The League: How Five Rivals Created the NFL and Launched a Sports Empire

by John Eisenberg

Overview

The epic tale of the five owners who shepherded the NFL through its tumultuous early decades and built the most popular sport in America
 
The National Football League is a towering, distinctly American colossus spewing out $14 billion in annual revenue. But it was not always a success. In The League, John Eisenberg focuses on the pioneering sportsmen who kept the league alive in the 1920s, 1930s, and 1940s, when its challenges were many and its survival was not guaranteed. At the time, college football, baseball, boxing, and horseracing dominated America's sports scene. Art Rooney, George Halas, Tim Mara, George Preston Marshall, and Bert Bell believed in pro football when few others did and ultimately succeeded only because at critical junctures each sacrificed the short-term success of his team for the longer-term good of the league.
 
At once a history of a sport and a remarkable story of business ingenuity, The League is an essential read for any fan of our true national pastime.

 
 

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781541618640
Publisher:	Basic Books
Publication date:	10/01/2019
Pages:	416
Sales rank:	33,625
Product dimensions:	5.50(w) x 8.20(h) x 1.20(d)

About the Author

John Eisenberg is the author of nine previous books, including That First Season and Ten-Gallon War, and a former sportswriter for the Baltimore Sun. He also has written for Sports Illustrated and Smithsonian Magazine. Eisenberg lives in Baltimore, Maryland.

Table of Contents

Prologue 1

Part 1

1 Halas: The Founder 11

2 Mara: The Promoter 31

3 Marshall: The Showman 49

4 Bell: The Profligate Son 56

5 Rooney: The Gambler 70

Part 2

6 Almost Broke 81

7 New Ideas 94

8 Benny and the Giants 104

9 Instituting a Draft 117

10 Betting Bonanza 128

11 Move to DC 139

Part 3

12 Brotherhood of Rivals 155

13 A Step Forward 166

14 The Greatest Rout 176

15 Same Old Pirates 188

16 Political Winds 200

17 Dog Meat 209

18 Two Wars 222

19 The Right Guy in Charge 235

Part 4

20 Back Across the Color Line 249

21 Scandal 263

22 Everyone Loses 276

23 The Little Black Box 289

24 All-White Redskins 301

25 Forty Million Viewers 314

Epilogue 327

Acknowledgments 341

Note on Sources 343

Index 375

Editorial Reviews

"John Eisenberg tells the fascinating account of how five owners, including the Bears's George Halas, cut through their disputes and differences to work together to form the foundations of the league."—Chicago Tribune

"The pluck-and-luck tale of the creation and stabilization of the league is a small but exemplary chapter in American capitalism and popular culture."—Wall Street Journal

"[A] deeply researched, surprise-on-every-page, and altogether marvelous new book"—Weekly Standard

"Drawing on extensive research and personal interviews with descendants of the principle figures, Eisenberg (That First Season) puts a nearly century-old story into contemporary context. Football fans of all teams will appreciate this fascinating history."—Publishers Weekly

"A readable and fresh look at the early history of the NFL"—Library Journal

"Fans who only know the league as it exists today will be shocked and fascinated by its early years."—Booklist

"A rich history of the rise of the National Football League from its virtual obscurity at its genesis in the 1920s to its position as an economic and cultural powerhouse today... Thoroughly researched and gracefully told... An engaging and informative cultural history, on and off the gridiron."—Kirkus (Starred)

"In The League, John Eisenberg goes deep. He takes us to where it all started, in smoky backrooms, when the NFL-an American monolith now-was more David than Goliath. Carefully researched and astutely narrated, this is a fascinating time-transport trip that tells us as much about America as it does about football.—Gary M. Pomerantz, author of Their Life's Work

"We have had some terrific owners since the first half of the 20th century but founders are founders, and this is their marvelous story—how they survived the Great Depression and a World War, scrambling to make their player payrolls from week to week. They did it through their incredible character, loyalty to each other, and their love of the game—and they built the greatest sports league in America."—Ernie Accorsi, former General Manager of the Baltimore Colts, Cleveland Browns, and New York Giants

"Talk about a team of rivals ready to claw each other to death on Sundays and join forces to sell their game from Monday to Saturday, this is it! Halas, Mara, Marshall, Bell, and Rooney-this is their story. It is also the NFL's story. How the men and the league came though the ballyhoo of the 1920s, survived the Great Depression and World War II, and set the stage for football's ascendency as the national game is told by John Eisenberg with humor, heartbreak, and insight. Before the owners were billionaires, they were just a collection of scoundrels who believed in football and money."—Randy Roberts, coauthor of A Season in the Sun

"John Eisenberg has achieved something remarkable: He has uncovered a riveting story from the early days of the NFL that has yet to be told. Better yet, Eisenberg's deeply researched, put-you-there narrative is written with a novelist's flair-you'll feel like you're breathing the same air as the five men who risked it all to turn a struggling league into the juggernaut it is today. This is a movie waiting to be made."—Lars Anderson, New York Times bestselling author of The Storm and the Tide

From the Publisher

07/30/2018
Sportswriter Eisenberg’s enlightening history chronicles the first three decades of the National Football League. As he describes it, today’s multibillion-dollar National Football League bears little resemblance to the underdog association launched in 1920 as the American Professional Football Association in the showroom of an automobile dealership in Canton, Ohio. By 1932, the league consisted of 14 teams, none of them west of Chicago, and professional football was overshadowed by baseball and college football. Thanks to the tenacity of George Halas, the league’s founding father and legendary Chicago Bears owner, and four other team owners—Bert Bell (Philadelphia Eagles), Tim Mara (New York Giants), George Preston Marshall (Washington Redskins), and Art Rooney (Pittsburgh Steelers)—the NFL survived, despite competition with other leagues, public backlash against racially integrated teams (the first African-American player was drafted in 1939), and a lack of players during WWII. The original generation of team owners introduced many elements to the game that still exist today, including the draft and intricate rules relating to ball placement after fumbles and penalties. Drawing on extensive research and personal interviews with descendants of the principle figures, Eisenberg (That First Season) puts a nearly century-old story into contemporary context. Football fans of all teams will appreciate this fascinating history. (Oct.)

Publishers Weekly

★ 2018-07-31

A rich history of the rise of the National Football League from its virtual obscurity at its genesis in the 1920s to its position as an economic and cultural powerhouse today.

Former Baltimore Sun sportswriter Eisenberg (The Streak: Lou Gehrig, Cal Ripken Jr., and Baseball's Most Historic Record, 2017, etc.) returns with the story of how five owners—George Halas, Bert Bell, George Preston Marshall, Art Rooney, and Tim Mara—refused to give up on the struggling league and lived to see (and cause) its current dominance. Thoroughly researched and gracefully told, the story begins with the background of each of the five, then moves chronologically through the early years of the league—struggles, controversies (among the most significant was the arrival of black players), adjustments (to radio and then TV)—to its full arrival in 1958, when 40 million people watched the Baltimore Colts defeat the New York Giants in the exciting championship game. As the author repeatedly points out, these five were fierce rivals, but they knew that to make the league survive and flourish, they could not destroy one another. So they compromised and changed rules to make the game more exciting; all would live to see the league's vigorous health. (The final chapter deals with the deaths of each.) Although Eisenberg is admiring of the founders, he also recognizes—and highlights—their weaknesses. Marshall, for example, was a racist, the last to bring blacks onto his team, the Washington Redskins. Although the author provides some details about some key games (and iconic players like Red Grange, Marion Motley, and Sam Huff), the narrative is not a rehearsal of games but of the history of a game, a business, and five men who took a chance, lost money, and then found great success.

An engaging and informative cultural history, on and off the gridiron.

Kirkus Reviews