From Loss to Glory: The 1928 NFL Championship Journey

Are you ready to talk about some NFL Championship games?

Well, we're going to talk about not the games, but how about a championship season for a team that won only one NFL championship and is the last team to win the NFL championship that's not currently in the NFL?

It's all coming up in just a moment.

This is the Pigskin Daily History Dispatch, a podcast that covers the anniversaries of American football events throughout history on a day to day basis.

Your host, Darren Hayes is podcasting from America's North Shore to bring you the memories of the gridiron one day at a time.

So as we come out of the tunnel of the Sports History Network, let's take the field and go no huddle through the portal of positive gridiron history with pigskindispatch.

This podcast is part of the Sports History Network, your headquarters for the yesteryear of your favorite sport.

You can Learn more at sportshistorynetwork.com hello my football friends.

This is Darren Hayes of pigskindispatch.com welcome once again to the Pig Pen, your portal deposit of football history.

And again, we're talking about championships in the National Football League.

We're going through all these championships here in February that are the pre championship title game.

They had plenty of de facto championship games, but not one that's established at the beginning of the season to say hey, these two teams are going to meet and this winner is going to be our champion.

Now the record of the best team team at the end of the season would normally be granted as the championship team at a February or late January meeting of the owners where they would do it by vote.

But normally the team with the best record would have the championship talked about.

But before we get to that, let's talk about that.

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It was a transition time for the NFL too, because it was the ninth season as an organization and a league dropped to just 10 franchises.

But this year, the Duluth Eskimos, the Cleveland Bulldogs, Buffalo Bisons and Rochester Jeffersons were all dropping from the prior year standings.

As mentioned in earlier posts, Duluth played most of their games on the road and a dedicated team of road warriors.

Now this is in fact that their star player, Ernie Nevers, was stepping away from the team.

It sealed the Eskimos franchise's fate.

But Buffalo and Rochester had each sat out the prior season hoping to get a second win, get some finances rolling.

But the cards were not in their favor.

Cleveland didn't disappear.

The franchise was sold and relocated to Eastern Michigan and somewhat morphed into an expansion team called the Detroit Wolverines.

Now, the Wolverines were run by Jimmy Conzelman, who we've talked about multiple times in our books and in, you know, some of these podcasts that we've done.

Jimmy Conzelman a very famous coach and player back then and Conzelman had a very outstanding quarterback in young Benny Friedman and brought some excitement to the game.

We talked about Benny Friedman plenty as when later on when he became a New York Giant.

Now besides losing, the star powers of Nevers and Red Grange also retired from the playing the game.

So kind of a bad time for pro football.

Or was it?

The real story is in the race for the league title that season and what an exciting race it was.

Now the Bears and the Wolverines raced out as early favorites.

Each of them were undefeated after four weeks.

George Hallis team was knocked back A peg on October 21st that season though, when the Green Bay packers defeated them 16 6.

November 3rd saw the first setback for the Detroit Wolverines when they traveled east to play the Yellow Jackets near Philadelphia.

Frankford won that contest handily by the score of 25 7.

That loss was followed up the very next day in a 70 loss to the Steamroller of Providence.

When a smoke cleared that weekend, Providence and Frankfurt sat atop the leaderboard of the league with identical 5:1 records.

In week eight, Pottsville and Frankfurt played a pair of games in a home and home series with the Yellow Jackets victorious with a 190 score at home and a 24 to nothing route on the Maroons home sod while at the Steamroller sat idle.

The following week's games on November 18th featured a big showdown of the eastern powers as Frankfurt traveled to Rhode island in the Cyclodrome to play the steamroller.

10,000 fans packed the stadium and the Cyclodrome was an oval field built for bike racing, but they put a football field in the middle of it, had regular grandstands outside and some fans and some team benches sat on the inside of the bike track as the Gridiron Stars traded blows on the infield.

The defenses of both teams played well and the AP wire described the game as a bitterly fought and a lone score was set up on George Wildcat Wilson's throw to Curly Oden play.

Later, Wildcat Wilson scored on a 35 yard scamper that would be the Only points of the day as Providence won six to nothing, propelling them into first place in the NFL standings.

Now this game was a deciding game in a championship race as a Steamroller would win their next two games.

And here's what Greg had to say about the season.

So.

Well, so in 28, you know, they start the season and they actually lose their second game of the year to the Yellow Jackets.

They blew a fourth quarter lead and lost the Yellow Jackets and that, that ends up turning out to be their only loss of the season.

But they go on a win streak and they get to, oh, I don't know, they're about 2/3 of the way through the season.

And the Yellow Jackets were an interesting team because they were, they were at Frankfurt, which was really part of Philadelphia.

They were in Pennsylvania.

Well, Pennsylvania had blue laws and you couldn't play football on Sundays.

So the Yellow Jackets would play their home games on Saturday and then they would travel to Providence and play the Steamroller on Sunday.

So they had a back to back games in the middle of November and the Steamroller I think were 5, 1 and 1 coming into the games.

And Yellow Jackets were 7 and 1.

They were the two top teams in the NFL.

And so they were playing back to back games and it would go a long way in determining, you know, who the championship of the league was.

Well, on Saturday they're in Frankfurt, places packed, 15,000 standing room only.

And the Yellow Jackets are leading until the fourth quarter, six to nothing.

And then Wildcat Wilson basically carries the ball eight consecutive times, drives 65 yards and ties the game.

And they just barely missed the extra point, but the game ends in a six to six tie.

Then they get on the train and they travel to Providence overnight and play at the Cycle Drum the next day.

Cycle Drum is packed and the Steamroller end up scoring early in the game and go up six nothing and hang on.

Defensively they played a great game and they end up winning six nothing.

And they come out of that game in first place.

And of course in those days, the champion was determined by winning percentage.

And so, you know, they were in first place and so their destiny was in their own control.

So the following week they have the largest crowd in the history of the cyclodrome to play the Giants and they beat the Giants and then they beat Pottsville on Thanksgiving.

And then they go into their final game of the season against the Green Bay packers.

And they have to win or tie.

So even if they tie, they would win the, the NFL championship.

And the games at the cycle drome again, another standing room only crowd.

And there's a tragedy that happens two days before the game.

So the team's all psyched up and the city's all on fire, ready to go for the championship game.

And two days before, Pierce Johnson's mother go shopping in the morning to get.

Because she didn't have enough cereal for her players, for the boys, as she referred to them.

Well, anyway, she gets hit and killed by a streetcar and you know, her son finds out later and then of course, the players do.

Well, it's a devastating blow to the, to the team.

And here they are on the verge of playing for, you know, an NFL championship.

It's a gut punch.

As a reader reading your book too get to that point too.

You're, you build it up quite nicely.

And then, you know, you're, you're picturing Mrs.

Johnson and bananas and cereal scattered under a streetcar somewhere in Providence.

Right, right.

And so, you know, they end up playing the game.

They started slow, they didn't play their best first half, but you know, they found it in, in themselves.

So Green bay takes a 7 nothing lead early in the game and holds that lead until the fourth quarter.

And then again, Wilson and Odin get together and they end up getting a touchdown and Sonenberg kicks the extra point to tie the game seven to seven.

And the game ends in a seven, seven tie.

And then Providence is the NFL champions and the fans didn't want to leave, you know, and the, as the team celebrated on the, on the field, I think I determined as, you know, described it as a bunch of schoolboys, you know, jumping up and down on the field as their, you know, NFL champions.

And then the following day, the seven players that played, that stayed with the Johnsons, the pallbearers for Mrs.

Johnson's funeral.

And that was on, on Monday.

And then Tuesday they had a celebration of the, you know, of the team, a victory banquet, you know, at, at a hotel in downtown Providence at the Hotel Biltmore and celebrated the championship.

What an emotional roller coaster for the, the Pierce family and that team, you know, the, those four like four or five day cycle there of.

Oh yeah.

And you know, and the saddest part is, you know, Pierce Johnson, who was instrumental in the founding of the team, he didn't go to the Green Bay game because he was at the funeral parlor.

And then he didn't go to the, to the banquet because he was still mourning the loss of his, you know, of his mom.

You know, and here's a guy who, you know, help get the team started and you know, was a huge, for a long, long time was a huge advocate of, of football in the state of Rhode Island.

I mean, you know, he's renowned for, for what he did for football in Rhode island for years and years after the Steamroller was gone.

So Greg, why don't we take this opportunity.

Let's give the name of the book and where folks can get it.

Yeah, sure.

So it's called the, the Providence Steamroller, New England's First NFL Team.

It's available online from you know, like all the major, like Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Walmart, Target.

It's available at all those places online.

It is available in a few independent bookstores in Rhode island like Books on the Square, which is in downtown Rhode island or downtown Providence, which is a pretty popular bookstore.

And we are so appreciative that Greg Tranter was able to join us and what a great book that he wrote on there.

So make sure you check that out.

We'll have a link for it here in the show notes of the podcast.

Also you follow what Greg says on the stores that you could buy it on too.

So pretty incredible stuff.

But no worries, there was plenty of good football to be played and exciting right to the finish.

So thanks again to Greg.

Thank you for listening to our podcast.

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And don't forget to check out pigskindispatch.com for the latest in football history and check out some of our items too in our store.

So till next time everybody have a great gridiron day.

Peeking up at the clock the time's running down.

We're going to go into victory formation.

Take a knee and let this baby run out.

Thanks for joining us.

We'll see you back tomorrow.

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