History
In 1920, representatives of several professional American football leagues and independent teams met in Canton, Ohio, and founded the American Professional Football Conference, soon renamed the National Football League. The first official championship game was held in 1933; before then, there was no playoff system, and instead the team that finished with the best regular season record was awarded the league title. By 1958, after which that season's NFL championship game became known as "The Greatest Game Ever Played", Professional Football was on its way to becoming one of the most popular sports in the United States. A new league, the American Football League, began play in 1960, and its expanded market and offense-oriented style of play had the result that by 1965, Professional Football supplanted Major League Baseball as the most popular televised sport in America. The NFL's merger with the American Football League, agreed to in 1966 and completed in 1970, further expanded the sport and created the Super Bowl, which has become one of the most watched sporting events in the world, and is second to association football (soccer)'s UEFA Champions League final as the most watched annual sporting event worldwide.
Read more about this topic: National Football League
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“The principle office of history I take to be this: to prevent virtuous actions from being forgotten, and that evil words and deeds should fear an infamous reputation with posterity.”
—Tacitus (c. 55–117)
“It’s nice to be a part of history but people should get it right. I may not be perfect, but I’m bloody close.”
—John Lydon (formerly Johnny Rotten)
“The greatest horrors in the history of mankind are not due to the ambition of the Napoleons or the vengeance of the Agamemnons, but to the doctrinaire philosophers. The theories of the sentimentalist Rousseau inspired the integrity of the passionless Robespierre. The cold-blooded calculations of Karl Marx led to the judicial and business-like operations of the Cheka.”
—Aleister Crowley (1875–1947)