National Football League

See the external Professional Football Researchers Association for more "player named" rules, and background information on how these rules came about. Measurements are made manually at marked locations known as snow courses, and remotely using special scales called snow pillows. The following is a partial list of rules that were enacted largely based on a single player's exploits on the field. Water equivalent is of great interest to water managers wishing to predict spring runoff and the water supply of cities downstream. However, in December 2004, Electronic Arts signed a five-year exclusive agreement with the NFL, meaning only Electronic Arts will publish games featuring NFL team and player names. By late spring, snow densities often exceed 50% of water [1]. Prior to the 2005-2006 football season, other NFL games were produced by competing video game publishers, such as 2K Games and Midway Games. More snow on top of this will compress it even further.

Electronic Arts publishes an NFL video game for current video game consoles and for PCs each year, called Madden NFL, being named after former coach and current football commentator John Madden. New snow often has a density of around 12% of water, and even under cold conditions, the same snow will settle under its own weight until it is approximately 33% water. shifting of franchises from the central city to the suburbs became popular from the 1970s on, though at the turn of the millenium a reverse shift back to the central city became somewhat evident. This is a much more useful measurement to hydrologists than snow depth, as the density of even freshly fallen snow widely varies. Additionally, with the increasing suburbanization of the U.S. For example, if the snow covering a given area has a water equivalent of 20 inches, then it will melt into a pool of water 20 inches deep covering the same area. Louis, each of which eventually received teams some years after their original franchises left. The water equivalent of a snow pack is the amount of water that it contains, regardless of its depth.

While owners invariably cited financial difficulties as the primary factor in such moves, many fans bitterly disputed these contentions, especially in Cleveland, Baltimore and St. The world´s biggest snowcastle is built in Kemi, Finland, every winter. Franchise moves became far more controversial in the late 20th century when a vastly more popular NFL, free from financial instability, allowed many franchises to abandon long-held strongholds for perceived financially greener pastures. Where snow is scarce but the temperature is low enough, snow cannons may be used to produce an adequate amount for such sports. Franchise mergers were popular during World War II in response to the scarcity of players. Forms of recreation dependent on snow:. In the early years, the league was not stable and teams moved frequently. The crystals were not flakes in the usual sense but rather hollow hexagonal prisms.

In 2003, the NFL lauched its own cable-television channel, the NFL Network. The American Meteorological Society has reported that matching snow crystals were discovered by Nancy Knight of the National Center for Atmospheric Research. The league played a regular-season NFL game in Mexico City in 2005 and intends to play more such games in other countries. In a more pragmatic sense, it's more likely, albeit not much more, that a pair of snowflakes are visually identical if their environments were similar enough, either because they grew very near one another, or simply by chance. In 1991, the league formed the World League of American Football, (now NFL Europe), a developmental league now with teams in Germany and the Netherlands. Strictly speaking, it is extremely unlikely for any two objects in the universe to contain an identical molecular structure; but, there are, nontheless, no known scientific laws which prevent it. In recent years, the NFL has expanded into new markets and ventures. However, the concept that no two snowflakes are alike is not necessarily true.

However, the USFL failed to make money and folded after three years. The difference in the environment in scales larger than a snowflake leads to the observed lack of correlation between the shapes of different snowflakes. The USFL was a well-financed competitor with big-name players and a national television contract. This environment is believed to be relatively spatially homogenous on the scale of a single flake, leading to the arms growing to a high level of visual similarity by responding in identical ways to identical conditions, much in the same way that unrelated trees respond to environmental changes by growing near-identical sets of tree rings. The founding of the United States Football League in the early '80s was the biggest challenge to the NFL in the post-merger era. The other explanation, which appears to be the prevalent view, is that the arms of a snowflake grow independently in an environment that is believed to be rapidly varying in temperature, humidity and so on. Rules changes in the late '70s ensured a fast-paced game with lots of passing to attract the casual fan. Surface tension or phonons are among the ways that such communication could occur.

Monday Night Football, which first aired in 1970 brought in high ratings by mixing sports and entertainment. Firstly, there could be communication (information transfer) between the arms, such that growth in each arm affects the growth in each other arm. The Super Bowl became an unofficial national holiday and the top-rated TV program most years. There are, broadly, two possible explanations for the symmetry of snowflakes. In the 1970s and '80s, the NFL solidified its dominance as America's top spectator sport and its important role in American culture. A snowflake always has six lines of symmetry, which arises from the hexagonal crystal structure of ordinary ice (known as ice I_h) along its 'basal' plane. After the merger, the then-renamed Super Bowl became the NFL's championship game. See also: List of Countries receiving snowfall.

Another result of the merger was the creation of an AFL-NFL Championship game that for four years determined the so-called "World Championship of Professional Football". Mount Baker received a staggering 28.96 meters (1,140 in) of snow, thus surpassing the previous record holder, Mount Rainier, Washington, U.S.A which during the 1971–1972 season received 28.5 meters (1,122 in) of snow. The remaining 13 NFL teams became the National Football Conference. The highest seasonally cumulative precipitation of snow ever measured was on Mount Baker, Washington, U.S.A during the 1998–1999 season. The ten AFL teams joined three existing NFL teams to form the NFL's American Football Conference. In areas that normally have very little snow, this may occur even with light accumulation, something often ridiculed by those people accustomed to colder climates, where streets would remain passable given the same amount of snow. By 1966, the leagues agreed to merge as of the 1970 season. This can lead to a "snow day", which is a day on which the school or other services are cancelled due to unusually heavy snowfall.

The ensuing costly war for players between the NFL and AFL almost derailed the sport's ascent. Basic infrastructures such as electricity, telephone lines, and gas supply can also be shut down. It is most likely that if the AFL had never existed, neither would have the Cowboys, the Vikings, or the Falcons. Automotive traffic may be greatly inhibited or may be stifled entirely. The AFL also forced the NFL to expand in order to compete: The Dallas Cowboys were created to drive the AFL's Dallas Texans out of business; the Minnesota Vikings were the NFL franchise given to Max Winter for abandoning the AFL; and the Atlanta Falcons franchise went to Rankin Smith to dissuade him from purchasing the AFL's Miami Dolphins. Substantial snowfall can, at times, even disrupt the infrastructure and services of a region that is accustomed to such weather. The newer league also secured itself financially after it established the precedents for gate and television revenue sharing between all of its teams, and network television broadcasts all of its games. Conversely, many regions of the Arctic and Antarctic receive very little precipitation and therefore experience little snow despite the bitter cold (below a certain temperature, air essentially loses its ability to retain water vapor).

The AFL introduced features that the NFL did not have, such as wider-open passing offenses, flashier uniforms with players' names on their jerseys, and an official clock visible to fans so that they knew the time remaining in a period (the NFL kept time by a game referee's watch, and only periodically announced the actual time). Examples include Mount Kilimanjaro in Tanzania and the Tropical Andes in South America; however, the only snow actually to appear on the Equator is at 4,690 m altitude of the southern slope of Volcán Cayambe in Ecuador (Google Earth images). As more people wanted to cash in on this surge of popularity than the NFL could accommodate, a rival league, the American Football League (AFL), was founded in 1960. As temperature decreases with altitude, high mountains, even near the Equator, have permanent snow cover on their upper portions. The rise of professional football was so fast that by the mid-'60s, it had surpassed baseball as Americans' favorite spectator sport in some surveys. The western coasts of the major continents remain devoid of snow to much higher latitudes. The 1958 NFL championship in New York -- considered by many to be the most-important game in the rise of the NFL -- drew record TV viewership and made national celebrities out of Unitas and his Baltimore Colts teammates. In the latitudinal area closer to the equator, there is a lesser chance of snowfall, 35° N and 40°S are often quoted as a rough delimiter.

The NFL embraced television, giving Americans nationwide a chance to follow stars like Bobby Layne, Paul Hornung and Johnny Unitas. The probability of snowfall varies with season, location, and other geographic factors such as latitude and elevation. In the 1950s, pro football finally earned its place as a major sport. . In 1950, the NFL accepted three teams from the defunct All-America Football Conference, expanding to 13 clubs.
. In 1945, the Cleveland Rams moved to Los Angeles, becoming the first big-league sports franchise on the West Coast. Snow is commonly formed when water vapor undergoes deposition high in the atmosphere at a temperature of less than 0°C (32°F), and then falls to the ground.

The spread of the T formation led to a faster-paced, higher-scoring game that attracted record numbers of fans. It has an open and therefore soft structure, unless packed by external pressure. By the end of World War II, pro football began to rival the college game for fans' attention. Since it is composed of small rough particles it is a granular material. One factor in the league's rising popularity was the institution of an annual championship game in 1933. Snow is precipitation in the form of crystalline water ice, consisting of a multitude of snowflakes. By 1934 all of the small-town teams, with the exception of the Green Bay Packers, had moved to or been replaced by big cities. Making a snow angel.

Yet as former college stars like Red Grange and Benny Friedman began to test the professional waters, the pro game slowly began to increase in popularity. Pygmy chimpanzees have been known to carry snowballs around, but never to throw them.). Franchises included such colorful representatives as the Oorang Indians, an all-Native American outfit that also put on a performing dog show. (Humans seem to be the only being that throw their snowballs. Teams entered and left the league frequently. Throwing snowballs mutually in a snowball fight or at others to tease them. However, the NFL was hardly a major league in the '20s. Building a snowman (or 'snowwoman') or snow fort.

In 1921, the APFA began releasing official standings, and the following year, the group changed its name to the National Football League. Playing with a sled or riding in a sleigh. In the early years, APFA members continued to play non-APFA teams. Many winter sports, such as skiing, snowmobiling, snowshoeing and snowboarding. The group of 11 teams, all but one in the Midwest, was originally less a league than an agreement not to rob other teams' players. Legendary athlete Jim Thorpe was elected president.

The American Professional Football Association was founded in 1920 at a Hupmobile dealership in Canton, Ohio. Over the next few decades, while most attention was paid to football at elite colleges on the East Coast, the professional game spread widely in the Midwest. Professional football in the United States dates at least to 1892, when an athletic club in Pittsburgh paid William "Pudge" Heffelfinger $500 to take part in a game. from Canada in 1874, and then transformed into American college football.

English Association Football or "soccer" developed into rugby, which was imported to the U.S. Like the Amerian college football game from whch it sprung, NFL football is a descendant of the sport nowadays called soccer in the United States. Since then, NFL broadcasts have become among the most-watched programs on American television, and the fortunes of entire networks have rested on owning NFL broadcasting rights. In fact, it was television that brought pro football into prominence in the modern era of technology.

The television rights to pro football are the most lucrative (and most expensive) rights of any sport available. Whites make up the majority of the remaining players, followed by Pacific Islanders, Hispanics, and Asians. Since then, the percentage of black players has increased steadily to its present 2005 level of 69%. In the early 1980s, blacks and whites each made up roughly half of the players.

Increasingly, positions such as tight end, fullback, and linebacker are being filled by blacks. Most quarterbacks, punters, and kickers are white, while almost all running backs, wide receivers, defensive backs, defensive linemen, safeties, punt returners, and kickoff returners are black. In 2005, a slim majority of offensive linemen are white, while no whites are listed as Tailbacks or Cornerbacks on NFL rosters. White running backs, defensive backs, and receivers have become less and less common over the last 25 years.

White skill players have become increasingly rare in the modern NFL, as most positions are filled by blacks. (disputed — see talk page). To this day, the NFL's head-coach hiring policies are questioned, and it has had to institute measures to attempt to have black head coach candidates be treated more equitably. It took until 1988 before a black quarterback started for a Super Bowl team, when Doug Williams won it for the Redskins.

1978 Rose Bowl MVP Warren Moon played for six seasons in the CFL before his abilities finally landed him the starting role with the Houston Oilers. Even after that, for many NFL teams the door would remain closed to black quarterbacks through the 1970s. After that, no old-line NFL team had a black starting quarterback until the Steelers' Joe Gilliam in 1972. The Chicago Bears had a black quarterback in 1953, Willie Thrower, who played in only one game and did not start in any games.

The next year 1969, another American Football League team, the Buffalo Bills were the first professional football team of the modern era to begin the season with a black, James Harris as their starting quarterback. The AFL's Denver Broncos were the first modern-era team to have a black starting quarterback, Marlin Briscoe, who started the fourth game of the 1968 season, and broke pro football rookie records for passing yardage and touchdowns. This action, and pressure by another competing league, the more racially-liberal American Football League, slowly managed to reverse the NFL's racial quotas. Stadium, which was at the time controlled by the United States Department of the Interior, would be voided if he continued to refuse to sign any black players.

Still, Marshall refused to sign black players until threatened with civil rights legal action by the Kennedy administration in 1962, in which it was explained to him that his lease on the then-new D.C. Another theory holds that the NFL, like most of the United States during the Great Depression, simply fired black workers before white workers, but this could hardly account for the league's apparent "all-white" policy during this period. Marshall's policies not only excluded blacks from his Washington Redskins team but may have influenced the entire league to drop blacks until 1946, when pressure from the competing All-America Football Conference induced the NFL to be more liberal in its signing of blacks. The league had a few black players until 1933, one year after entry to the league of George Preston Marshall.

Although the current NFL is well-represented at virtually every position by African-American athletes, that was not always the case. The NFL's current CBA (collective bargaining agreement) expires in 2008. Furthermore, they attribute NFL competitive parity instead to the league's extensive revenue sharing policies. They also note that the salary cap could hypothetically drive prospective athletes to other sports that do not cap the salaries of players; while NFL's large rosters lead to high total payrolls, star players earn more in baseball and basketball (it should however be noted that talent in football does not necessary translate into talent in basketball or baseball, and that star players typically make more money from endorsements than from their team salaries).

Critics of the salary cap note that the driving reason for the cap was to maximize the profitability of the NFL teams, and limit the power of NFL players to command the high salaries they are said to deserve in exchange for bringing in large numbers of paying fans to the stadiums. These concerns, among others, led in part to modified salary cap adoption in the National Basketball Association in 1984 and the National Hockey League in 2005. They claim fans end up paying higher ticket prices to help pay for escalating player salaries. They point to the relative parity of competition that exists in the NFL as of 2005 compared to Major League Baseball as evidence that the NFL salary cap preserves competitive balance.

This has been seen as a problem in American baseball, long dominated since the advent of free agency by large market teams. Proponents of the salary cap note that it prevents a well-financed team in a major city from simply spending giant amounts of money to secure the very best players in every position and thus dominating the entire sport. The cap for the 2005 season is expected to be approximately $85.5 million. For the 2004 season, the NFL's salary cap was $80.582 million, an increase of $5.5 million from 2003.

The cap is determined via a complicated formula based on the revenue that all NFL teams receive during the previous year. Escalating player salaries throughout the 1980s and the advent of free agency in 1992 led to the NFL's adoption of a salary cap in 1994, a maximum amount of money each team can pay its players in aggregate. These numbers are of course exceeded dramatically by the best players in each position. These numbers are set by contract between the NFL and the players' union, the National Football League Players' Association.

Exhibition game minimum is $10,000. The minimum salary for an NFL player is $235,000 in his first year, and rises after that based on the number of years in service. However, these players usually begin as second- or third-string backups, only playing games if the first-stringer is injured, or if there has been a runaway score and the coach decides to put a backup in the game for a little experience, and to ensure his first-stringer does not get injured at the end in a play that is not meaningful to the team. Occasionally a player drafted out of college will go right into a "first-string" position as the team's primary player in that position.

For example, before the draft occurs, Team A might trade its first-round draft pick plus a certain player (who already plays for Team A) to Team B in exchange for another particular player who already plays for Team B. Draft picks are frequently traded in advance for players and other draft picks. Draft picks continue, in the order from the weakest team to the strongest team, and once all teams have picked one player, they all pick again starting with the weakest team. The idea is that weak teams can thereby become strengthened over time, in the specialties where they need strengthening.

That is, the team is the first to select a player from a pool of all eligible college players in the country. The NFL team with the worst record in the previous year gets first pick of the draft. There is a highly organized and formal process called the draft (currently consisting of seven rounds) that takes place over two days in April, in which all NFL teams participate. Many of the USA's college football players want to play in the NFL.

For the history of the process see National Football League championships. The NFL's method for determining its champions has changed over the years. To date, a coin toss has never been used by the league to break a tie. If the teams remain tied after comparing all of these statistics, then the tie is broken using a coin toss.

Other data that is then compared include their record against teams in their division, their record against teams in their conference, their record against common opponents, net points scored, and net touchdowns scored. The first criterion that is always compared first is head-to-head, how the tied teams fared when they played each other during the regular season. The process basically involves comparing a set of each team's season statistics, one record at a time, until one club has a higher value than the others. The tiebreaking rules are also used to help determine playoff seedings and the order in which teams pick in the NFL draft (see below).

As mentioned above, each team's order of finish in their respective divisions (first-place, second-place, etc.) determine the opponents in two of their games during the following season. teams that have the same regular season won-lost-tied record. The league uses a set of rules to break ties in the final season standings, i.e. For example, the Jacksonville Jaguars finished the 2005 regular season with a 12-4 record, but only qualified as a wild card team and thus had to face the New England Patriots, the AFC East division champions with a 10-6 record, at the Patriots' home field, Gillette Stadium.

A major disadvantage that critics cite in the current system is that a divisional winner could host a playoff game against a wild card team that earned a better regular season record. Only the wild card teams played during the first round, while all of the division winners received a bye, automatically advancing to the second round. During that time, three division winners and two wild card teams from each conference qualified for the playoffs. The terms "Wild Card Playoffs" and "Divisional Playoffs" originated from the playoff format that was used before 1990.

The two surviving teams from the Divisional Playoff games meet in Conference Championship games, with the winners of those contests going on to face one another in the Super Bowl. the game is held at the higher seed's home field). And in any given playoff game, whoever has the higher seed gets the home field advantage (i.e. In any given playoff round, the highest surviving seed always plays the lowest surviving seed.

The first and the second seeds from each conference receive a bye in the first round, which entitles these teams to automatically advance to the second round, the Divisional Playoff games (even though the participants may be from different divisions) to face the Wild Card survivors. The third and the sixth seeded teams, and the fourth and the fifth seeds, face each other during the first round of the playoffs, dubbed the Wild Card Playoffs. At the conclusion of each 16-game regular season, six teams from each conference qualify for the playoffs, a single-elimination tournament, which culminates in the Super Bowl:. Festivities and a pre-game concert would kick off the season.

In 2002, the NFL began scheduling a Thursday night special opening game, which would be nationally televised. In addition, it would leave the three-day holiday weekend alone to the opening weekend of college football, preventing conflicts, and maximizing exposure. Television ratings seemed to be sagging due to the holiday, and the stadium crowds were apparently lacking due to vacationing fans and higher average temperatures of early September. In 2001, the NFL decided to move opening week to the weekend after Labor Day.

In 1994, the schedule was changed back to seventeen weeks. In 1993, the league adjusted the schedule to include two bye weeks per team, and the sixteen games were played over eighteen weeks. As a result, opening weekend was moved up to Labor Day weekend. One week during the season, on a rotating basis, each team would have the weekend off.

Each team would play sixteen regular season games over seventeen weeks. In 1990, the NFL introduced a bye-week to the schedule. From 1978-1989, the sixteen games were played over sixteen weeks. In 1978, the league changed the schedule to include sixteen regular season games and four exhibition games.

Teams played six, or even seven exhibition games. Opening weekend typically was the weekend after Labor Day, or even two weekends after Labor Day. From 1961 through 1977, the NFL schedule consisted of fourteen regular season games played over fourteen weeks. Competition from the new league caused the NFL to expand and follow suit with a fourteen-game schedule in 1961.

In 1960, the American Football League began play and introduced a balanced schedule of 14 games per team over a fifteen week season, in which each of the eight teams played each of the other teams twice, with one bye week. From 1947 through 1960, each NFL team played 12 games per season. From 1926 through 1946, they played from eleven to fifteen games per season, depending on the number of teams in the league. In its early years after 1920, the NFL did not have a set schedule, and teams played as few as eight and as many as sixteen games, some against college or other amateur squads.

. Interconference
. Intraconference
.
For the 2006 season, the assignments will be:.

. Interconference
. Intraconference
.
For the 2005 season, the assignments were as follows:.

This formula has been regarded as very successful, rekindling old rivalries while starting new ones, as teams will play in each other's stadiums eventually, which makes for a more consistent and attractive schedule each year. Currently, each team's regular season schedule is set using a pre-determined formula: ^[2]. In 2005, with Christmas falling on a Sunday, the NFL has flipped their normal schedule for that weekend, having the normal slate (less the Sunday night contest) of Sunday games on Saturday (Christmas Eve day), with two nationally televised games on Sunday (Christmas Day), similar to what the NFL did in 1994 with the afternoon games on Saturday, and the primetime games the following two days (Detroit at Miami on Sunday, San Francisco at Minnesota on Monday). For the last three weeks or so of the regular season, after the end of the college football season, the league typically schedules two or three nationally televised games on Saturday afternoons or evenings.

In addition, the Dallas Cowboys and the Detroit Lions each host a game on Thanksgiving Day. In recent years, the league has started scheduling a nationally telecast regular season game on the Thursday night prior to the first Sunday of NFL games to "kickoff" the season. Traditionally, every game is played on Sunday afternoon with the exception of one game per week being played in Sunday night, and another game being played on Monday night. Each team plays 16 games during a 17-week period.

The NFL season begins the weekend after Labor Day. This is especially true of the television networks, which now telecast many exhibition games nationally. The NFL publicity machine has relentlessly called the exhibition games "pre-season" games, to the point where most media have jumped on board and use the same expression. Pro football is so popular that fans pay the price of the exhibition games for the right to have a guaranteed seat during the season.

A judgment in 1974^[1] stated: "No fewer than five lawsuits have been instituted from Dallas to New England, each claiming that the respective National Football League (NFL) team had violated the Sherman Act by requiring an individual who wishes to purchase a season ticket for all regular season games to buy, in addition, tickets for one or more exhibition or preseason games.". Supreme Court, but have failed to change the policy. Such complaints have gone all the way to the U.S. The exhibition games are unpopular with many season ticket holders who point out that regular-season prices are charged for meaningless games, in which teams seldom play their stars and starters for more than a quarter of each game.

Two "featured" exhibition games, the Pro Football Hall of Fame Game and American Bowl, do not count toward the normal allottment of four games, so the four teams playing in those games each end up playing five exhibition games. Summers see most NFL teams playing four "pre-season" exhibition games from early August through early September. . One week later, selected all-star players from both the AFC and NFC meet in the Pro Bowl, currently held in Hawaii.

This game is held at a pre-selected site which is usually a city that hosts an NFL team or a popular college stadium. At the end of each regular season, six teams from each conference play in the NFL playoffs, a 12-team single-elimination tournament that culminates with the NFL championship, the Super Bowl. During the league's regular season, each team plays 16 games over a 17-week period generally from September to December. The divisions are labeled East, West, North, and South; the teams do not consistently follow geographic boundaries as the NFL wanted to keep certain rivalries intact.

Each conference is then further divided into four divisions consisting of four teams each. Currently, the league's 32 teams are divided into two conferences: the American Football Conference (AFC) and the National Football Conference (NFC). After the 1958 NFL Championship Game (which went into overtime), the NFL's greatest spurt in popularity came in the 1960s and 1970s with the merger of the rival American Football League, or AFL (1960-1969). Prior to the 1960s, the most popular version of American football was played collegiately.

The NFL is one of the major professional sports leagues of North America. The league was formed in 1920 as the American Professional Football Association, which adopted the name "National Football League" in 1922. The National Football League (NFL) is the largest professional American football league, consisting of thirty-two teams from American cities and regions. ^  NFL scheduling formula at NFL.com.

^  Examples of Exhibition Game Lawsuits. Walter Payton Man of the Year Award. NFL Comeback Player of the Year. Super Bowl MVP.

Defensive Rookie of the Year. Offensive Rookie of the Year. Defensive Player of the Year. Offensive Player of the Year.

Coach of the Year. Most Valuable Player. Halas Trophy. George S.

Lamar Hunt Trophy. Vince Lombardi Trophy. Enacted in 2005. the Roy Williams rule -- no horse-collar tackles.

the Peyton Manning rule -- basically more emphasis on the Mel Blount rule after the New England Patriots committed several uncalled pass interference penalties in the 2003 AFC Championship game against the Indianapolis Colts. the Terrell Owens rule -- no "foreign objects" on a player's uniform (enacted in response to the 2002 "Sharpie™ incident"). Enacted due to a play in the 1999 NFC Championship Game, where Emanuel, playing for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers had a catch ruled incomplete since the ball touched the ground. the Bert Emanuel rule -- the ball can touch the ground during a completed pass as long as the receiver maintains control of the ball.

Another rule, resulting in offensive pass interference, prohibiting WRs to push off CBs, is also often called "the Michael Irvin rule.". the Michael Irvin rule -- no taunting. Enacted in 1978. the Mel Renfro rule -- allows a second player on the offense to catch a tipped ball, without a defender subsequentlly touching it.

Enacted in current form in 1978. the Mel Blount rule -- Officially known as defensive pass interference, defensive backs can only make contact with receivers within five yards of the line of scrimmage. Enacted in 1956. the Lou Groza rule -- no artificial medium to assist in the execution of a kick.

Enacted in 1981. the Lester Hayes rule -- no Stickum™ allowed. A Defensive player can recover and advance at any time of play.Enacted in 1979. the Ken Stabler rule -- on fourth down or any down in the final two-minutes of play, if a player fumbles, only the fumbling player can recover and/or advance the ball.

Enacted in 1965. the Fran Tarkenton rule -- a line judge was added as the sixth official to ensure that a back was indeed behind the line of scrimmage before throwing a forward pass. the Erik Williams rule -- no hands to the facemask by offensive linemen. Enacted in 1997.

the Emmitt Smith Rule -- no taking your helmet off on the field of play. (There is also a college football rule with this nickname.). Enacted after Deion Sanders signed with the Dallas Cowboys in 1995 for a minimum salary and a $13 million signing bonus. the Deion Sanders rule -- Player salary rule which correlates a contract's signing bonus with its yearly salary.

Enacted in 1977. the Deacon Jones Rule -- no head-slapping. Prior to this rule change a player had to be five yards behind the line of scrimmage to throw a forward pass.. Enacted in 1933.

the Bronko Nagurski Rule -- forward passing made legal from anywhere behind the line of scrimmage. The clock didn't stop and New England won. Enacted in 2002 after the Patriots' kicker won Super Bowl XXXVI on a last second kick that went through with three seconds remaining on the clock. the Adam Vinatieri Rule -- the clock stops immediately after a field goal is kicked through the uprights.

Current NFL players. List of American football players. New York, New York (1960-present). Philadelphia, Pennsylvania (1946-1960).

Chicago, Illinois (1941-1946). Columbus, Ohio (1921-1941). Canton, Ohio (1920-1921). Commissioner Paul Tagliabue (1989-present).

Commissioner Alvin "Pete" Rozelle (1960-1989). Interim President Austin Gunsel (1959-1960, following death of Bell). Commissioner Bert Bell (1946-1959). Commissioner Elmer Layden (1941-1946).

President Carl Storck (1939-1941). President Joseph Carr (1921-1939). President Jim Thorpe (1920). Two wild card qualifiers (those non-division champions with the conference's best won-lost-tied percentages), which are seeded five and six.

The four division champions from each conference (the team in each division with the best regular season won-lost-tied record), which are seeded one through four based on their regular season won-lost-tied record. The Super Bowl bye week was removed to accommodate the longer, expanded playoffs. In the 1982 strike-shortened season, a postseason tournament replaced the traditional playoff format. By the 2003 season, the bye week was restored.

As a result, Super Bowl XXXVI had to be delayed after the league postponed the second week's games following the September 11 attacks. In the 2001 season, the bye week disappeared when the league moved opening weekend a week later. In the 1999 season, the bye week was removed to accommodate the schedule being moved ahead one week. In the 1993 season, there was no bye week since the regular season consisted of eighteen weekends.

In the 1990 season, there was no bye, as the league was still adjusting the schedule from adding the bye week during the season. For most years, there has been an open weekend between the Conference Championship games and the Super Bowl. By moving the season a week later, the NFL hoped to prevent teams traveling complications. The Year 2000 problem sparked travel concerns for the final week of the season, and playoffs.

In 1999, the NFL moved the first week of the season one week later due to the conflict with January 1, 2000. NFC West. AFC West v. NFC East.

AFC South v. NFC South. AFC North v. NFC North.

AFC East v. NFC West. NFC North v. NFC South.

NFC East v. AFC West. AFC North v. AFC South.

AFC East v. NFC East. AFC West v. NFC West.

AFC South v. NFC North. AFC North v. NFC South.

AFC East v. NFC South. NFC North v. NFC West.

NFC East v. AFC South. AFC North v. AFC West.

AFC East v. The second-place, third-place, and fourth-place teams in a conference are matched in the same way each year: one at home, and one on the road. These games match a first-place team against the first-place teams in the two same-conference divisions the team is not scheduled to play that season. Each team plays two games versus two teams within its conference based on the prior year's standings.

Each team plays the four teams from a division in the other conference on a rotating four-year cycle: two at home, and two on the road (four games). Each team plays the four teams from another division within its conference on a rotating three-year cycle: two at home, and two on the road (four games). Each team plays every other team in their division twice: once at home, and once on the road (six games).