Who were the first nfl teams

Published February 05, 2020

The NFL traces its origins back to 1920, when the now-dominant sports league had an entirely different name and just two of the franchises that eventually became known to modern fans.

Originally known as the American Professional Football Association, the league began as a collection of teams scattered across a few states. Five of the original organizations were in Ohio, including one in Canton, the eventual home of the Pro Football Hall of Fame.

The APFA had 14 teams in its inaugural season: the Akron Pros, Buffalo All-Americans, Canton Bulldogs, Racine Cardinals, Chicago Tigers, Cleveland Tigers, Columbus Panhandles, Dayton Triangles, Decatur Staleys, Detroit Heralds, Hammond Pros, Muncie Flyers, Rock Island Independents and Rochester Jeffersons.

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The Akron Pros were the first-ever league champions, amassing an 8-0-3 record, according to the Los Angeles Times. Legendary athlete Jim Thorpe played for the Bulldogs and also served as the APFA’s first president.

Of the 14 original franchises, just two survived through the present day. The Cardinals eventually relocated to St. Louis and then again to Phoenix. The team is still active in the NFC West division.

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The Decatur Staleys were renamed the Chicago Staleys after one season. In 1922, the Chicago Staleys became the Chicago Bears. An NFL mainstay, the Bears play in the NFC North division.

The APFA changed its name to the National Football League in 1922. The league’s power grew when it merged with its chief rival, the American Football League, in 1970.

The modern-day NFL earns more than $16 billion in annual revenue.

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The Pro Football Hall of Fame reports that the NFL started on September 17, 1920 — and it wasn’t yet known as the NFL. Then called the American Professional Football Conference, the Canton, Ohio, location remains a sacred place for football today. Nascent regional leagues formed around the game of gridiron football for years by this point. But this was the first functional, national attempt.

But it didn’t start with just eight teams; it started with 14 teams, although the unstable nature of this semi-pro league meant just four of those finished the entire 1920 schedule. Membership fluctuated heavily, ballooning up to 22 teams in 1926, then falling to 12 the next year. Some of these fleeting organizations disappeared into near-total obscurity. But several became the backbone of what eventually became America’s top sport.

How the original eight teams achieved their status in NFL history

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As the Pro Football Hall of Fame reports, the 1932 season was when the NFL we know truly came to be. Eight active teams existed at this point: the Chicago Bears, Chicago Cardinals (today’s Arizona Cardinals), Green Bay Packers, New York Giants, Boston Braves (today’s Washington Football Team), Portsmouth Spartans (today’s Detroit Lions, Staten Island Stapletons, and Brooklyn Dodgers.

The Packers are the only team that still plays right where they started. The Bears were once known as the Decatur Staleys and played downstate. The first championship game — which was also the first televised football game ever — came about as something of a fluke. The nascent NFL had no plans to hold anything resembling a postseason game.

The Bears and Spartans had identical records, though, forcing a one-game playoff to decide the true winner of the season. With the now-legendary Wrigley Field snowed in, the game was forced into a smaller Chicago Stadium. The Bears won the game 9-0 and inspired the league to make the playoffs a permanent addition.

The AFL-NFL merger became the true start of the league of today

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The original eight teams of the NFL sometimes play second fiddle to the other set of eight crucial football teams from a different area. As The Game Before the Money reports, the original AFC lineup in 1960 also happened to be eight teams. And these names will be even more familiar than the now-ancient history of the original NFL.

The Dallas Texans (now the Dallas Cowboys), Houston Oilers (today’s Tennessee Titans), Los Angeles Chargers, Buffalo Bills, the Titans of New York (known now as the New York Jets), Denver Broncos, Oakland Raiders (now in Las Vegas), and Boston Patriots (rebranded to be New England’s regional team) made up the original AFC charter. The new league was widely ridiculed, due to the dominance of the NFL. It turned out to be a major success that attracted the NFL leadership for a merger.

Talks started in 1966 and played out over the next four years. Once merged, the NFL began a path toward the dominance of American sports fan mindshare. There have been some new teams, renamed teams, and minor adjustments since. But it was this moment when the NFL undoubtedly took the form it is known for today.

The NFL was founded in 1920 as the first professional football league to successfully establish a nationwide showing, after various decades of failed attempts. At the time, it was founded as the APFA, or the American Professional Football Association, with 14 teams- two of which still exist today, the Chicago Bears and the Arizona Cardinals.

So why is it the “original 8” who started the NFL and not the original 14? Let’s take a look.

The “Original 8” NFL Teams

Over the first decade of the NFL’s existence, the number of teams fluctuated regularly; the 14 teams became 22 teams in 1926, and a year later they dropped to 12 teams.

Then the first playoffs took place in 1932, and there were eight teams existing by then: the Chicago Bears, the Chicago Cardinals, the Green Bay Packers, the New York Giants, the Boston Braves (today’s Washington Football Team), the Portsmouth Spartans (today's Detroit Lions), the Staten Island Stapletons, and the Brooklyn Dodgers.

That’s when the NFL we know truly came to be.

In 1943, the NFL also had eight existing teams again: the Dodgers, the Redskins, the Bears, the Cardinals, the Giants, Packers, the Detroit Lions, and the Philadelphia-Pittsburgh Steagles (the wartime player shortage resulted in the merging of the Eagles and Steelers in one season).

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From 1944 to 1969, the Rams, Browns, 49ers, Vikings, Saints, Falcons, Cowboys, and Colts were added to the league. Then the NFL merged with the AFL in 1969/1970, which added ten new teams.

The AFL-NFL merger: the Super Bowl Creator 

The AFL, or American Football League was founded in 1960, as the rival. Because of the NFL’s dominance at the time, the birth of the AFL only created the merger that the old NFL needed to become the real NFL we know today. That merger was the reason the league expanded greatly, and created the Super Bowl, which became the dominant sporting event in the United States.

The modern NFL is the outcome of decades of expansions and contractions, with 32 teams currently. The latest team addition was in 2002 when the Houston Texans were added to the league.