NFL Europe League was a professional American football league that functioned as the developmental minor league of the National Football League (NFL). Originally founded in 1989 as the World League of American Football, the league was envisioned as a transatlantic league encompassing teams from both North America and Europe. Initially, the WLAF consisted of seven teams in North America and three in Europe. It began play in 1991 and lasted for two seasons before suspending operations; while the league had been "wildly popular" in Europe, it failed to achieve success in North America. After a two-year hiatus, it returned as a six-team European league, with teams based in England, Germany, the Netherlands, Scotland, and Spain. NFL Europa was dissolved in 2007 due to its continued unprofitability and the NFL's decision to shift its focus towards hosting regular-season games in Europe; at the time of its closure, the league consisted of five German teams and one team based in the Netherlands.
The Pro Football Hall of Fame is the hall of fame for professional American football, located in Canton, Ohio. Opened on September 7, 1963, the Hall of Fame enshrines exceptional figures in the sport of professional football, including players, coaches, officials, franchise owners, and front-office personnel, almost all of whom made their primary contributions to the game in the National Football League (NFL).
Alvin Ray "Pete" Rozelle was an American businessman and executive. Rozelle served as the commissioner of the National Football League (NFL) for nearly thirty years, from January 1960 until his retirement in November 1989. He became the youngest commissioner in NFL history at just the age of 33. He is credited with making the NFL into one of the most successful sports leagues in the world.
James Edward Finks was an American football and Canadian football player, coach, and executive.
The AFL–NFL merger was the merger of the two major professional American football leagues in the United States at the time: the National Football League (NFL) and the American Football League (AFL). It paved the way for the combined league, which retained the "National Football League" name and logo, to become the most popular sports league in the United States. The merger was announced on the evening of June 8, 1966. Under the merger agreement, the leagues maintained separate regular-season schedules for the next four seasons—from 1966 through 1969 with a final championship game which would become known as the Super Bowl—and then officially merged before the 1970 season to form one league with two conferences.
In sports, a farm team, farm system, feeder team, feeder club, or nursery club is generally a team or club whose role is to provide experience and training for young players, with an agreement that any successful players can move on to a higher level at a given point, usually in an association with a major-level parent team. This system can be implemented in many ways, both formally and informally. It is not to be confused with a practice squad, which fulfills a similar developmental purpose but the players on the practice squad are members of the parent team.
In American football, the placekicker (PK), or simply kicker (K), is the player who is responsible for the kicking duties of field goals and extra points. In most cases, the placekicker also serves as the team's kickoff specialist and occasionally in youth football, also acts as the punter.
The 1963 NFL season was the 44th regular season of the National Football League.
Richard Frederick Gordon is an American former professional football player who was a wide receiver for ten seasons in the National Football League (NFL). He played for the Chicago Bears, Los Angeles Rams, Green Bay Packers, and San Diego Chargers. After playing his option year with the Bears in 1971, Gordon became a free agent on May 1, 1972. The lateness of his signing with the Rams on October 12 after the start of the 1972 campaign was due to the uncertainty of compensation that the Bears were to receive. The Rams sent a 1974 first-round selection to the Bears as compensation to complete the last of only four times the NFL exercised the Rozelle rule. He was one of the fifteen plaintiffs in Mackey v. National Football League in which Judge Earl R. Larson declared that the Rozelle rule was a violation of antitrust laws on December 30, 1975. In 2019, he was selected as one of the 100 greatest Bears of All-Time.
All-Pro is an honor bestowed upon professional American football players that designates the best player at each position during a given season. All-Pro players are typically selected by press organizations, who select an "All-Pro team," a list that consists of at least 22 players, one for each offensive and defensive position, plus various special teams players depending on the press organization that compiles the list. All-Pro lists are exclusively limited to the major leagues, usually only the National Football League; in the past, other leagues recognized as major, such as the American Football League of the 1960s or the All-America Football Conference of the 1940s, have been included in All-Pro lists.
The Newton Nite Hawks are a semi-pro American football team that played in Newton, Iowa. They were members of the Chicagoland Football League and Northern States Football League from 1974-1978 and returned to play from 2019-present. They now play in the Heartland Football Association (HFA).
The Commissioner of the National Football League is the chief executive officer of the National Football League (NFL). The position was created in 1941. The current commissioner is Roger Goodell, who assumed office on September 1, 2006.
The San Francisco Dons football program were the intercollegiate American football team for University of San Francisco located in San Francisco, California. The team competed in NCAA Division II as a Division II Independent football program. The school's first football team was fielded in 1917. The program disbanded in 1982.
Bob Kap, also known as Robert Kapoustin and Božidar or Bojidar Nikolaiovich Kapušto, was a Yugoslav-Canadian association football (soccer) and American football coach who was a pioneer in introducing "soccer-style" kicking to the gridiron game.
Minor league football, also known as alternative football or secondary football, is an umbrella term for professional gridiron football that is played below the major league level.
The European League of Football (ELF) is a professional American football league based in Europe, continuing some team names and logos of the former NFL Europe. The ELF played its first season in 2021, and has 17 teams in the 2023 season. Teams are located in Germany, Poland, Spain, Austria, Italy, Switzerland, Hungary, the Czech Republic and France, with plans to expand.
The 2022 ELF season was the second season of the European League of Football, a semi professional American football league based in Europe. Twelve teams from five countries participated. The 2022 season started on June 4, 2022, and concluded with
The 2023 ELF season is the third season of the European League of Football, a professional American football league based in Europe. Seventeen teams from nine different countries will participate and will compete for the title at the Championship Game in the Schauinsland-Reisen-Arena Duisburg, Germany on September 24, 2023.
