History of the Super Bowl

How The Game Started

Have you ever watched the super bowl? If you have you might like to learn about the rich history of this historic game. In order for  you to truly understand our nation’s most famous game you first must learn about the AFL-NFL World Championship Game.  

The NFL used to have a whole other league called the AFL before the merger in 1966 creating the NFC and AFC conferences. The champion of the NFL would play the champion of the AFL in a world championship game. The Green bay packers were the final world champions. These games would take place all the way up until 1966. In 1967 the NFL and AFL merged into one league called the NFL. The reason for the merger was, the following quote is from history.com. ¨The NFL’s prediction and hope that the AFL would field only second-rate players and washed-up former NFL players was not to be: Instead, the two leagues began to compete over fans, players and coaches. An unspoken agreement that one league would not sign the other league’s players was broken in 1966 when the NFL’s New York Giants signed place-kicker Pete Gogolak away from the AFL’s Buffalo Bills. As neither league could afford a bidding war, owners soon began to talk of a merger. Under the merger agreement announced on June 8, 1966, the new league would be called the NFL, and split into the American Football Conference (AFC) and the National Football Conference (NFC) All eight of the original AFL teams would all be absorbed by the NFL, unlike in 1946 when the NFL merged with the rival All-America Football Conference but only took in its Baltimore, Cleveland and San Francisco franchises and dissolved four other teams¨. The First super bowl took place on January 15th, 1967. Between the NFC´s Green Bay Packers and the AFC´s Kansas City Chiefs In a game where the Green Bay Packers won 35-10. 

Popularity of The Super Bowl

Between the two top television providers NBC and CBS there were 75,500,000 people who viewed Super Bowl I. Since then there have been 54 Super Bowls. There is an obvious growth in popularity since Super Bowl I just 25 years later In Super Bowl XXV which included the Buffalo bills and the New York Giants in which the Giants won 20-19, That game had 112,100,000 views in a off year for the viewing of the super bowl just 5 years earlier there was 127,060,000 viewers of the Chicago Bears New England patriots game which was a blowout 45-10 to the Bears fans excitement. As you can see there has been an up and down trajectory of the super bowls viewing But as of late it has just been up. In the 2017 super bowl, Super Bowl LI there were 172,000,000 views of that year’s super bowl (the most viewed super bowl ever) this game pitted the New England Patriots versus the Atlanta Falcons in an amazing comeback the Patriots won the game 34-28 . Considering the amount of growth this game has seen since 1967 there is no way of knowing how popular this game will be in just 10 years.  

Super Bowls and the effect on franchises  

Super Bowls usually make or break NFL franchises. Coaches year after year get fired for failing to win super bowls. Some of the most successful franchises include the Dallas Cowboys, Pittsburgh Steelers, San Francisco 49ers and the New England Patriots. All of these teams have 5 or more super bowl wins and all of these franchises had their dynasties. A franchise is considered a dynasty when they dominate an era or a long period of time. The Cowboys dominated the 90’s, the Steelers had the 70’s, the 49ers had the 80’s and  most recently the New England Patriots have dominated, but those are successful cases. There are so many unsuccessful teams, such as the Buffalo Bills who went to 4 back to back Super Bowls from 1990 to 93 and lost every single one which led to their coach Marv Levy being fired. Another example of an unsuccessful franchise is the Philadelphia Eagles where their franchise began in 1933 and they didn’t get their first Super Bowl until 2018 In that span they hired and fired 22 head coaches until they hired Doug Peterson in 2016, but he was recently fired because he was not capable of making it to the Super Bowl like he did in 2018. There are only 12 teams who have never won a super bowl and none of them are thought to be successful franchises. The Super Bowl has a huge effect on making or breaking NFL franchises. I hope Reading this article taught you something you did not know about the Super Bowl and its rich history. Thank you for reading.