December 11, 1927: The 1st MLB-NFL Double

Earl Potteiger

December 11, 1927: The New York Giants football team completes its season with a record of 11 wins, 1 loss and 1 tie. This is good for 1st place in the National Football League. In just their 3rd season, they are NFL Champions.

Since the New York Yankees had won the World Series the preceding October 8, this makes New York the 1st city to have World Champions in 2 different sports.

Giants head coach Earl Potteiger, also a halfback on the team, could count on 

future members of the Pro Football Hall of Fame: Fullback Joe Guyon, and tackles Steve Owen, Cal Hubbard and Pete Henry. Owen would coach the Giants to wins in the NFL Championship Game in 1934 and 1938; while losing it in 1933, 1935, 1939, 1941, 1944 and 1946. Hubbard would win 3 more titles with the Green Bay Packers, and be named to the NFL's 50th, 75th and 100th Anniversary All-time Teams. The '27 Giants also included tackle Century Milstead (so named because he was born on January 1, 1901), a member of the College Football Hall of Fame; and guard Al Nesser, probably the best of the 6 Nesser brothers (plus a brother-in-law, a son and a son-in-law) to play in the early NFL.

And Henry "Hinkey" Haines was an outfielder when the Yankees won the 1923 World Series, and a halfback with the 1927 Giants, making him, to this day, the only man to play for a World Series winner and an NFL Champion. (Deion Sanders came close, winning 2 Super Bowls but losing 2 World Series.)

The Giants started slowly: They won 8-0 away to the Providence Steam Roller (no S on the end), played the Cleveland Bulldogs to a 0-0 tie away, beat the Pottsville Maroons away 19-0, and losing to the Bulldogs 6-0 at the Polo Grounds. Part of that was having to open the season on the road, as the baseball Giants had priority at the ballpark.

But this meant that, after the game in Pottsville, all but 1 of their games would be in New York City. On back-to-back days, they beat the Frankford Yellow Jackets, first 13-0 in Philadelphia, then 27-0 at the Polo Grounds.

They beat the Maroons 16-0, the Duluth Eskimos 21-0, the Steam Roller 25-0, the Chicago Cardinals 28-7, the Chicago Bears 13-7, and closed with a home-and-home series against the baseball version of the New York Yankees, who would have featured the great running back Red Grange, but he injured his knee earlier in the season. The Giants won 14-0 at the Polo Grounds, and 13-0 at Yankee Stadium. After nearly going out of business after their inaugural season of 1925, saved by the huge crowd that the Chicago Bears, then with Grange, brought in, the Giants were "World Champions."

On 11 occasions, the same city has been home to the champions of Major League Baseball and the NFL at the same time. New York has done it 5 of those times:

1. December 11, 1927 to December 16, 1928, the New York Yankees and the New York Giants. From April 14 onward, this included a 3rd team, the New York Rangers.

2. December 15, 1935 to October 6, 1936, the Detroit Tigers and the Detroit Lions. From April 11 onward, this included a 3rd team, the Detroit Red Wings.

3. December 11, 1938 to December 10, 1939, the New York Yankees and the New York Giants.

4. December 30, 1956 to October 10, 1957, the New York Yankees and the New York Giants.

5. October 16, 1969 to January 11, 1970, the New York Jets and the New York Mets. This was the 1st time the football title was won before the baseball title. The New York Knicks won the NBA Championship on May 8, 1970, but that was after the Jets were succeeded as World Champions.

6. January 17 to October 17, 1971, the Baltimore Colts and the Baltimore Orioles. The Baltimore Bullets almost made it 3, but they lost the NBA Finals.

7. October 17, 1979 to October 21, 1980, the Pittsburgh Steelers and the Pittsburgh Pirates.

8. January 25 to October 25, 1987, the New York Mets and the New York Giants.

9. October 28, 1989 to October 20, 1990, the San Francisco 49ers and the Oakland Athletics.

10. October 27, 2004 to October 26, 2005, the New England Patriots and the Boston Red Sox. They almost had 3, but while the Red Sox won the 2007 World Series and the Boston Celtics the 2008 NBA Championship, the Patriots lost Super Bowl XLII to the Giants.

11. February 3 to October 30, 2019, the Boston Red Sox and the New England Patriots. This time, the Red Sox won the title first.

Why not the 1920 Akron Pros with the Cleveland Indians? After all, downtown Akron is closer to downtown Cleveland than Levi's Stadium in Santa Clara, current home of the San Francisco 49ers, is to downtown San Francisco. Well, at the time, the concept of "metropolitan areas" wasn't really a thing. This also rules out the 1928 Providence Steam Roller and the 1929 Boston Bruins as being a "double." Under today's circumstances, we would count both of these confluences. That distance is further than San Francisco and Santa Clara.

The Giants have now won 8 NFL Championships, more than any team except the Green Bay Packers (13) and the Chicago Bears (9). In addition to the single-division NFL of 1927, they won the NFL Championship Game in 1934, 1938 and 1956; Super Bowl XXI in 1987; Super Bowl XXV in 1991; Super Bowl XLII in 2008; and Super Bowl XLVI in 2012.

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December 11, 1927 was a Sunday. Baseball was out of season. The NBA hadn't been founded yet. There were 2 games played in the NHL. The Montreal Canadiens beat the New York Rangers, 2-0 at the old Madison Square Garden, which was then new. And the Boston Bruins beat the Detroit Cougars, 2-1 in overtime at the brand-new Olympia Stadium in Detroit. The Cougars became the Falcons in 1930, and the Red Wings in 1932.