The NFL is one of the most successful sports businesses in history. With annual revenues hovering between $13 and $14 billion dollars, it is in many ways an unparalleled juggernaut. But when the NFL’s first game was played in Akron, OH in 1920, it wasn’t nearly as popular as college football, and there were plenty of people who thought the five owners who formed the league were destined for failure.
In his latest book, John Eisenberg chronicles the rivalry and the cooperation between those five owners -- Art Rooney, George Halas, Tim Mara, George Preston Marshall, and Bert Bell -- that set the stage for the NFL to grow to its present-day gargantuan proportions.
Eisenberg is a columnist for BaltimoreRavens.com, and the author of nine books. His latest is The League: How Five Rivals Created the NFL and Launched a Sports Empire. He'll be discussing his book tonight at 7:00pm at the Ivy Bookshop on Falls Road in North Baltimore.
Now, John Eisenberg joins Tom in Studio A.
