What was like to play football in 1920 and how were teams organized?
Football in 1920 bore no resemblance to the glittering, exciting game of today. The forward pass was used only rarely. Games were bruising, plodding contests with teams grinding out yards with the running game. Field position was critical, and teams often punted on first or second down. College football was king; it was well-organized and popular among fans and the media. Pro football, on the other hand, was a struggling enterprise. The leagues and teams were financially unstable, the players were poorly paid if they were paid at all, and fans and media barely paid attention. How did quarterback Benjamin “Benny” Friedman develop the forward pass and why hadn’t teams figured this out before the 1920s? Benny Friedman did not invent the forward pass; it had existed for a number of years before he played. But it had been used sparingly. The football at that time was more like a rugby ball — fat, roundish, difficult to grip and throw with any accuracy or for any distance. And the rules in
