Since it is the 50th anniversary of the inaugural AFL Season, and the NFL will pay homage to that league throughout the 2009 season, including having the Hall of Fame game dominated by the nostalgia of the old AFL, the question becomes what exactly was the AFL?

In the late 1950’s the NFL was already a very successful league, and most of the teams were making a good deal of money. One team that was not were the Chicago Cardinals, forever labeled the other team in the Windy City (much less popular than the Chicago Bears) the Cardinals were looking for new ownership to facilitate a relocation to a new city.

Lamar Hunt, a Texas businessman, along with Bud Adams, Bob Howsam, and Max Winter were all interested in buying the Cardinals. Since none of these men were able to gain a controlling interest in that team the group approached NFL Commissioner Bert Bell looking to secure expansion NFL franchises. Bell was unwilling to risk the NFL to expansion and denied the men NFL franchises.

On the plan ride home to Dallas, Hunt had the idea to form his own league with the other men who had been pursuing the Cardinals. He had the idea that a regional rivalry would be key to the new league so with Hunt starting a team in Dallas, he convinced Adams to start a team in Houston. He also secured Howsam to start a team in Denver. Winter was secured to start a team in Minnesota, and efforts were made to start a team in Seattle, but ultimately failed.

Within announcing the new league in the summer of 1959, Hunt received commitments from Barron Hilton to start a team in Los Angeles, and Harry Wismer to start an AFL New York Franchise. It should be noted that Hunt sought the blessing of the NFL and didn’t want to start a costly rivalry between the two leagues.

In August of 1959 the first AFL league meetings were held in Chicago and charter franchises were awarded to Denver, Dallas, New York, Houston, LA, and Minnesota. While NFL Commish Bell had given his public approval of the new league, many NFL owners started a campaign to undermine the new league. They offered many of the AFL ownership groups’ interest in existing teams, or NFL franchise teams. OF all the AFL owners only the Minnesota group accepted and the Vikings began play in the NFL the following year.

The NFL also appeared, ready to reverse its decision on further expansion and announced plans to expand to Houston and Dallas by 1961 in response the new league.
Toward the end of 1959 the AFL was able to recruit Ralph Wilson, then a minority owner with the Detroit Lions, was awarded a team for Buffalo after being tuned down by the city of Miami. The league also found a 10 person ownership group to start a team in Boston.

Since the Minnesota team was now headed to the NFL, Barron Hilton demanded that the new league give it’s open 8th team to a California city. Oakland was later selected and the AFL had eight teams for their initial season.

In July of 1960 the league secured a TV contract with ABC that would pay the league over 2 million dollars a year for five years. This is the ultimate lesson of new football leagues if TV is willing to pay big money to secure TV right for the new league the league will continue, we saw it play out this way for the USFL in the 1980’s, the XFL in 2001, and now the UFL in 2009. Once the TV deals sours the new league is doomed.
From 1960 till 1965 the NFL and AFL challenged each other not on the field of play but in the signing of players both pro and amateur. Since this got really expensive really fast, ultimate the two leagues were forced to merge to control the ever rising cost of payroll.

The Proof that he AFL was the biggest challenge to the NFL dominance of American Football all ten AFL teams, Miami and the Cincinnati Bengals had since been awarded expansion franchises, and joined the NFL in the merger.

The NFL created a new Conference with all ten team were to be located and moved the Cleveland Browns, Pittsburgh Steelers, and Baltimore Colts to the now AFC to insure a balance among the two conferences.

In the end the AFL brought around many new ideas to the world of football. They were the first league to negotiate a TV contract for the league instead of for individual teams, and they played a higher up tempo kind of offensive game over the, somewhat boring pound it out style of the old NFL teams.

Toady all ten AFL team remain an important piece of the AFC and we could argue that at least three other NFL tams owe their existence to the AFL-NFL rivalry. The Vikings were added to keep Minnesota in the NFL, Rankin Smith was awarded the Atlanta Falcons to keep him from buying the Dolphins, and the New Orleans Saints were added as part of an anti trust settlement that allowed the two leagues to merge.