By Darin The origins of this very first, New York Yankees pro football franchise, and there were several who used the name, predating their NFL entry by one year. The Yankees were the brainchild of Charles CC Pyle, whose original intent was to be a member of the NFL. CC Pyle held the controlling rights to Red Grange’s contract and decided to try to replicate the Chicago Bears’ success on their barnstorming tour in the early 1926 season. Pyle figured that Grange would be a crowd magnet for a Yankees tour. The New York Giants’ exclusive territorial rights to New York allowed Commissioner Joe Carr to block Pyle’s attempt to join the NFL.
Chicago Tribune, October 17, 1927, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.
The 1925 NFL Dispute and the Rise of the AFL
The Pottsville Maroons and the Frankford Yellow Jackets established this precedent during the 1925 season. Their dispute stemmed from an exhibition contest between the Maroons and a Notre Dame alumni all-star team. As a result, the NFL suspended the Pottsville franchise and crowned the Chicago Cardinals the 1925 champions.
Having already leased Yankee Stadium for 1926, C.C. Pyle brashly started his own league—the first of four to bear the name American Football League. Perhaps out of spite, Pyle established a second franchise in New York: the Brooklyn Horsemen.
The Horsemen and the Lions merged midseason, and the Yankees, despite Grange’s drawing power, had difficulty attracting large crowds on the road, and several franchises dropped out before the scheduled conclusion.
In a postseason exhibition at Yankee Stadium, the NFL’s fifth-place Giants team humbled the AFL champion Philadelphia Quakers 31 – 0. Shortly afterward, this first edition of the AFL officially closed.
The NFL admitted the Yankees franchise, featuring Red Grange, for the 1927 season, stipulating that their home contests could not conflict with the Giants’ schedule. Because of the public-relations power of Grange’s stardom, the public referred to the team as Red Grange’s Yankees.
The ’27 Yankees featured Grange at halfback quarterback, while Wild Bill Kelly from Montana and former Penn State star guard Mike Michalske filled out the star-studded roster. The lineup also included a 26-year-old Verne Lewellan and Red Badgro.
The Philadelphia Inquirer, via Wikimedia Commons.
The 1927 Yankees were a competitive team with a winning record for most of the season. Ironically, Grange injured his knee during a home victory over his former team, the Bears, and missed several games. He was in the lineup for a home-and-home series against the Giants to close out the season. As their rivals from the Polo Grounds swept on their way to the NFL title, Grange played in 118 of a possible 120 minutes on poor fields in those two Giant contests.
The first game was played in the snow, and the second in torrential rain that reduced the field to a muddy quagmire. Red Grange sat out the 1928 season to rehabilitate that knee, and without the start of track fans, the Yankees struggled and folded for good after the season ended. Grange returned to Chicago in 1929, where he played until his retirement in 1933.
The research on the Yanks comes from Larry Schmidt at gridironuniforms.com, who shared it with us back in 2020.
Be sure to check out the great research and display of uniforms at gridironuniforms.com, which covers most of the teams that have ever played the game professionally.
You can learn more about Red Grange and C.C. Pyle in other articles here on the site or through the book, Red Grange & Chicago Bears 1925-1926 Barnstorming Tour: 100th Anniversary Scrapbook by Chris Willis, with contributions by Darin Hayes of Pigskin Dispatch.