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NFL is born
The NFL formed August 20, 1920, as the American Professional Football Conference then changed its name to the American Professional Football Association on September 17, 1920, and officially changed its name to the National Football League on June 24, 1922 -
First Black Head Coach
Before joining leagues, Akron Pros star Fritz Pollard adds coaching responsibilities to his on-field duties, becoming the NFL's first black head coach. -
Survival of the fittest
In the hopes of elimanting the unstable franchises it cuts its teams from 22 to 12 leaving only the financially stable ones. -
Football gets segregated
Thanks to Washington Redskins owner George Preston Marshall, the NFL imposes a new de facto policy of total racial segregation. No more black athletes will play in the NFL -
The Draft
The NFL holds its first annual draft of college players. The first player selected, Heisman Trophy winner Jay Berwanger, chooses to pursue a career in plastics manufacturing instead of pro football and never plays a down in the NFL. -
Television
NFL game airs on television for the first time, with NBC producing a local broadcast of a game between the Brooklyn Dodgers and Philadelphia Eagles. Since fewer than 1,000 TV sets are known to exist in New York at the time, it is unclear whether anyone actually watches the broadcast. -
War brings us together
Due to the war the two penn teams were short players combing to make the Phil-Pitt Steagles -
First NFL championship aired
NFL championshiped aired on tv for first time -
AFL
Lamar Hunt and Bud Adams,in their attempts to acquire NFL franchises for Houston and Dallas, announce plans to form a new football league to rival the NFL. Their new league, called the American Football League (AFL), will begin play in 1960 with eight teams -
Pete Rozelle
Pete Rozelle after 23 rounds voting Pete was voted First comissioner of the NFL. A spot he held for 29 years. -
AFL ABC
AFL signs a big 5 year contract with ABC -
Trust in the antitrust
The NFL wins a special antitrust exemption from Congress, authorizing the sale of league-wide television broadcast rights and the distribution of resulting revenues in equal shares to all league teams. Commissioner Pete Rozelle negotiates the NFL's first national TV deal with CBS to pay the league $4.65 million a year for exclusive broadcast rights. -
AFL NFL merge
After many meeting commisioner rozelle decides to join to make one big powerhouse split in to the AFC(most AFL teams) and NFC(NFL teams) -
Coke Ad
During Super Bowl XIII, Coca-Cola airs one of the most popular Super Bowl ads of all time, showing fearsome Pittsburgh linebacker "Mean" Joe Greene and a young fan "having a Coke and a smile" in a stadium tunnel after a game. -
Apple changes the world
Apple airs its legendary mac commercial during Super Bowl XVIII changing the way people advertise and makng super bowl commercials legendary. -
Players on strike
The NFLPA and players went on strike demanding higher proportion of league revenues and fre agency. The strike that lasted about three weeks . the nfl brought in replacement players for those games.
