First NFL draft in 1936 was all about sport, not spectacle

Story courtesy of Chicago Tribune

The NFL draft is a big event. Thousands of football fans watch it in person and millions more watch on television.

NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell announces the picks. The players selected celebrate with their families and friends. (Early picks sign contracts that are worth millions of dollars.) And there is endless analysis of the players picked by people who are called draft experts.

The first NFL draft also was held in Philadelphia, but it was nothing like today's draft.

The NFL did not have a player draft in the early years following the founding of the league in 1920. Teams recruited any players they could, and the players signed contracts with whatever team they wanted. Most of the best players signed with the best teams, such as the Chicago Bears, New York Giants and Green Bay Packers.

Bert Bell, the owner of the Philadelphia Eagles and later the commissioner of the NFL, came up with the idea of a player draft. Under Bell's plan, the team with the worst record the year before would select the first player. The remaining teams would follow, with the team with the best record picking last.

Guess which team had the worst record. That's right, Bell's Philadelphia Eagles.

The owners of the then nine NFL teams gathered at the Ritz-Carlton Hotel in Philadelphia on February 8, 1936. There was no television, radio or even newspaper coverage of the draft. Baseball, boxing and horse racing were much more popular sports than professional football in the 1930s.

There also were no scouts or much information about the players selected. The owners simply posted a list of 90 graduating college players on the wall. The owners picked from the list.

The Eagles picked Jay Berwanger, a running back from the University of Chicago, as the first pick in the draft. Berwanger had been named the outstanding college player in 1935.

Berwanger, however, did not sign a contract to play with the Eagles. Instead he became a sportswriter and later a successful businessman.

Fewer than 30 of the 81 players selected in the first NFL draft ever played in the league. One player who was drafted but did not play in the NFL became a famous college football coach. Paul "Bear" Bryant won more than 300 games at Maryland, Kentucky, Texas A&M and Alabama.

As I said, the first NFL player draft was very different from today's draft. I doubt any of the draft picks will pass up an NFL contract to become a sportswriter!