The National Football League (NFL) is the top professional league in the United States for American football. The NFl is the most popular professional sports league in the United States, and the Super Bowl is often the most watched television event of the year. Here are 12 incredible facts about the NFL that you won’t believe are true.

1) After the AFL/NFL merger, no one could agree on a realignment plan for the NFC. So how was it determined? The five best plans were put into a vase and Pete Rozelle’s secretary selected one at random.

2) Jerry Rice and Brett Favre are about as durable of a football player as you can ask for. They are the only non-kickers to play in over 300 games.

3) Most people associate NFL football with Sunday. However, there has actually been games played on every day of the week in the modern NFL. A game was played on a Tuesday because of a Pennsylvania blizzard. A game was played on Wednesday because the NFL moved the Washington-New York Thursday night season opener so that it would not overlap with John McCain’s speech at the Republican convention. Games that were played on a Friday were either due to Christmas or New Year’s.

4) Steve Young is the only left-handed quarterback to be inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame.

5) Back in 1962, CBS paid $4.65 million for the first exclusive rights to broadcast NFL games, a small fraction of what it costs for these rights today. Fox Network pays a reported $1.15 billion per year to broadcast NFC games.

6) In 1992, the National Football League experimented with two bye weeks.

7) Emmitt Smith won the rushing title during the 1993 season, despite missing the first two games because of a contract dispute.

8) There have been a lot of team names in the NFL that have come and gone. Some of the team names that no longer exist include the All-Americans, Celts, Reds, Panhandles, Triangles, Heralds, Eskimos, Yellowjackets, Colonels, Marines, Tornadoes, Maroons, Jeffersons, Gunners, Stapes, and Maroons.

9) The Indianapolis Colts won an impressive 23-straight regular-season games spanning the 2008 and 2009 seasons.

10) There is only one quarterback in NFL history that has an undefeated record in multiple playoff starts. Frank Reich went 2-0 in relief of Jim Kelly back in 1993. One of the games includes one of the biggest comeback of all time.

11) There have been a total of 373 sets of brothers who have played in the NFL. Since the merger, the Browner family holds the record for most brothers in the NFl with a total of four. Eli and Peyton Manning are the only brothers to both win the Super Bowl MVP.

12) NFL Players were not required to wear helmets until the 1943 season.

 

Information courtesy of USA Today