Professional Football Researchers Association Forum

Webster defines semiprofessional as "engaging in an activity for pay or gain but not as a full-time occupation." But wouldn't this definition make the early NFL a "semiprofessional" league instead of a professional league? In PFRA parlance, what is the guidance for using the term semiprofessional when referring to teams or leagues?

I have often wondered how the game in which I played would be classified.

I think of it as "sandlot" but we often had semi-pro players (guys who actually got paid to play!?) and college players, especially during their "off-season." When they weren't playing college or semi-pro they would come out and play with us to keep in "football condition." And, of course, many of our regulars had played in high school or college.

Then again, there were other weeks when we had only a handful of scrubs and ne'er-do-wells...

Still, when we were at our best we (probably) could have beat many local "semi-pro" and college teams... and we did handily defeat San Francisco's City College team in one of the years they were J.C. Champions (but they were playing by our rules, on our field).

I never "laced up the pads" but I played in hundreds and hundreds of games... but was it "football?"

There's also the difference between semipro of decades ago and what gets called "semipro" now -- a lot of differences, including quality of leagues/owners/coaches/players. Modern/Now it's paying to play and just saying you're a "semipro." At least in all the areas where I'm familiar with it. It's pay to play with the very rare "you're good so we'll waive the fee" and play for free, but also not getting paid anything. Perhaps somewhere in the country someone is being paid instead of paying to play at the so-called semiprofessional level.

Even as late as the 70s, many players kept "regular" jobs while toiling on the gridiron, sometimes even during the time of year when football was being played. Until the days of big salaries, these guys knew they had to have something either to fall back on in case football didn't pan out, or to move on to once their careers were over. So even though they were pro football players, the game was not necessarily the occupation that sustained them.

I recall around 1971 some professors at Vanderbilt were criticizing the emphasis on football. They thought Vanderbilt should leave the SEC. Among other things, they said teams at Georgia, Alabama, and Tennessee were "semiprofessional."

RyanChristiansen wrote:Webster defines semiprofessional as "engaging in an activity for pay or gain but not as a full-time occupation." But wouldn't this definition make the early NFL a "semiprofessional" league instead of a professional league? In PFRA parlance, what is the guidance for using the term semiprofessional when referring to teams or leagues?

For the PFRA definition, I guess I'd go by how Bob Carroll described the standards of the early days in his article about why Pudge Heffelfinger (instead of John Brallier) was the first pro football player instead of a semi-pro.
http://www.profootballresearchers.com/a ... easons.pdf

Here's part of it, about the standards in 1892:
"Actually, even under the suspicious eyes of the A.A.U., athletes were permitted more than friendly pats for their exertions. Some guidelines grew out of two cases on opposite sides of the country. In 1890, the San Francisco Olympic A.C. was accused by a rival club of enticing athletes to jump to its ranks with offers of jobs. After investigating, the A.A.U. ruled that the Olympics' practice was not actually professionalism but only a "semi" form of it, thus inventing the term "semi-pro," which led to countless snickers about 'semipregnant.'

Although the A.A.U. didn't like the idea very much, it decided that clubs could indeed offer employment without losing
their amateur status or compromising the athlete. In other words, if you paid a fellow $20 a week to cut your grass and $20 a game to play football, he was a professional; if you paid him $40 a week to cut your grass and he also played on your football team, he was an amateur.

Meanwhile, the Orange A.C. in New Jersey came under fire for the expensive trophies it doled out to gridders at the end of each season. The A.A.U. wrestled with this one until 1892 when it passed a rule outlawing any kind of trophy except a banner, not to exceed twenty-five cents in cost. "

It's really annoying when people who don't know any better use it to describe minor PROFESSIONAL leagues like the Continental Football League.

TodMaher wrote:It's really annoying when people who don't know any better use it to describe minor PROFESSIONAL leagues like the Continental Football League.

Yes! What he said.

Mark L. Ford wrote:
Although the A.A.U. didn't like the idea very much, it decided that clubs could indeed offer employment without losing
their amateur status or compromising the athlete. In other words, if you paid a fellow $20 a week to cut your grass and $20 a game to play football, he was a professional; if you paid him $40 a week to cut your grass and he also played on your football team, he was an amateur.

"

Was there ever a football equivalent of the Industrial Basketball League of the 1940s and 50s? They played very competitive basketball and hired quite a few college stars who chose to play for them rather than the NBA. Yet they maintained their amateur standing and furnished many Olympic basketball players.

John Grasso wrote: Was there ever a football equivalent of the Industrial Basketball League of the 1940s and 50s? They played very competitive basketball and hired quite a few college stars who chose to play for them rather than the NBA. Yet they maintained their amateur standing and furnished many Olympic basketball players.

I guess the football equivalent would have been the "service teams" that were operated by the Army and the Air Force during the Cold War, in case someone wanted to maintain their college eligibility if they didn't get a student deferment.