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Wild World of Sports Brian Brill Opinion Editor The story of the 1925 National Football League differs depending upon whom you ask. Faithful fans of the Pottsville Maroons would spin a yarn about a disputed NFL championship that should be in Schuylkill County. It begins during the chill of autumn turning to winter. The Maroons had just battled through a grueling 11-game schedule having only lost once and tied once. The Chicago Cardinals matched Pottsville game for game to produce an equal record. To break the tie, the two teams, both now defunct, played a game billed as “The World’s Championship.” Pottsville prevailed. Fresh off their victory at the end of the season, the Maroons proceeded to schedule an exhibition game against Notre Dame alumni, including the legendary four horsemen. League President Joe Carr warned the Maroons not to play, telling them that they were invading the territory of the Frankford Yellow Jackets, who were from the Philadelphia area. Pottsville ignored the warnings and played the game. Carr’s retaliation was to suspend the Maroons and to strip them of their championship. While the game was likely an invasion of territory, it was after the championship had been decided. On top of that, it had nothing to do with any part of the NFL season. For Joe Carr to take the 1925 title from Pottsville would be like awarding the Super Bowl XXXIV runner up, the Tennessee Titans, the 1999-2000 championship if the St. Louis Rams were to play a game in neighboring Kansas City against a team other than the hometown Chiefs. It’s ridiculous. The championship had been decided and any actions taken by a team afterwards are after the fact. College athletic teams are constantly in trouble for breaking fragile rules concerning eligibility and benefits to student athletes. However, when a team is caught, they aren’t stripped of on-field accomplishments unless they were aided by a player deemed ineligible. In other words, if it doesn’t affect what has happened during competition, it shouldn’t alter the results of the competition. In the NFL today, every year a handful of players fail drug tests for substances, including steroids and other performance-enhancing drugs. This does affect on-field results, but the NFL doesn’t strip victories from teams for it. They merely give out a four-game suspension to the guilty player. If the NFL can overlook such a major violation, why were they so uptight about a harmless exhibition game? Chicago, too, was guilty of breaking rules. Unlike Pottsville, the Cardinals’ violations did affect what took place between the end zones. Bitter after their championship loss, they scheduled extra games in an attempt to better their record. The games took place after the season had ended but, due to a lack of organization in the league, the games were factored into the Cardinals’ record. One game was against the Milwaukee Badgers, who were short four men because their players had left after the season had ended. Art Foltz of the Cardinals successfully recruited four high school players. Not only was it against league rules to use high school players, but a game between a professional team and a piecemeal team of high schoolers and others was an obvious mismatch. Chicago easily won. However, there wasn’t substantial evidence to prove that Cardinals management was aware of the rules infraction. Nineteen twenty-five is an infamous year in the heart of Pottsville football fans. Schuylkill County residents won’t see another NFL team in their lifetimes and the Maroons are our last link to professional football greatness. They won the championship on the field and were stripped of it by men in suits, not by men in helmets and pads. Our Pottsville Maroons are the 1925 NFL champions as far as I’m concerned.
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