Football Facts

During WWII, because a lot of players were called to duty, the Pittsburgh Steelers and Philadelphia Eagles combined to become The Steagles.

Before 1910, football teams were penalized 15 yards for an incomplete forward pass—a rule so harsh it nearly killed the forward pass before it could revolutionize the game.

The Pittsburgh Steelers were originally called the Pirates.

In the 2004 Harvard-Yale game, Yale students tricked thousands of Harvard fans into holding up cards that together spelled out "WE SUCK."

Everton FC used to be called St Domingo's FC!

In England, there's a phenomenon called the "half-time kettle effect" where power use surges at half-time during England's matches in the World Cup as everyone turns on their tea kettles at the same time.

Four months before England hosted the 1966 World Cup, the Jules Rimet Trophy was taken from a London exhibition. A week later, a mongrel named Pickles sniffed out a newspaper-wrapped package in a south London hedge - and returned the trophy to the nation. Corbett collected a £6,000 reward. Pickles got invited to the victory banquet.

Homer Jones had just caught his first NFL touchdown in 1965, an 89-yard catch for the Giants, and he planned to throw the ball into the stands. A new league rule fined players for doing exactly that, so at the goal line he changed his mind and slammed the ball into the turf instead. The Giants credit him with inventing the spike, and it remains an NFL touchdown celebration.

The Herkie is the cheer jump: one leg kicked straight out, the other bent back. It started as a flub. Dallas teenager Lawrence Herkimer went up for a clean split jump and missed. "It was just a poor split jump," he said later. "I don't like to tell people that." The jump took his name anyway. Squads still throw it every Friday night.

Philip Rivers, an eight-time Pro Bowl quarterback, has coached a high school team in Fairhope, Alabama since 2021. In December 2025 the Colts signed him off that sideline at 44 and he started three games. In January he interviewed for the Bills head coaching job, then withdrew. He is back coaching high-school football in Fairhope this fall.

A year after the April 2011 tornadoes hit Alabama, Bo Jackson got on a bicycle. He rode 300 miles in five days through the tornado-hit towns. It became Bo Bikes Bama and ran for 14 years, through 2025. More than 10,750 riders joined it. The money rebuilt homes and paid for dozens of community storm shelters across the state.

The Goodyear Blimp has floated over college football since the 1955 Rose Bowl. Over the 64 years that followed, it covered more than 2,000 games. In January 2019, the College Football Hall of Fame gave it an honorary induction. More than 1,300 people are enshrined there. The blimp is still the only member who isn't human. Fans still watch the sky to see if a game is a big one.

A man bet $50,000 that someone would streak at Super Bowl LV - then streaked himself. Yuri Andrade sprinted onto the field in a hot pink swimsuit and expected to collect about $374,000 across multiple Bovada accounts at +750 odds. The sportsbook connected the linked accounts and voided every bet. He paid a fine, did 100 hours community service, and wrote an apology letter to the NFL. He netted negative money.

Tom Brady was drafted by the Montreal Expos as a catcher in the 1995 MLB Draft. The scout ranked him a late second-round talent but placed him in round 18 - they knew his Michigan football scholarship made him impossible to sign. Brady chose football and won seven Super Bowls. Asked where baseball would have led, Brady said: "I would be selling insurance."

Terry Crews worked as a courtroom sketch artist in Flint before the NFL. He won a scholarship to study at the Interlochen Arts Academy. He then entered Western Michigan on an art scholarship, before switching to football. When teams cut him from NFL rosters, he painted portraits of teammates - charging $5,000 each. The muscle-bound action star is a trained, photorealistic portrait artist.

Every October, Texas and Oklahoma play their biggest football rivalry at a state fair. Carnival rides spin outside the Cotton Bowl in Dallas. More than 92,000 fans pack the stands. Tickets split 50-50 at the 50-yard line. Oklahoma's crimson fills one side, Texas's burnt orange fills the other. Locked in at the fair through 2036. Half crimson, half orange, every October.

The Lambeau Leap is Green Bay's touchdown ritual: score, then dive into the stands. It began by accident on Dec. 26, 1993: Reggie White scooped a fumble, lateraled to LeRoy Butler, who scored and leaped into the crowd. Replays later showed White stepped out of bounds before the toss. The NFL banned celebrations in 2000 and 2014 but kept the Leap. Nearly every Packers touchdown at Lambeau still ends there.

The football huddle is credited to one deaf quarterback hiding his hands. In 1894, Gallaudet played a game against another deaf team. Quarterback Paul Hubbard called plays in sign language, open for anyone to read. So he had his teammates circle up tight before every snap. That circle became the huddle, copied by teams everywhere. Teams still huddle up today, from Friday night lights to the NFL, 132 years later.