December 29, 1963: Two Old Men and a Football

George Halas and John Johnson

December 29, 1963: The NFL Championship Game is played at a frigid Wrigley Field in Chicago. As with the 1st official title game, 30 years earlier, the opposing teams were the Chicago Bears and the New York Giants.

Coached, run, and owned by the man who founded the NFL, George Halas, the Bears had a relatively ordinary offense, led by quarterback Bill Wade and running backs Willie Galimore and Ronnie Bull. But they had Mike Ditka, who practically invented the position of tight end. Only once all season did they score more than 27 points, although that was in a 52-14 clobbering of the Los Angeles Rams in Los Angeles.

It was on defense where they were truly dominant. End Doug Atkins, tackle Stan Jones and middle linebacker Bill George -- described after his death by Sports Illustrated columnist Rick Reilly as "the meanest Bear ever," and that's saying something -- would be elected to the Pro Football Hall of Fame. End Ed O'Bradovich, linebackers Joe Fortunato and Larry Morris, cornerback J.C. Caroline and safety Richie Petitbon were also All-Pros. Not once all season did the Bears allow more than 21 points in a game, and only twice more than 17.

They also had an unexpected advantage: Two key players from other teams in the Western Division, running back Paul Hornung of the Green Bay Packers and defensive tackle Alex Karras of the Detroit Lions, had been suspended for the season due to gambling (on sports other than football, which is why they only got one year).

As a result, it was neither the two-time defending NFL Champion Packers or the Lions, who had dealt the Packers their only loss the season before, who put any blemishes on the Bears' record. The Bears jumped out to a 5-0 start before losing 20-14 away to the San Francisco 49ers. They got up to 9-1, then faced back-to-back 17-17 ties, away to the Pittsburgh Steelers and at home to the Minnesota Vikings, before closing by avenging their loss to the 49ers and completing their sweep of the Lions.

The Bears were the NFL's founding team. But its flagship team, as is usually the case in sports, was in New York. The Giants had half of the "Million Dollar Backfield" of the 1950s San Francisco 49ers: Quarterback Yelberton Abraham (Y.A.) Tittle and running back Hugh McElhenny. The other two, Joe "the Jet" Perry and John Henry Johnson, never appeared in an NFL Championship Game, and this was one last chance for Y.A. and Hugh. All 4 would be elected to the Pro Football Hall of Fame.

Y.A. Tittle

They also still had the NFL's biggest glamour boy of the 1950s, Frank Gifford, hanging on. And they still had some members of the defense, including Hall-of-Famers Andy Robustelli at defensive end and Sam Huff at middle linebacker, who allowed them to reach the Championship Game 6 times in 8 years. But they had only won in 1956, beating the Bears. They had lost to the Baltimore Colts in 1958 and '59, and, with Allie Sherman taking over from Jim Lee Howell as coach, to the Packers in '61 and '62.

Tittle was 37 years old, bald, and what little hair he had left was already gray, so he looked even older. Halas was 68, at the time the oldest head coach in NFL history. It was looking like the last chance for either of them, which it did turn out to be.

Wrigley Field is known to baseball fans for, among other things, its lack of lights until 1988, and the Chicago Cubs' continuation of scheduling as many day games as they can, so fans can sit in the bleachers and soak up the Summer sun. But this was between Christmas and New Year's, and the temperature was in the single digits, Fahrenheit. The field was frozen.

It would have been frozen at the much larger Soldier Field, but NFL Commissioner Pete Rozelle asked Halas to move the game there, so the lights could be used. Halas refused. So, in order to avoid the game ending in darkness, the starting time was moved up to 12:05 PM, Central Time (1:05 Eastern).

With extra bleachers running north-to-south from left field to the right-field foul line, seating capacity was 45,801. Despite the cold, every seat was filled. Chicago fans may be divided between the Cubs and the White Sox when it comes to baseball, but the NFL's Chicago Cardinals had moved, and locals had given up on them before that. No team is more popular in Chicago than the Bears -- not the Cubs, not the White Sox, not the Bulls even in their Michael Jordan years, not the Blackhawks, not even Notre Dame. It was true then, and it is true now, despite a long title drought for "Da Bears."

Wrigley Field in its football configuration

With the kind of drive that would have pleased later coach Bill Parcells, the Giants methodically moved down the field on the game's opening drive, eating the clock, taking up the 1st half of the 1st quarter, until Tittle threw a 14-yard touchdown pass to Gifford. Just before the end of the quarter, Wade tied things with a 2-yard run.

Don Chandler, later to be the kicker and punter for the Packer teams that won the 1st 2 Super Bowls, kicked a field goal in the 2nd quarter, putting the Giants up, 10-7. But on their next drive, Morris hit Tittle and reinjured a knee that had been hurt earlier in the year. Sherman took Tittle out and replaced him with Glynn Griffing, but showed so little confidence him him that he ordered a punt on a 3rd down.

Much like New York Yankees star Mickey Mantle, with whom he shared a home stadium, Tittle tried to play through his pain. He got shots of cortisone and Novocaine, and threw off his back foot, normally unwise for a quarterback, but with his collected know-how, he thought he could lead the Giants to victory.

But late in the 3rd quarter, Tittle tried a screen pass, and O'Bradovich intercepted it, setting up a Bears drive that ended with a quarterback sneak by Wade. The Bears led, 14-10. Tittle gamely trudged through the 4th quarter, trying to get one more touchdown. But with 10 seconds left, in range of the end zone, Tittle threw, and was intercepted in the end zone by Petitbon.

It was the Bears' 5th interception of the day. With the country watching on CBS, seeing him limp off the field, Tittle had won the hearts of millions of fans, but the Bears had won the NFL Championship. It was their 1st since the last of the Sid Luckman titles in 1946.

Halas was ecstatic, but the players knew better than to lift the aging "Papa Bear" onto their shoulders and carry him off the field in triumph. So the defensive players picked up Halas' defensive coordinator, and carried him, and gave him the game ball in the locker room. He had been nearly as responsible for this title as Halas. His name was George Allen, and he would later coach the Rams into the Playoffs, and the Washington Redskins to the 1972 NFC Championship, and be elected to the Hall of Fame.

It was the 8th and last Championship for Halas as owner, his 6th as head coach, each a record that has never been matched. (Bill Belichick has coached 6 title winners, but he cheated.)

It also made Chicago the 1st city to win both the NFL Championship and the NCAA Basketball Tournament in the same calendar year. Loyola University had won the title in March. It's only happened once since, in 2018, with the Super Bowl by then played in February: Philadelphia did it with the Eagles and Villanova.

The following year would be a bad one for both teams, starting eras of mediocrity. During the Summer, Willie Galimore and fellow Bear running back Bo Farrington were killed in a car crash outside the team's Indiana training camp. This led them to draft Gale Sayers in 1965. They also drafted Dick Butkus, to shore up their aging defense. In spite of having 2 of the top 5 players in the game in the late 1960s, the Bears didn't reach the Playoffs again until 1977, by which point both Sayers and Butkus were retired.

And, just as the Yankees got old in a hurry in the 1964-65 off-season, so, too, did the Giants suddenly look very old in Autumn 1964. Huff had been traded to Washington, and 1964 would be the last season for both Tittle and Gifford. Hall of Fame offensive tackle Roosevelt Brown only lasted one year after that. The Giants didn't make the Playoffs again until 1981.

Halas' reasons for not moving the Bears to Soldier Field have been debated. Finally, the AFL-NFL merger of 1970 forced his hand: NFL stadiums now had to have both lights and a seating capacity of over 50,000, and Wrigley Field then had neither. In 1971, Halas moved the Bears to Soldier Field. Given his love of football, and his love of making money, he must have been very happy being able to play Monday Night Football, and the Bears did so 14 times, 7 at Soldier Field, before his death in 1983.

The Giants and the Bears have met to decide the NFL Championship 6 times, more than any other pairing. The Bears won in 1933, 1941, 1946 and 1963; the Giants, in 1934 and 1956. With the realignment of the NFL, they cannot face each other in the Super Bowl. But they have faced each other in the NFC Playoffs again in the seasons of 1985, when the Bears won; and 1990, when the Giants won. On each of those occasions, the winner did go on to win the title.

The Bears are the founding franchise of the NFL. Yet they’ve won only one title since, Super Bowl XX in the 1985-86 season. That’s just 2 titles in the last 77 years.

But consider this: The Bears won 8 World Championships in their 50 seasons playing at Wrigley Field. It took the Cubs 101 seasons playing there to win one.

In 2019, in connection with their 100th Season (not their 100th Anniversary, which was the next year), the Bears did fan balloting for their 100 Greatest Players. From this 1963 title team, they chose quarterback Billy Wade, running backs Willie Galimore, Rick Casares, receiver Johnny Morris, tight end Mike Ditka, center Mike Pyle, guard Stan Jones, tackles Herm Lee and Bob Wetoska; defensive ends Doug Atkins and Ed O'Bradovich, linebackers Joe Fortunato and Larry Morris (no relation to Johnny; cornerbacks J.C. Caroline, Roosevelt Taylor and Bennie McRae; safety Richie Petibon, and punter Bobby Joe Green.

From the period between the 1963 and 1985 titles, they chose running back Gale Sayers, linebackers Dick Butkus and Doug Buffone, receiver Dick Gordon, defensive tackles Jim Osborne and Wally Chambers, cornerback Allan Ellis and safety Doug Plank.

When The Sporting News named its 100 Greatest Football Players in 1999, George was ranked 49th, and Ditka 90th. When the NFL Network named its 100 Greatest Players in 2010, George

dropped off the list, but Ditka rose to 59th.

*

December 29, 1963 was a Sunday. Sean Payton, who would coach the New Orleans Saints to their 1st World Championship, was born.

Baseball was out of season. There were 2 games played in the NBA. The New York Knicks lost to the Cincinnati Royals, 105-99 at the Cincinnati Gardens. And the Los Angeles Lakers beat the Detroit Pistons, 140-128 at Cobo Hall (now Huntington Place) in Detroit. Jerry West scored 39 points.

And the NHL's entire "Original Six" were in action:

* The New York Rangers lost to the Montreal Canadiens, 6-2 at the old Madison Square Garden.

* The Detroit Red Wings beat the Boston Bruins, 2-1 at the Olympia Stadium in Detroit.

* And the Chicago Black Hawks beat the Toronto Maple Leafs, 2-0 at the Chicago Stadium.

December 26, 1943: Nagurski's Return Leads Bears to Title

Bronko Nagurski

December 26, 1943: The NFL Championship Game is played at Wrigley Field in Chicago. It features the 2 best teams in the League, based not just on recent history, but also on the fact that these are the 2 teams least affected by the manpower drain of World War II.

Sammy Baugh had debuted in the NFL in 1937, as the quarterback for the Washington Redskins, coached by Ray Flaherty. That year, they beat George Halas' Chicago Bears in the Championship Game. They faced each other again in the Championship Game in 1940, when the Bears won the biggest blowout in NFL history, 73-0; and in 1942, when the Redskins ruined an undefeated season for the Bears.

In 1943, Baugh did something never done before, nor since: He led the NFL in passing yards, interceptions by a defensive player, and punting yards. To put this into a more modern perspective: Imagine that, in the 2000s, Tom Brady, Ed Reed and Sean Landeta were one man doing what all three of those men did. That was "Slingin' Sammy": The 1st great quarterback, a great defensive back, and the best punter ever.

But the Bears had the era's other great quarterback, Sid Luckman. And an offense and a defense so mighty that they were nicknamed "The Monsters of the Midway." In addition to facing the Redskins in the title game in 1937, 1940 and 1942, they had also beaten the New York Giants in the title game in 1941.

What the Bears did not have was Halas, who was team founder, owner, general manager and, usually, head coach. But, having served in the U.S. Navy during World War I, he was called back to serve in World War II, overseeing the recreational needs of the Seventh Fleet, and eventually being discharged with the rank of Captain.

In his stead, his assistant coaches, Heartley "Hunk" Anderson and Luke Johnsos served as co-head coaches. Anderson had been a guard at Notre Dame on Knute Rockne's National Championship teams of 1919 and 1920, and had played for the Bears from 1922 to 1925. Johnson was a Chicago native who played end at Northwestern University, and helped the Bears win the NFL Championship in 1932 and 1933.

But the draft -- the U.S. Army's, not the NFL's -- had hit the Bears, too. While a deal was worked out to keep some players stateside, as long as they kept their jobs in defense plants, they lost other key players. They kept their great center and defensive tackle Clyde "Bulldog" Turner, but lost back Bill Osmanski. They needed help.

From 1930 to 1937, the Bears had Bronislau "Bronko" Nagurski. At 6-foot-2 and 230 pounds, he wouldn't be considered all that big today. But in the 1930s, he was considered huge, and was the prototype for the big bruising fullback, the progenitor of Marion Motley, Jim Brown, Larry Csonka, John Riggins, Jerome Bettis, etc.

The University of Minnesota didn't win anything while he was there, but, in the same backfield as Red Grange, he helped the Bears win the Championship in 1932 and 1933.

"Who would you pick to win a football game?" asked the great sportswriter Grantland Rice. "11 Jim Thorpes? 11 Glenn Davises? 11 Red Granges? Or 11 Bronko Nagurskis? The 11 Nagurskis would be a mop-up. It would be something close to murder and massacre. For the Bronk could star at any position on the field, with 216 pounds of authority to back him up."

Try 230, Mr. Rice. Otherwise, you're right. One year, Nagurski hurt his back, and, instead of sitting out and healing, accepted a switch to offensive tackle, and was great at it. He played defensive tackle. Oh yeah, he could also pass, pretty well by the standards of the time. Imagine Bettis throwing an option pass, and having it result in a touchdown: Nagurski did it. In an interview late in life, he said he'd probably be a linebacker, admitting he wouldn't be carrying the ball 30 times a game. I have no doubt that, with his speed, he would have excelled.

He was a professional wrestler in the off-season, because, at the time, it made him more money. He was the Heavyweight Champion of the World. And while pro wrestling was always a bit theatrical, it was not like today's WWE. He would have made mincemeat out of Hulk Hogan in the 1980s, Stone Cold Steve Austin in the 1990s, Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson (also a college football star) in the 2000s and John Cena today. And he would never have done Vince McMahon's bidding.

After the 1937 season, Nagurski quit football over a salary dispute with Halas. He kept wrestling, even though he had a bad back, and, once World War II came, it didn't make him as much money. In 1943, due to the manpower shortage, Halas sent a telegram to Anderson and Johnsos, telling them to offer Nagurski, now 35 and 6 years past his last down of football, $5,000 to come back. He took it.

In 1943, the Bears went 8-1-1. The season began with a 21-21 tie away to their arch-rivals, the Green Bay Packers. But they still had a shot at an undefeated season until their next-to-last game, when the Redskins beat them in Washington, 21-7.

The Redskins, by now coached by Dutch Bergman, had a bit more trouble. They started out 6-0-1, the only blot on their record a 14-14 tie with the Steagles in Philadelphia. Yes, the "Steagles": Because of the manpower drain, the 2 Pennsylvania teams, the Philadelphia Eagles and the Pittsburgh Steelers, joined forces for one season, playing 4 games at the Eagles' Shibe Park and 2 at the Steelers' Forbes Field.

But after beating the Bears, the Redskins dropped their last 3 games, 27-14 to the Steagles at Griffith Stadium, 14-10 to the Giants at the Polo Grounds, and then 31-7 to the Giants at home. This forged a tie with the Giants for the Eastern Division title. Under today's rules, the Giants would have won the Division, due to the head-to-head win. Under the rules of 1943, a Playoff game was needed, so the Giants and Redskins ended up playing 3 weeks in a row. Despite the Giants having home-field advantage, the Redskins won, 20-0.

So the NFL Championship Game was set for a week later than intended, on the day after Christmas. Since the game alternated between the Division titlists' homes, and it was the Western winner's turn to host, the game would be at Wrigley Field. Because of the weather, this became the 1st NFL game to earn the nickname "The Ice Bowl." After the 1967 NFL Championship Game, that name was retired, and nobody ever again used the name for the 1943 title decider.

Wrigley Field in its football configuration

There was no scoring in the 1st quarter. In the 2nd, Andy Farkas ran the ball in from 1 yard out to give the Redskins a 7-0 lead. That may have woken the Bears up: Later in the quarter, Luckman threw a 31-yard touchdown pass to Harry Clarke, and Nagurski ran the ball in from 3 yards, and it was 14-7 Chicago at the half.

The Bears dominated in the 2nd half as well. Luckman threw 2 touchdown passes to Dante Magnani in the 3rd quarter, 36 and 66 yards. On the 2nd of these, Bob Snyder missed the extra point, so it was 27-7 Bears. Baugh threw a 17-yard touchdown pass to Farkas, to give the 'Skins some hope as the quarter ran out, 27-14.

That hope ended quickly. Luckman threw touchdown passes to Jim Benton for 26 yards and Clarke for 10. Baugh threw one to Joe Aguirre for 25 yards, but it was small consolation. The Bears won, 41-21, and had their 3rd title in 4 seasons.

Nagurski retired again, returning to his farm in Minnesota in the Summer, and the pro wrestling circuit the rest of the year, until 1960. The University of Minnesota retired its Number 72 for him, and named its football facility the Gibson-Nagurski Football Complex. The Chicago Bears retired Number 3 for him. He was a charter inductee into the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 1963.

He was named to the NFL's 50th Anniversary Team in 1969, and its 75th Anniversary Team in 1994. Despite being named as a finalist, he was not named to the 100th Anniversary Team in 2019. The Sporting News ranked him 35th on their 100 Greatest Football Players in 1999. and the NFL Network's 100 Greatest Players in 2010, 73 years after he was a regular player, actually boosted him to 19th. In 2008, ESPN named ranked him 17th on their list of the Top 25 College Football Players of All Time. He died in 1990.

The 1944 season saw the continued decimation of the NFL. But by the start of the 1945 season, The War was over, and the players began to be discharged, and switch back from the battlefield to the football field. The Redskins reached the Championship Game again, losing to the Cleveland Rams, who then moved to Los Angeles for 1946. In that season, the Bears won another title, beating the Giants in the Championship Game. So it was 4 titles in 7 seasons.

The Bears would not reach another NFL Championship Game, under any name, until 1956; the Redskins, the 1972 season. The Bears would not win another title until the season of 1963; the Redskins, that of 1982.

*

December 26, 1943 was a Sunday. Baseball was out of season. The NBA hadn't been founded yet. There were 2 NHL games played on this day. The New York Rangers beat the Chicago Black Hawks, 7-6 at the old Madison Square Garden. For the Rangers, Bryan Hextall Sr. had 2 goals and 2 assists. For the Hawks. Bill Mosienko had 3 goals and an assist, while former Ranger Clint Smith had a goal and 3 assists.

And the Boston Bruins and the Detroit Red Wings played to a tie, 4-4 at the Olympia Stadium in Detroit.

The Montreal Canadiens and the Toronto Blue Jays were not scheduled. This strikes me as odd, since Canada was part of the British Empire, and December 26, the day after Christmas, is Boxing Day, a big day for the British, including major soccer games. But Canada's NHL teams didn't play on the day.

December 21, 1941: The Last NFL Player Without a Helmet

According to Pro-Football-Reference.com,

the only number Dick Plasman wore

during a game for the Bears was 14.

December 21, 1941: The NFL Championship Game is played at Wrigley Field in Chicago. The Chicago Bears make it back-to-back titles, beating the New York Giants, 37-9.

It wasn't as demonstrative as the year before, when the Bears beat the Washington Redskins, 73-0 in Washington, earning them the nickname "The Monsters of the Midway." But it was decisive. The Giants actually led 6-3 at the end of the 1st quarter, and forged a 9-9 tie in the 3rd. But quarterback Sid Luckman ran the T formation as well as ever, leading 3 long drives that ended with short touchdown runs, 2 by Norm Standlee, 1 by George McAfee. The Bears also got 2 field goals from Bob Snyder, and a 42-yard fumble return by Ken Kavanaugh.

This game was notable for other reasons. It had been 2 weeks since the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, so it would be the last NFL game played before the manpower drain of World War II began to take effect. Two players in this game would be killed in The War, both in early 1945: Chicago back Young Bussey, with the Navy in the Philippines; and New York end Jack Lummus, with the Marines on Iwo Jima.

On the Bears' last touchdown, Ray "Scooter" McLean chose to dropkick the extra point. There wouldn't be another attempt at a dropkick in an NFL game for 64 years, until Doug Flutie of the New England Patriots did it at the end of the 2005 season. A member of 4 title teams with the Bears, McLean would go on to be the Green Bay Packer head coach replaced by Vince Lombardi in 1959.

"There'll be no need of breaking up the Bears for the good of pro football," Bears end Dick Plasman said. "The war's done it already." This prediction turned out not to be completely true: The Bears did manage to reach the Championship Game again in 1942, but lost it to the Redskins; then, with a makeshift roster, including bringing running back Bronko Nagurski out of retirement after 6 years, beat the Redskins in the 1943 title game. After 2 years missing the title game, they got back to it in 1946, and beat the Giants. The Giants got into the 1944 title game, losing to the Packers.

Plasman did not wear a helmet in the 1941 title game, or in any game he'd played before that. By his own admission, he didn't even like hats. He thus became the last man to appear in an NFL game without a helmet. The NFL mandated helmets starting in 1943, with no "grandfather clause." When Plasman, on leave with the U.S. Army Air Forces, was allowed to return to the Bears in 1944, and when he played for the Chicago Cardinals after The War in 1946 and 1947 (his last game was their NFL Championship win), he wore a helmet.

Paul Zimmerman, the Sports Illustrated pro football expert known as Dr. Z, said of Plasman, "Ferocious on his blocks, a great pass rusher and a receiver, too. The guy was terrific, a force out there. He was worthy of the Hall of Fame."

In 1974, sportswriter Ira Berkow asked Plasman if he would wear any headgear if given an opportunity to return to the field. He said, "Yes, earmuffs." He had sustained frostbite in his ears during The War. He died in 1981.

*

December 21, 1941 was a Sunday. Baseball was out of season. The NBA hadn't been founded yet. There were 3 games in the NHL:

* The New York Rangers beat the Montreal Canadiens, 4-3 at the old Madison Square Garden. Bryan Hextall scored the winning goal, 6:07 into overtime.

* The Boston Bruins and the Detroit Red Wings played to a tie, 2-2 at the Olympia Stadium in Detroit.

* The Toronto Maple Leafs beat the Chicago Black Hawks, 3-0 at the Chicago Stadium.

* And the New York Americans were not scheduled. They had been renamed the Brooklyn Americans, even though they were still playing at Madison Square Garden. World War II put their plans for an arena in Brooklyn on hold, and they never played again.

December 17, 1933: The 1st NFL Championship Game

Hewitt's lateral to Karr

December 17, 1933: The 1st official NFL Championship Game is played. Appropriately, it's between the League's founding team, the Chicago Bears; and its team in the biggest market, the New York Giants.

There had been controversies for the League title in 1921 and 1925, so having a definitive title game would have helped. In 1932, the Bears and the Portsmouth Spartans (who became the Detroit Lions in 1934) finished tied for first: The Bears were 6-1-6, the Spartans 6-1-4. (At the time, ties were not counted in winning percentage.) So a playoff game was set, and the Bears won it, 9-0.

So, for the 1933 season, the NFL was divided into Eastern and Western Divisions, and the winners were to meet in a Championship Game. The Giants won the East, going 11-3. The Bears won the West, 10-2-1. So the decider was set for Wrigley Field. (Until the Super Bowl began, regardless of which team had the better record, the West winners would host the game in odd-numbered years, and the East winners would do so in even-numbered years.

Coached by Steve Owen, the Giants had some fantastic players: Quarterback Harry Newman, running back Ken Strong, end Ray Flaherty, and the man regarded for decades to come as the best center in NFL history, Mel Hein.

George Halas, one of the co-founders of the NFL, coached the Bears. They had 2 of the defining players of NFL history, speedy halfback Harold "Red" Grange and bruising fullback Bronislau "Bronko" Nagurski. They also had center George Trafton, tackles Link Lyman and George Musso, and end Bill Hewitt, who famously played without a helmet, at a time when that was still allowed, even though everybody knew it was a bad idea. All of them are in the Pro Football Hall of Fame.

Another difference in this new season was a liberalization of the passing rules. The Bears, the 1st NFL team to use the T formation, took advantage of this. The Giants had not done so as much. Nevertheless, when meeting with the officials before the game, Newman told them the Giants would be trying some trick plays, checking to ensure they would be legal.

Wrigley Field in its football configuration

The game kicked off at 1:45 PM Central Time (2:45 Eastern). It was broadcast on Chicago radio station WGN and a few other stations, but not on a national network. Nor was it broadcast on radio in New York.

Early in the game, the Giants' offensive line shifted, so that Hein was now on the end, and thus an eligible receiver. Hein snapped the ball to Newman, who handed it right back to him, then ran out to fake a run. While the Bears keyed on Newman, Hein took off. By the time the Bears caught on and caught up with him, he had gotten to the Bears' 15-yard line. But Chicago managed to, as their later fight song said "Bear Down," and hold the Giants to a field goal attempt, which the normally reliable Strong missed.

Jack Manders, so reliable he was known as "Automatic Jack," kicked field goals in each of the 1st 2 quarters, and the Bears led 6-0. But just before the half, Newman threw a 29-yard touchdown pass to Badgro, and the Giants went into the locker room up 7-6.

Manders kicked another field goal in the 3rd quarter, but a Giant drive resulted in Max Krause scoring from the 1-yard line, making it 14-9 New York. Finally, late in the quarter, Nagurski, not known as a passer, or as a jumper -- his style was to take the ball, crash into the line, and let the defenders fall where they may -- threw a jump pass to Bill Karr, who ran it in 8 yards for a touchdown, and the Bears led, 16-14.

The Giants had another trick play in them, early in the 4th quarter. Newman took off on a 30-yard run, then lateraled to Strong, who finished the touchdown, and then kicked the extra point. It was 21-16 Giants.

The minutes ticked away, and another Manders field goal would have done the Bears no good. Quarterback Carl Brumbaugh drove them to the Giants' 36 with less than 2 minutes left. He passed to Hewitt, and the Giant defense was ready to tackle him. But pulled the "hook and ladder play": He spun and lateraled to Karr, who took it in for a touchdown. The Bears led, 23-21.

The Giants got the ball back, and there was still time for them to get within Strong's field goal range. They got to their own 40, and again set Hein up as an eligible receiver. Running back Dale Burnett tried an option pass, and Hein was wide open on the Bear 30. But the pass was a bad one, and fell well short.

There was time for one more play. Newman passed to Badgro, who was ready to copy the earlier Hewitt-to-Karr hook and ladder. But this was the era of two-platoon football, where, no matter how big a star you were, you had to play both offense and defense. And there was no bigger star in football than Grange. He immediately figured out what was about to happen, and ran to Badgro, and wrapped his arms around Badgro's arms. Any lateral Badgro made wouldn't go very far. The clock ran out. Halas, eventually the grand old man of football, would later call it the greatest defensive play he ever saw.

The Bears were NFL Champions for the 3rd time, having won it in controversial fashion in 1921, and then definitively in 1932. The Giants had won in 1927, and would get revenge over the Bears in 1934, in the Polo Grounds, in a frigid contest known as The Sneaker Game.

These 2 teams would also meet in the NFL Championship Game in 1941, 1946, 1956 and 1963, with the Giants winning only in 1956. They've since met in the NFC Playoffs in the seasons of 1985, with the Bears winning; and 1990, with the Giants winning; and, each time, it was a good omen, as the winner went on to win the Super Bowl.

In 1981, John Thorn left his comfort zone, baseball, and published Pro Football's 10 Greatest Games. He included this game as the earliest of them.

In 2019, in connection with their 100th Season (not their 100th Anniversary, which was the next year), the Bears did fan balloting for their 100 Greatest Players. From the 1932 and 1933 NFL Champions, they chose running backs Red Grange and Bronislau "Bronko" Nagurski, guards Joe Kopcha and George Musso, tackle William "Link" Lyman, and ends Luke Johnsos and Bill Hewitt. From the 1934 team that didn't quite do it, they named halfback Beattie Feathers.

*

December 17, 1933 was a Sunday. It was the only football game played that day. Baseball was out of season. There was no NBA yet. There were 3 games played in the NHL:

* The New York Rangers and the Boston Bruins played to a tie, 2-2 at the old Madison Square Garden.

* The New York Americans and the Detroit Red Wings played to a tie, 4-4 at the Olympia Stadium in Detroit.

* And the Chicago Black Hawks beat the Montreal Canadiens, 4-1 at the Chicago Stadium. 

December 12, 1965: The Gale Sayers Game

December 12, 1965: The most amazing one-man, one-game performance in NFL history occurs.

On November 28, 1929, the Chicago Cardinals beat the Chicago Bears, 40-6 at Wrigley Field in Chicago. Ernie Nevers of the Cardinals set a single-game record by scoring all 40 points: 6 rushing touchdowns and 4 kicked extra points.

On November 25, 1951, the Cleveland Browns beat the Bears, 42-21 at Cleveland Municipal Stadium. William "Dub" Jones scored 6 touchdowns, 4 rushing and 2 receiving. His son would also become an NFL star, 1970s Baltimore Colt quarterback Bert Jones.

On December 25, 2020, Christmas Day, the New Orleans Saints beat the Minnesota Vikings, 52-33 at the Superdome in New Orleans. Alvin Kamara rushed for 6 touchdowns.

But what Gale Sayers did on December 12, 1965 was even more amazing. Not just because, unlike the others, he was a rookie, but because the weather was miserable.

*

Sayers scored 22 touchdowns in 1965, setting an NFL record that stood for 10 years. Think about that: 22 NFL touchdowns at age 22: 14 rushing, 6 receiving, a punt return and a kickoff return. On October 17, against the Minnesota Vikings, he had a rushing touchdown, a receiving touchdown, and a kickoff return for a touchdown in the same game. That would not happen in the NFL again until 2016, when Tyreek Hill did it for the Kansas City Chiefs.

After that October 17, 1965 game, Bears founder-owner-general manager-head coach George "Papa Bear" Halas compared Sayers favorably to old-time Bears Red Grange and George McAfee. As it turned out, the Kansas Comet was just getting warmed up.

This was also the rookie season for Dick Butkus, who would revolutionize the position of middle linebacker, becoming the most ferocious player of his generation.

The Bears had opened the season, and thus Sayers' and Butkus' careers, on September 19 at Kezar Stadium in San Francisco, and lost 52-24. On December 12, the 49ers came to Wrigley Field, and the Bears wanted revenge. I don't think anybody expected it to take this form, though.

Wrigley Field, with football bleachers added

It rained all day, and the field on which Grange and McAfee -- and Bronko Nagurski, and Bill Osmanski, and Willie Galimore -- had run was practically a swamp. How anybody could get any speed on it was a mystery.

On that field, Gale Sayers had 113 rushing yards, 89 receiving yards, and 134 punt return yards. He scored 4 touchdowns rushing, 1 receiving, and 1 on a punt return. He had 326 total yards. He scored 6 touchdowns. Talk about "announcing your presence with authority."

The Bears pounded the 49ers, 61-20. One of the 49ers' receivers that day was Bernie Casey, who went on to become one of the top black actors of the 1970s.

The Bears finished the season at 9-5. With 2,272 all-purpose yards, 1,371 of them rushing, Sayers was an easy choice for NFL Rookie of the Year.

Sadly, injuries would cut Sayers' career short. He retired after the 1971 season, having played only 68 regular-season games -- enough to add up to a shade over 4 full seasons -- and, like Butkus, who hung on for 2 years longer despite his own ravaged knees, never appeared in a Playoff game, because the players from the Bears' 1963 NFL Champions had gotten old, and, except for the all-time greats Sayers and Butkus, there weren't any good players coming up to replace them.

In 1969, the year immortalized in Sayers' book I Am Third, and in the movie based on it, Brian's Song, starring Billy Dee Williams as Sayers and James Caan as ailing running back Brian Piccolo, the Bears went 1-13.

Halas, in his 70s and set in his ways, gave up coaching after the 1967 season, but it would take another decade or so before he turned operational control of the team over to his son, George "Mugs" Halas Jr., and Jim Finks. But Mugs died in 1979, of a heart attack, only 54 years old. Since Papa Bear wasn't willing to give control to his daughter, Virginia, he gave it to her husband, "Big Ed" McCaskey, who handed some to their son, Mike McCaskey. This would result in short-term glory, but not enough, and long-term problems. 

Sayers was elected to both the College and Pro Football Halls of Fame in 1977. He was 34 years old, the youngest player ever elected to the Pro Football Hall. He became a successful businessman and a college sports administrator. Butkus was elected to the Pro Football Hall in 1979, and the College Football Hall in 1983. He became an actor, especially known for his commercials for Miller Lite Beer, playing on his tough-guy image.

It took until 1994, in a nationally-televised halftime ceremony during a Monday Night Football game on a miserably rainy and cold Halloween Night, for the Bears to formally retire the Number 40 of Gale Sayers and the Number 51 of Dick Butkus. As the Bears were losing to the Green Bay Packers, their arch-rivals, most of the fans stayed long enough to cheer the honorees and boo Mike McCaskey, and then left without watching the 2nd half.

In 1999, The Sporting News ranked Butkus 9th on its list of the 100 Greatest Football Players, and Sayers 21st. On the CBS special honoring those 100 players, NFL Today analyst and former coach Jerry Glanville, who specialized in defense, called Butkus the greatest football player he ever saw. Not the greatest defender, the greatest player. In 2010, the NFL Network ranked Butkus 10th -- as before, 2nd only to Lawrence Taylor among defensive players -- and Sayers 22nd on its list of the 100 Greatest Players.

Sayers died in 2020. As of December 12, 2022, Butkus is still alive. (UPDATE: He died in 2023.)

*

December 12, 1965 was a Sunday. These other games were played in the NFL that day:

 * The New York Giants beat the Washington Redskins, 27-10 at District of Columbia Stadium in Washington. It was renamed Robert F. Kennedy Stadium in 1969.

* The Green Bay Packers beat the Baltimore Colts, 42-27 at Memorial Stadium in Baltimore.

* The Philadelphia Eagles beat the Pittsburgh Steelers, 47-13 at Pitt Stadium in Pittsburgh.

* The Minnesota Vikings beat the Detroit Lions, 29-7 at Tiger Stadium in Detroit.

* The Los Angeles Rams beat the Cleveland Browns, 42-7 at the Los Angeles Coliseum.

* The day before, the Dallas Cowboys beat the St. Louis Cardinals, 27-13 at the Cotton Bowl in Dallas.

In the American Football League:

* The New York Jets lost to the Oakland Raiders, 24-14 at Frank Youell Field in Oakland.

* The Buffalo Bills beat the Kansas City Chiefs, 34-25 at War Memorial Stadium in Buffalo.

* The San Diego Chargers beat the Houston Oilers, 37-26 at Rice Stadium in Houston.

* And the Boston Patriots beat the Denver Broncos, 28-20 at Bears Stadium in Denver. It was renamed Mile High Stadium in 1968.

There was 1 NBA game that day: The Los Angeles Lakers beat the St. Louis Hawks, 123-101 at the Los Angeles Sports Arena. Jerry West scored 33 points.

And the entire "Original Six" of the NHL were in action that day:

* The New York Rangers played the Toronto Maple Leafs to a tie, 1-1 at the old Madison Square Garden.

* The Detroit Red Wings beat the Boston Bruins, 5-3 at the Boston Garden.

* And the Montreal Canadiens beat the Chicago Black Hawks, 5-3 at the Chicago Stadium. 

December 12, 1937: A Rookie Quarterback Wins the NFL Championship

December 12, 1937: The National Football League has been holding Championship Games, under the name "NFL Championship Game" from seasons 1933 to 1965, and the name "Super Bowl" from seasons 1966 onward. Only twice has it been won by a team with a rookie starting quarterback.

Sammy Baugh nearly led Texas Christian University to the National Championship in 1935. In 1937, in their 1st season in the nation's capital after 5 ill-attended seasons in Boston, the Washington Redskins drafted him.

With team owner George Preston Marshall presenting the professional team in the same manner as a college team, complete with a marching band and a fight song, "Hail to the Redskins," and coach Ray Flaherty and Baugh leading the most-passing offense the NFL had ever seen, the Redskins did very well at the box office, and equally well on the field. They split their 1st 4 games, then won 6 of their last 7 to finish 8-3, winning the NFL Eastern Division.

The season before, in Boston, they had won the Division, but lost the NFL Championship Game to the Green Bay Packers. This time, they were playing the Chicago Bears, who had gone 9-1-1. They didn't have a notable passer, but they did have Bronko Nagurski, the man who became the model for all big, bruising fullbacks to follow. Since it was the Western Division Champions' turn to host the title game, it would be at Wrigley Field in Chicago.

The game kicked off at 1:15 PM Central Time (2:15 Eastern). Cliff Battles put the Redskins on the board first with a 7-yard touchdown run. The Bears' Jack Manders, also their main placekicker, ran it in from 10 yards, and caught a 37-yard touchdown pass from Bernard Masterson. At halftime, it was Chicago 14, Washington 7.

Baugh took to the air in the 2nd half, throwing a 55-yard touchdown pass to former Notre Dame end Wayne Millner to tie the game. But before the 3rd quarter ran out, the Bears retook the lead on a short pass from Masterson to Edgar "Eggs" Manske.

The Redskins owned the 4th quarter. Baugh threw a 78-yard touchdown pass to Millner and a 35-yard touchdown pass to Ed "Chug" Justice (no relation to later Washington running back Charlie "Choo Choo" Justice). Washington won, 28-21.

Baugh would lead the Redskins back to the NFL Championship Game in 1940. By that point, however, the Bears had retooled, drafting quarterback Sid Luckman, running the T formation on offense, and and boosting their defense. The Bears won by a reality-shaking 73-0. They won again in 1941, beating the New York Giants. In 1942, Baugh and the Redskins beat Luckman and the Bears.

In 1943, Baugh had the greatest season any individual player has ever had, leading the NFL in passing yards, punting yards, and interceptions by a defensive player. And he got the Redskins back into the Championship Game. But the Bears won. The Redskins got back into the Championship Game in 1945, losing to the Cleveland Rams. Their quarterback was Bob Waterfield, and he became the 2nd rookie quarterback to win an NFL Championship. There has never been a 3rd.

After that, the Redskins got old, and Baugh was soon the last remaining player from the 1937 and '42 title teams, retiring in 1952. The Redskins didn't reach the Playoffs at all -- not even the 2nd-place Bert Bell Benefit Bowl of the 1960s -- between 1945 and 1972. But they won the NFC Championship in 1972, and won 4 in a span of 10 years from 1982 to 1991, going 3-1 in Super Bowls.

Baugh lived to see them all: When he died in 2008, he was the last surviving charter inductee of the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 1963. Until recently, the Washington Football Team had a policy of not officially retiring numbers, only "unofficially retiring" them, with the exception of Baugh's Number 33.

From 1992 to 2021, under any name, the team now known as the Washington Commanders has made the Playoffs only 6 times, winning only 2 Playoff games.

The Commanders have a Ring of Honor, based on the Washington Wall of Stars that had been erected at Robert F. Kennedy Memorial Stadium. From the 1937 NFL Champions, it includes quaterback Sammy Baugh, running back Cliff Battles, and end Wayne Millner. The Washington DC Sports Hall of Fame has elected each of them, and also head coach Ray Flaherty.

Millner enlisted in the U.S. Navy after America entered World War II, so he was not there for the Redskins' return to the Championship in 1942, though Baugh was still quarterback, and Flaherty was still head coach. With The War over, Millner returned, and, with Baugh throwing to him and Dudley DeGroot as Washington coach, played in the 1945 NFL Championship Game, which, as I said, they lost to the Rams. No additional player from the 1945 team has been elected to either the Commanders Ring of Fame or the DC Sports Hall of Fame.

George Preston Marshall, the owner who brought the team to Washington, was elected to both, but was removed from both in 2020, over his racism. The monument to him that had been erected outside RFK Stadium was also removed, and put into storage.

It speaks to Marshall's mismanagement of the team from 1946 until the stroke that incapacitated him in 1963, leading to his death in 1969, that there were only 5 players from the 1950s elected to the Ring of Fame: Quarterback Eddie LeBaron; running backs "Bullet" Bill Dudley, Charlie "Choo-Choo" Justice and Dick James: and defensive end Gene Brito. From the 1960s, but not the 1972 NFC Championship, there have been 4: James, guard Vince Promuto, flanker Bobby Mitchell, and linebacker Sam Huff.

All of those men were also elected to the DC Sports Hall of Fame. So was Jim Gibbons, who broadcast for the team from 1943 to 1967. In 1999, The Sporting News released their list of the 100 Greatest Football Players. In 2010, the NFL Network released their list of the 100 Greatest Players. Baugh ranked 11th in the former, and 14th in the latter, despite it being 47 and 58 years, respectively, since he had played his last game.

*

December 12, 1937 was a Sunday. Singer Connie Francis was born on this day.

This was the 2nd and last season of one of several leagues with the name of the American Football League, and the Los Angeles Bulldogs beat the Cincinnati Bengals, 14-3 at Nippert Stadium in Cincinnati. The Bulldogs won the AFL Championship, then folded with the league. The team that debuted in the 1960s AFL in 1968 named themselves the Cincinnati Bengals after this team.

Baseball was out of season. The NBA hadn't been founded yet. There were 3 games played in the NHL:

* The New York Rangers beat the Detroit Red Wings, 5-2 at the Olympia Stadium in Detroit.

* The New York Americans and the Montreal Canadiens played to a tie, 4-4 at the old Madison Square Garden.

* The Chicago Black Hawks beat the Montreal Maroons, 3-2 at the Chicago Stadium. Paul Thompson scored the winning goal with 39 seconds left in overtime. The teams were going in opposite directions: The Hawks won the Stanley Cup in 1937-38, while the Maroons went out of business.

* And the Boston Bruins were not scheduled.

December 12, 1920: The 1st NFL Champions

Fritz Pollard (left) and Paul Robeson

December 12, 1920: The Akron Pros and the Decatur Staleys play to a 0-0 tie at Cubs Park in Chicago. This was the last game of the season for each team. The Pros finished with a record of 8-0-3, while the Staleys finished 10-1-2. This made the Pros the Champions of the American Professional Football Association in its 1st season. In 1922, the APFA would be renamed the National Football League. So the Akron Pros were the 1st-ever NFL Champions.

The Pros also had the 1st black head coach in any major league sport -- if, that is, the APFA could be defined as "major league." It would be many years before the NFL could be taken seriously as such. Frederick Douglass "Fritz" Pollard coached the Pros, and was also their star end, making the 1st All-Pro team. Also making it from Akron were fullback Andrew "Rip" King, guards Alf Cobb and Brad Tomlin, and end Bob Nash.

The Pros, playing their home games at League Park in Akron, Ohio, didn't lose a game. The blemishes on their record were ties: Against the Cleveland Tigers, at the Cleveland Indians' League Park on November 7; against the Buffalo All-Americans, at Olympic Park in Buffalo on December 5; and this game against the Staleys.

League Park, Akron

Not on the Pros in this season, but joining them for 1921, was Paul Robeson. A star at Rutgers, he impressed Walter Camp, the former Yale coach who created the concept of the All-America team, to the point where Camp called him the best defensive end he'd ever seen. When Camp made his all-time All-America team in 1920, he named Robeson to it.

But Robeson had his mind on bigger things than professional sports. He played for the Pros in 1921, and moved with Pollard to the Milwaukee Badgers in 1922. Robeson then became a lawyer, a singer, an actor, and perhaps the biggest civil rights advocate of his time.

Camp called Pollard, a Chicago native who starred at Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island, "one of the greatest runners these eyes have ever seen," moved around football a bit, last playing in 1926 and last coaching in 1928. Without him, the Pros folded after the 1926 season. He died in 1986, and was elected to the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 2005.

The Staleys were a "company team" (what British soccer fans would call a "works side"), working for the A.E. Staley Starch Company of Decatur, Illinois. The team was also coached by one of its ends, who was also a co-owner: George Halas, who had played at the University of Illinois. Their membership on the 1st All-Pro team included Halas, end Guy Chamberlin, tackles High Blacklock and Bert Ingwerson, guard Ross Petty, center George Trafton, and halfback Ed Sternaman.

The 1st game for this historic sports franchise came on October 3, against the Moline Universal Tractors, a team that never entered the NFL, at Staley Field in Decatur. In front of an estimate 1,500 fans, most of whom had no idea that history was being made, the Staleys won, 20-0. The 1st game they played against an actual NFL team was on October 17, at Douglas Park in Rock Island, Illinois, one of the "Quad Cities" on the Mississippi River in Illinois and Iowa. They beat the Rock Island Independents, 7-0.

The Staleys returned to Rock Island on November 7, and played the Indys to a 0-0 tie. What cost them the title was a tight schedule, what English soccer fans would call "fixture congestion." On November 21, they had a relatively easy 28-7 win at Staley Field over the Hammond Pros, based in Hammond, Indiana, just over the State Line from Chicago.

Just 4 days later, on Thanksgiving Day, they played the Chicago Tigers, one of the new league's worst teams, at Cubs Park on the North Side, and only won, 6-0. Just 4 days after that, the Staleys returned to Chicago, to Normal Park on the South Side, and lost to the Chicago Cardinals, 7-6. They beat the Racine Cardinals the next week, but then closed the season with the tie with Akron.

Right behind these 2 teams were the Buffalo All-Americans. They went 9-1-1, having tied the Pros, and lost to the Canton Bulldogs, 3-0 at home on November 21. That cost them the APFA title. It was the 1st professional heartbreak for football in Buffalo. It would not be the last. Strangely, no All-Americans were selected for the All-Pro team.

In 1921, the Staleys would move to Chicago full-time. In 1922, in line with their landlords, the Chicago Cubs, they became the Chicago Bears, and Halas bought the Staley ownership out, becoming sole owner. He would play for the team until 1929, coach them on and off until 1968, and own them until his death in 1983. The Bears still wear his initials, GSH, on their sleeves. In 1963, he became the 1st man elected to the Pro Football Hall of Fame.

In 1926, Cubs Park was renamed Wrigley Field. The Bears remained there until 1970, moving to Soldier Field for 1971, because Wrigley was too small to meet the new NFL attendance requirements. The fact that Monday Night Football had been started, and Wrigley didn't have lights until 1988, had nothing to do with it.

The Bears' arch-rivals, the Green Bay Packers, began play in 1919, and joined the APFA/NFL in 1921. Like the Bears, they began as a company team, for the Indian Packing Company, a meatpacking company in Green Bay, Wisconsin. However, it would be many years before the Packers became established as the Bears' arch-rivals: From 1922 to 1933, the Bears would play the crosstown Cardinals on Thanksgiving; from 1934 to 1937, the Bears played the Detroit Lions on the day; and from 1951 to 1963, the Packers played the Lions on Thanksgiving.

*

December 12, 1920 was a Sunday. This was the only game played in the APFA that day. Baseball was out of season. The NBA hadn't been founded yet. And the NHL season didn't start for another 12 days. So this was the only score on this historic day.

December 4, 1921: The Staley Swindle

December 4, 1921: The Chicago Staleys beat the Buffalo All-Americans, 10-7 at Cubs Park in Chicago. The Staleys thus win an NFL Championship that the All-Americans thought they had already won. It becomes known as the Staley Swindle.

The Buffalo All-Stars were a professional football team founded in 1915. They became the Buffalo Niagaras in 1918, the Buffalo Prospects in 1919, and the Buffalo All-Americans in 1920, as charter members of the American Professional Football Association.

The APFA was founded by the owners of the member teams, including George Halas, a former University of Illinois end who was now the head coach, general manager, and starting end on both offense and defense, for the Decatur Staleys, as they were a "company team" (in English sport, they would say "works side") for the A.E. Staley Manufacturing Company of Decatur, Illinois, makers of starchers and sweeteners. And Halas was then employed by them.

After playing the 1920 season in Decatur, Halas got permission to move the team to Chicago for 1921, signing actual football players, not just Staley employees who had once played football. Company owner Gene Staley offered to sell the team to Halas, on the condition that it keep the Staleys name for 1 more season. He agreed.

At the time, not every team played by an APFA team was another APFA team. Nevertheless, the Staleys won their 1st 7 games of 1921, beating non-APFA team the Waukegan Legion (of Illinois) in their opener, and then APFA teams the Rock Island Independents (Illinois) twice, the Rochester Jeffersons (New York State), the Dayton Triangles (Ohio), the Detroit Tigers and the Cleveland Indians (those last 2 named for the baseball teams in their cities).

In contrast, all of the All-Americans' games that season were against APFA teams, and they won their 1st 6, beating the Hammond Pros (Indiana), the Columbus Panhandles (Ohio), the New York Brickley Giants (led by former Harvard star Charley Brickley and failing to get many fans into the Polo Grounds), the Jeffersons, the Tigers and the Indians. This was followed by ties against teams from outside Cleveland, the defending Champion Akron Pros and the Canton Bulldogs.

The Commonwealth of Pennsylvania did not permit professional sports to be played on Sundays, making it difficult for teams from Philadelphia and Pittsburgh to get into the new league while still playing on Saturday, when college football soaked up the market.

So, to make more money -- and, remember, in those days, most football players weren't the 300-pound behemoths of today, or even the 250-pounders of the 1950s -- some men played pro games on Saturdays and Sundays, to make more money. Some were playing for the Philadelphia Quakers on Saturday, then taking a train to Buffalo, where they played for the All-Americans on Sunday.

But in mid-November, the APFA found out about this. It violated league policy, and forced the players to decide. And 5 of the Quakers/All-Americans decided to stick with Philadelphia. Fortunately, the league permitted the All-Americans to hire players from a team that folded in midseason, the Detroit Tigers, so they could have a full roster the rest of the way.

On November 24, Thanksgiving Day, the All-Americans played the Staleys at Cubs Park on the North Side of Chicago. Buffalo emerged victorious, 7-6. Three days later, they beat the Triangles, and had just 1 more game to go, home to Akron. They were 8-0-2. Their fullback, Elmer Oliphant, ended up leading the league in these categories: Field goals (5), points-after-touchdown (26), overall scoring (47 points) and touchdown passes (7 -- it was mostly a running game then).

Elmer Oliphant

Three days after Thanksgiving, the Staleys played a team founded in 1919, but making their league debut in 1921: The Green Bay Packers. Chicago won, 7-0. Now, they were 8-1. And Halas challenged the All-Americans to a rematch.

George Halas. Yes, old "Papa Bear" was a player,

and, by the standards of his time, a very good one.

The All-Americans agreed to play them on December 4, again at Cubs Park, on one condition: That the game would be considered an exhibition game, designed solely to generate gate receipts for the teams, and wouldn't count in the standings. Halas told them that he accepted this.

There was a problem, and, as would happen with Buffalo sports teams in the future, the All-Americans had no one to blame but themselves: They played a game that did count the day before, December 3. They beat Akron again, 14-0 at Buffalo Baseball Park. Then they got on a train to Chicago, to play again the very next day.

They did so knowing that they wouldn't have the former Detroit Tigers players they had signed. Because the Tigers were allowed to reassemble for one last game, to make up some of the money they owed, by playing the Detroit Maroons. That game ended in a 0-0 tie.

So the All-Americans, depleted in terms of manpower and physical energy, took the field at Clark and Addison Streets on the North Side of Chicago, and played the Chicago Staleys in front of a crowd estimated at 12,000. Chicago scored a touchdown in the 1st quarter, when Guy Chamberlin intercepted a pass from Oliphant, and returned the ball 75 yards for a touchdown. Buffalo equalized in the 3rd, when they blocked a punt, and Clarence "Steamer" Horning recovered it in the end zone.

But, later in the 3rd quarter, Dutch Sternaman -- at that point, Halas' co-owner, and brother of another teammate, Joey Sternaman -- kicked a 20-yard field goal to give the Staleys a 10-7 lead, and that lead held to the end of the game.

And then, the other shoe dropped: Halas got in touch with the other team owners, and gained their support, and contacted the league office, arguing that the game should count in the standings. After all, in pro football leagues to that point, the season usually extended past December 4. To make his point further, Halas risked his standing by scheduling 2 more games. They beat the Canton Bulldogs on December 11, then played the Chicago Cardinals on December 18, only gaining a 0-0 tie. So this plan could have backfired on him.

Now, the season was over. Chicago were 9-1-2, and Buffalo were 9-1-1. Each team's only loss was to the other. At the time, ties were not computed as part of winning percentage: Only wins and losses mattered. If ties had been counted, as half a win and half a loss, it would have been Buffalo .864, Chicago .833, and Buffalo would have been declared the Champions.

Frank McNeil, owner of the All-Americans, pointed out the agreement between him and Halas that the game was an exhibition and didn't count in the standings. Halas broke the agreement, telling the league that, under league rules, there was no such thing as an "exhibition game." This was a half-truth: While the league rules did not recognize exhibition games as a thing that could be played, they didn't rule such a thing out.

And then, Halas invoked the tiebreaker which was part of league rules at the time: The 2nd game between a pair of teams counted more than the 1st did. Had the APFA not bought this argument, he was prepared to argue aggregate points, which favored the Staleys, 16-14. But the league did buy the 2nd-game argument, and recognized the Staleys as Champions.

Football historians are split on this. On the one hand, Halas did break his word, and the December 4 game should have been accepted as an exhibition. On the other hand, Halas didn't break the rules: Instead, he used the rules as they then stood, regardless of whether they were fair then, or seem fair now. Halas was perfectly willing to be seen as a smart businessman, even if it affected his reputation as a sportsman.

Jeffrey J. Miller, a Buffalo-based historian who has written several books on Buffalo and pro football -- including a few books about Buffalo-based football -- wasn't born until 40 years later. But the subject bothered him enough to coin a phrase that did not exist at the time: "The Staley Swindle." In 2004, he published a book about the All-Americans: Buffalo's Forgotten Champions.

One way in which Halas did keep his word was to keep the Staley name for the 1921 season -- but no longer: The Staleys became known as the Chicago Bears in 1922. The APFA became the National Football League that year as well. And Cubs Park was renamed Wrigley Field in 1926.

The All-Americans? They became known as the Buffalo Bisons in 1924, the Buffalo Rangers in 1926, the Buffalo Bisons again in 1927, and a team out of business in 1930. Ironically, in their last season, 1929, they avoided a winless season by beating the Bears. The NFL would not return to Buffalo until the merger with the AFL in 1970, admitting the Buffalo Bills.

The Staley company remained in business, long after everybody but people who knew NFL history had forgotten they had anything to do with the Bears, until 2005, when they were bought out by Tate & Lyle Ingredients Americas, LLC.

In 2019, in connection with their 100th Season (not their 100th Anniversary, which was the next year), the Bears did fan balloting for their 100 Greatest Players. From these 1921 NFL Champions, they included end, head coach, general manager and founding owner George Halas; center George Trafton, and tackle Ed Healey. Not on this team, or on their next title team in 1932, but selected for the 100 Greatest Bears, were quarterback Joey Sternaman and halfback John "Paddy" Driscoll.

*

December 4, 1921 was, of course, a Sunday. These other APFA games were played that day, all previously scheduled, thus unwittingly deepening the case for the Staleys:

* The Akron Pros beat the Chicago Cardinals, 7-0 at Normal Field on the South Side of Chicago.

* As mentioned, the Detroit Tigers and the Detroit Maroons (not an APFA team) played to a tie, 0-0 at Navin Field, which would be renamed Briggs Stadium in 1938 and Tiger Stadium in 1961.

* The Columbus Panhandles beat the Louisville Brecks, 6-0 at Eclipse Park in Louisville, Kentucky. What the heck is a "Breck"? The team was founded by the Louisville Breckenridge club, named after (though misspelling) John C. Breckinridge, who served Kentucky in both houses of Congress before becoming President James Buchanan's Vice President -- and, near the end of the Civil War, the Confederate Secretary of War.

* The Evansville Crimson Giants beat the Indianapolis Football Club (not an APFA team), 17-0 at Bosse Field in Evansville, Indiana.

* The Minneapolis Marines played away to Sioux City Football Club (not an APFA team) in Iowa, and lost 10-0.

* And the Green Bay Packers played fellow Wisconsans the Racine Legion to a 3-3 tie, at Hagemeister Park in Green Bay.

Baseball was out of season. The NHL started its season a few days later. And there would be no NBA for another 25 years.

Also on this day, Canadian singer and actress Deanna Durbin was born.

November 26, 1925: Red Grange Makes His Professional Debut

November 26, 1925: Red Grange, just 5 days past his last game for the University of Illinois, plays his first professional football game. (That was within the rules at the time, as there was no NFL Draft, let alone restrictions connected to it.)

I don't think I can underestimate how big an event this was considered to be. This was "The Golden Age of Sports," and, what Babe Ruth was to baseball, Jack Dempsey to boxing, Man o' War to horse racing, Howie Morenz to hockey, Paavo Nurmi to track, Bill Tilden to tennis, and Bobby Jones to golf, Red Grange was to football. He had Peyton Manning and Tom Brady levels of hype at a time when the only real form of mass media was newspapers. Radio broadcasting was in its infancy, television was still in the experimental stage, and newsreels weren't much yet.

It is the annual Thanksgiving Day tussle between Chicago's NFL teams, the Bears and the Cardinals, and Cubs Park -- which was renamed Wrigley Field the next season -- is packed to the gills, 39,000 people, to watch the Galloping Ghost put on his Number 77 jersey for the Bears -- in the same colors as UI, dark blue and orange, and the first truly famous uniform number in North American sports. The game ends in a scoreless tie.

(The NHL already had uniform numbers, but was still not thought of as an American game, so Howie Morenz's 7 was not yet famous outside Canada. And Major League Baseball wouldn't adopt numbers until 1929, so Babe Ruth hadn't yet begun wearing 3.)

Both Chicago teams finished 9-2, but the Cardinals had only 1 tie, while the Bears had 3. Under the rules then in effect, the standings were decided by winning percentage, with a tie counting as half a win, and not every team played the same number of games against in-league opponents. So the Cardinals had a winning percentage of .846, and the Bears .643. And that wasn't even the most controversial part. The Pottsville Maroons went 10-2, with no ties, so their percentage was .833. I described how the title was settled in the Cardinals' favor in a separate post.

The uneven scheduling was a big reason why the NFL was not exactly "major league" yet, and also a big reason why it needed a big name like Grange. Even having Jim Thorpe didn't help. The Philadelphia-based Frankford Yellow Jackets played 17 games. The Bears played 14. The Green Bay Packers played 13. The Cardinals, the Maroons, the Cleveland Bulldogs played 12. The New York Giants, the Detroit Panthers, the Rock Island Independents played 11. The Providence Steam Roller played 10. The Buffalo Bisons and the Columbus Tigers played 9. The Kansas City Cowboys, the Dayton Triangles, and the Canton Bulldogs -- not to be confused with nearby Cleveland -- played 8. The Rochester Jeffersons played 7. And struggling teams that soon went out of business played fewer: The Milwaukee Badgers 5, the Indiana-based Hammond Pros 4, and the Minnesota-based Duluth Kelleys 3.

Grange is one of the greatest all-around players in football history, a sensational running back and one of the best defensive backs of his era. He is also, by far, the most important player in the history of the NFL: If he had failed, the NFL might never have become bigger than it was in 1925, and likely would have gone out of business during the Great Depression, and another sport would have had to fill the gap between the end of the World Series in October and Opening Day in April. Maybe it would have been that other "football."

But Grange did succeed, and, along with his coach George Halas and his contemporary Jim Thorpe, he was one of the first 3 men elected to the Pro Football Hall of Fame.

*

November 26, 1925, as are all Thanksgiving Days, was a Thursday. Also on this day, the New York Giants, an NFL team in its 1st season, won 7-0 over the Staten Island Stapletons, a non-NFL team founded in 1915, and played in the Stapleton neighborhood of Staten Island. The game was played at the Stapes' home, Thompson Stadium, which stood from 1924 to 1933, and the attendance is listed as 10,000, which might be a sellout.

The Stapes did not join the NFL until the 1929 season, and the Great Depression knocked them out in 1932. Berta A. Dreyfus Intermediate School is now on the site of Thompson Stadium, at 101 Warren Street.

The Kansas City Cowboys and the Cleveland Bulldogs, neither of them drawing very well (which would shock later fans in those cities), played at Clarkin Field in Hartford, Connecticut. The Cowboys won, 17-0. Since New England was then, and remains now, a big region for high school football on Thanksgiving, the attendance for this game was listed as only 1,000. The Cowboys played 1 more season before folding, the Bulldogs 1 more after that.

The Pottsville Maroons beat the Green Bay Packers, 31-0 at Minersville Park in Pottsville. The Maroons lasted until 1929.

And the Rock Island Independents beat the Detroit Panthers, 6-3 at Navin Field (later renamed Briggs Stadium and Tiger Stadium) in Detroit. Both teams lasted 1 more year.

Among the major college rivalry games played that day:

* Virginia and North Carolina played to a tie, 3-3 at Emerson Field in Chapel Hill, North Carolina.

* Alabama beat Georgia, 27-0 at Rickwood Field in Birmingham, Alabama.

* Kentucky beat Tennessee, 23-20 at Stoll Field in Lexington, Kentucky.

* Texas A&M 28 beat Texas, 28-0 at Kyle Field in College Station.

* Colorado A&M (which became Colorado State) beat Wyoming, 40-0 at Colorado Field in Fort Collins.

* And Utah State beat Utah, 10-6 at Cummings Field in Salt Lake City.

Not rivalries, but also (in my opinion) noteworthy:

* Syracuse beat Columbia, 16-5 at Baker Field in Upper Manhattan.

* The University of Pennsylvania beat Cornell, 7-0 at Franklin Field in Philadelphia.

* The University of Pittsburgh beat Penn State, 23-7 at Pitt Stadium in Pittsburgh. (It had opened 2 months earlier, on September 26, with a 28-0 win over Washington & Lee University.

* Nebraska beat Notre Dame, 17-0 at Memorial Stadium in Lincoln, Nebraska.

* Oklahoma beat Oklahoma State, 35-0 at Memorial Stadium in Norman.