NFL reaches West Coast, is fairly stable despite war in ‘40s
Note: This is part of a series of stories by the Associated Press to commemorate the 100th anniversary season of the NFL. This week: The 1940s.
The NFL reached the West Coast for the first time when the defending champion Cleveland Rams moved to Los Angeles for the 1946 season.
That same year, the 49ers became San Francisco’s first professional sports team, a charter member of the upstart All-America Football Conference. Before the better-known American Football League merger of 1970, the AAFC laid the foundation for what amounted to the NFL’s first merger. The league played the final four seasons of the 1940s, with three of the seven remaining teams joining the NFL in 1950: the 49ers, Cleveland Browns and Baltimore Colts.
Overall, despite the upheaval that hit all sports leagues — and obviously, life in general — during World War II, the 1940s was a stabilizing period for the NFL in its third decade.
The war led to more than 1,000 players interrupting or postponing their pro football careers. As a result, the 10-team league went down to eight for one season, in 1943. The Cleveland Rams suspended operations, while the Philadelphia Eagles and Pittsburgh Steelers merged for the season.
The merged Philadelphia-Pittsburgh team of 1943 was called the Steagles by fans. Home games were divided between the cities.
The count went back to 10 in 1944 with the return of the Rams and the addition of the Boston Yanks, while the Steelers merged with the Chicago Cardinals just for that season. The combined team, called Card-Pitt, went 0-10.
The NFL’s military service roster totaled 638. Of those, 21 died in action.
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