What’s that? Playoffs?!
In 1932, the NFL held its first ever playoff game for the League Championship between the Chicago Bears and the Portsmouth Spartans. It was not only the first playoff game, it was the first indoor playoff game!
From its inception, the NFL had crowned the team with the highest winning percentage champion, ties excluded. The Bears finished 6-1-6 and the Spartans 6-1-4, giving them identical .857 winning percentages. Had the current system of counting ties been in place, the Green Bay Packers, 10-3-1, would have won their fourth consecutive championship. However, because the Bears and Spartans had tied both of their games, an additional game between them was scheduled. This was considered a regular season game, so whoever lost would drop to third place behind the Packers.
Due to a snowstorm and predicted extremely cold weather, both teams agreed to hold the game indoors at the three year old Chicago stadium.
Chicago Stadium had hosted a circus the week before and the cement floor was covered in tanbark, mulch, with the aromatic addition of elephant dung, the smell of which caused at least one Bears player to vomit.
The game was played on a “field” eighty yards long, and 45 yards wide, ten less than standard at the time, with sixty yards between the goal lines. The goal posts were moved in to the goal lines.
Prior to this game, wherever a player was tackled, that’s where the ball was spotted for the next play, even if it was on a sideline. Due to the proximity of walls to the sidelines, it was agreed to spot the ball on the hashmarks for the next play. The Bears prevailed over the Spartans, 9-0, thus winning the Championship.
The following year, the league expanded to ten teams in two divisions and began playing a championship game between the division winners.
The rules of spotting the ball on, or between, the hashmarks, the goal posts on the goal lines, and allowing a forward pass from anywhere behind the line of scrimmage were adopted in 1933. These rules were significant in increasing scoring in what had been a low scoring game up until then.
Oh, and the Portsmouth Spartans?
You may know them better as the Detroit Lions.