules but play preseason games, an AFL-NFL World Championship Game (the Super Bowl) and hold a combined college draft.

The best news for AFL faithful was that all of its existing franchises would be absorbed and none could be transferred outside their metro areas.

The 1960 AFL season began with the Boston Patriots, Buffalo Bills, Dallas Texans, Denver Broncos, Houston Oilers, Los Angeles Chargers, Oakland Raiders and Titans of New York.

Ten years later those franchises were still around, although the the Chargers shifted to San Diego in 1961; the Texans relocated to Kansas City in 1963 and were renamed the Chiefs; and the Titans rebranded as the New York Jets in 1963.

The United States Senate approved the merger on October 14, 1966, so the leagues basically had a working relationship for three full seasons before consolidating.

As a kid who had learned to love football thanks to the AFL (and specifically the New York Jets), this wasn’t particularly good news to me.

I thought the upstarts were a lot more fun to watch; it was sandlot football in pads, and I mean that as a compliment. Generally the games were more wide-open than those of the NFL, and coaches were much less conservative in their play-calling.

Not that I disliked the NFL (the Los Angeles Rams were my favorite team in the “other” league), but given a choice I’d always choose an AFL game first.

So as I sat and watched the final AFL title game 50 years ago, I did so with a touch of sadness.

Even though I wasn’t losing an old friend, that old friend was moving to a nicer neighborhood – and that meant my sandlot would never be the same.

In case you missed it, the Arena Football League has left the building.

After more than three decades of providing fans with a miniaturized, indoor version of the gridiron game, the innovative circuit breathed its last in November when it filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy.

There are still other low budget, lower level versions scattered across the country, but the king is dead and with it, much of the novelty.

Here’s a bit of trivia for you, though; the first National Football League playoff game was – to stretch a point – a prototype of arena football.

On December 18, 1932, the Chicago Bears (led by football legends in the making Red Grange and Bronco Nagurski) and Portsmouth Spartans were set to play at Wrigley Field to break a tie atop the NFL standings. The weather outside, however, was frightening.

No, really – it was historically awful with blizzard conditions and frigid temperatures making extended outdoor activities potentially deadly.

So leading up to the clash organizers of the event called an audible and decided to move it to Chicago Stadium, home of the National Hockey League Chicago Blackhawks.

Although the Bears had, in fact, played an indoor exhibition a couple of years earlier, this marked the first time the NFL had moved inside to stage a game that counted and nearly 12,000 fans showed up to witness the spectacle.

Naturally, some major rules concessions had to be made.

For this contest, the field was 60 yards long (not including two 10-yard end zones) and 45 yards wide. Instead of playing on concrete, tanbark was brought in and laid six inches thick to create a field.

The ball was placed inside the hash marks on every play.

And, the teams also agreed before the game not to kick field goals.

Why?

Well, read about it yourself from this classic game account written by United Press staff correspondent Kenneth D. Fry:

CHICAGO – There have been comical happenings on the football battlefields without number but herewith is submitted the champion football comic strip.

And it was for a championship.

For the sake of record, let it be said here and now that the Chicago Bears defeated the Portsmouth, Ohio, Spartans on the indoor gridiron at the Chicago Stadium last night, 9 to 0. The Bears scored a touch down and a safety in the final period to win the title that has heretofore been the property of the Green Bay Packers.

It was called a football game and was said to be played on a gridiron.

The playing field was composed of six inches of dirt and tanbark spread over the stadium’s concrete floor. The field itself was 60 yards long, forty yards short of rule book length.

Players standing on their own goal lines punted into the other team’s end zone all evening. Punts from the middle of the field landed in the mezzanine, balcony and adjacent territory. One kicked knocked the “BL” out of the Black Hawks hockey sign. Another hit a sour note on the organ as the organist was playing, for some obscure and undetermined reason, a song about cutting down the old pine tree.

The organist played “Illinois Loyalty” when Red Grange caught a forward pass for a touchdown, and that was the only note that rang true during the evening’s pastime.

By mutual agreement neither team attempted field goals. Windows cost money.

Officials spent more time picking large clinkers out of the soil than they did blowing whistles.

Only one punt was caught and returned during the entire contest. One went out of bounds; one was downed. The rest landed with loud thuds against the walls or sent spectators scurrying to cover. The thirty yard line was the middle of the field and a large copper standing nearby wanted to know in a loud voice how much it counted when a punt landed in the balcony.

Grange accounted for the only TD of the night, reeling in a five yard scoring toss from Nagurski. Tiny Engebretsen kicked the lone extra point, and Portsmouth gave up a safety when punter Mule Wilson mishandled a snap and allowed the ball to roll out of the back of the end zone.

(I figured I needed to provide some key stats in case you have any of those guys on your fantasy teams).

But kudos to Fry, who obviously had some fun writing his account of the contest. The NFL of 1932 was hardly the juggernaut of today (it had only eight franchises and was overshadowed by college football), so the story reflected more of the game’s human interest than the game itself.

Still, it’s significant that the first NFL postseason game was more similar to arena football than traditional outdoor football.

Of course with venues such as Mercedes-Benz Stadium and the Superdome, traditional outdoor football now works just fine indoors – no tanbark required.

So, what do you think about the lineup for this season’s College Football Playoff?

If you’re a fan of LSU, Ohio State, Clemson and Oklahoma, you think the selection committee got it right by choosing the four best Power 5 schools.

If you root for, say, Memphis or Appalachian State, you think the system is flawed because it’s too small and committee members ignore the Group of 5.

But let’s be honest – there’ll never be a consensus on the best playoff system regardless of how large or small it is.

Me? I’ve decided not to get emotionally involved anymore. I’d prefer a 16 team tournament with 10 conference champions and six wildcard teams, but doubt that’ll happen – certainly not in the foreseeable future.

What’s most likely is an eight team playoff, which will come once the current four team agreement runs out following the 2026 season (if not sooner).

With four teams, some believe the field is too exclusive.

With 16 teams, a case can be made that it’s too inclusive.

Eight teams is the middle ground, but even then there will be issues.

But I’m not here to opine about the merits of the CFP. There have already been thousands and thousands of columns written on the subject and I’ve been responsible for far too many of them.

What I thought would be fun, though, is to take the final pre-bowl Associated Press rankings and see how the Football Bowl Subdivision title chase would look under the “old eras.”

And for our purposes those eras will consist of the Conference Tie-In Era (ending in 1991); the Bowl Coalition Era (1992-94); the Bowl Alliance Era (1995-97); and Bowl Championship Series Era (1998-2013).

The Top 25 released December 8 is as follows: 1. LSU (13-0), 2. Ohio State (13-0), 3. Clemson (13-0), 4. Oklahoma (12-1), 5. Georgia (11-2), 6. Florida (10-2), 7. Oregon (11-2), 8. Baylor (11-2), 9. Alabama (10-2) and Auburn (9-3) tied, 11. Wisconsin (10-3), 12. Utah (11-2), 13. Penn State (10-2), 14. Notre Dame (10-2), 15. Memphis (12-1), 16. Minnesota (10-2), 17. Michigan (9-3), 18. Boise State (12-1), 19. Iowa (9-3), 20. Appalachian State (12-1), 21. Navy (9-2), 22. USC (8-4), 23. Cincinnati (10-3), 24. Air Force (10-2) and 25. Oklahoma State (8-4).

Let’s begin, shall we?

Conference Tie-In Era

You know how college football fans love to bitch and moan?

There would’ve been some major bitching and moaning if this week’s Top 25 existed in the 1991 season.

By then most of the top bowl games had reached agreements with conferences in order to have guaranteed participants, so the Rose Bowl would always feature the Big Ten champion against the Pac-10 (now Pac-12) champion, while the SEC champion was bound for New Orleans and the Sugar Bowl.

The Big 8 (now Big 12) winner was assigned to the Orange Bowl; the late, sometimes great Southwest Conference champion went to the Cotton Bowl; and the ACC titlist was placed in the Citrus Bowl.

A national championship game wouldn’t have been possible in 1991. LSU would be in the Sugar Bowl while Ohio State would meet Oregon in the Rose Bowl.

Clemson would be in Orlando, and its only chance of winning a title would be for the top-ranked Tigers and second ranked Buckeyes to lose.

If all the favorites won their bowls, the season would end with three undefeated teams and a butt load of unhappy fans.

Bowl Coalition Era

Both the 1990 and 1991 seasons ended with split national championships. In 1990 Colorado won the AP title with Georgia Tech claiming the Coaches Poll national championship, and a year later Miami finished atop the AP rankings and Washington was the choice of the coaches.

This led to the Bowl Coalition, which gave the SEC, Big 8, ACC and SWC some wiggle room. For example, if the season ended with the SEC team No. 1 and the Big 8 team No. 2, then the Orange Bowl would give up its right to host the Big 8 champion so it could play the top SEC team in the Sugar Bowl for the national title. If a team from the Big 8 was No. 1, then the Orange Bowl would host.

So that means if the Bowl Coalition existed in 2019, LSU and Ohio State would meet in New Orleans for all the marbles, right?

Nope.

The Pac-10 and Big Ten were not part of the deal because those leagues wanted to retain their Rose Bowl tie-in.

So Ohio State would be playing Oregon in Pasadena, while LSU would host Clemson in New Orleans.

That would possibly elevate the Sugar Bowl to the national championship game, but if Ohio State won the Rose Bowl that means there would still be two undefeated teams at the end of the season.

Bowl Alliance Era

This was a slight improvement over the Coalition in that the Sugar, Orange and Fiesta Bowls featured the highest ranked teams, with the top two meeting for the national championship.

And this was fine as long as a Pac-10 or Big Ten school wasn’t involved because they refused to give up their Rose Bowl gig.

So apply this plan to 2019 and once again you have LSU vs. Clemson in the Sugar and Ohio State vs. Oregon in the Rose.

The possibility of co-champions or an undefeated runner-up would again be not only possible, but probable.

Bowl Championship Series Era

Finally, the NCAA figured out a way to manufacture a national championship game without having to install a playoff system.

The Pac-10 and Big Ten agreed to join the party, and this party would include the BCS National Championship Game which was rotated among the Rose, Sugar, Fiesta and Orange Bowls before ultimately becoming a stand-alone event alternated among those bowl sites.

The top two teams would meet in the title match, while the other bowls would choose from the best of the rest (although the Rose still had “traditional” matchups when it wasn’t hosting the No. 1 and No. 2 teams).

The rankings were determined by a combination of polls and computer data, so who knows which two teams would’ve been spit out in 2019.

But assuming it jibed with this week’s Top 25, LSU and Ohio State would be playing for the national championship while Clemson would be taking on Oklahoma in a consolation prize bowl (although it would be little consolation to Dabo Swinney’s Tigers, even if they won).

But those eras are done, and now we find ourselves in year six of the CFP era.

For college football’s “haves” (meaning Power 5 members) there’s little room for complaining in 2019. Few doubt that LSU, Ohio State and Clemson belong in the field, and no team in the Pac-12, SEC, Big Ten or ACC can claim they should take the place of the Big 12 champ Sooners as the No. 4 seed.

The national championship of big-time college football has evolved quite a bit over the years, and it’s obviously much better that it’s ever been before.

Whether or not it can and will get even better, though, is a topic for another time.