Super Bowl 0 - What if?

Jay Z
Posts: 937
Joined: Sun Oct 12, 2014 7:42 pm
Location: Madison WI

Re: Super Bowl 0 - What if?

Post by Jay Z »

One thing that hurt the AFL in its early years was the weaker situations in Denver, New York, and Oakland. Since the AFL wasn't raiding the NFL veterans, no one should expect the 1960 AFL to be of equal strength. The falloff perhaps wasn't as bad because I think all sports had seen a postwar expansion in available talent; Unitas wasn't the only one to fall through the cracks in the second half of the 1950s.

So the veteran base isn't going to be the same, but average player's career only lasts 4 years, you're effectively turning over a lot of roster in 4 years. The AFL having weaker rosters to start with arguably ought to have more rookies making the teams and contributing. But until Oakland, New York, and Denver got shored up, the league as a whole was a bit behind the NFL in bringing in top rookie talent. I think in 1963 this was still something of an issue.
Post Reply