It was renamed the American Professional Football Association (APFA) a month later, September 17, 1920. The American Professional Football Conference (APFC) was formed as a consequence of this meeting. The loosely-affiliated teams met for the first time at the Jordan and Hupmobile showroom in Canton, Ohio. The year was 1920, and football required structure to remain a viable addition to the American sports scene. As a result, play-for-pay was formed, as was the emergence of the professional athlete.

William “Pudge” Heffelfinger of the Allegheny Athletic Association in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, was the first paid participant, earning $500 for his participation in a game November 12, 1892. It wasn’t until Walter Camp, a great rugby player from Yale, came along in the 1880s that the early rules for what we know today as American football were established. The regulations were developed as a cross between soccer and rugby.

The first formal football game as we know it took place in 1869 between Princeton and Rutgers, and the NFL has a long and illustrious history.

Nfl betting odds point spread