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|  | NOVEMBER 24, 2004
By Mike Brewster Pete Rozelle: The NFL's MVP During his 29-year run as commissioner, he built the league into a powerhouse, topped by the annual Super Bowl extravaganza Recent challenges to the National Football League's supremacy have produced more unintentional comedy than athletic drama. Back in 1983, U.S. Football League officials were certain that fans would rather watch the game on hot, sunny July afternoons than go to the beach. Wrong. Then, in 2001, a star running back for the XFL, another would-be contender, wore the phrase "He Hate Me" on the back of his jersey, thinking that the angry cry against the world would resonate with young fans. Wrong again. In the past two decades, the USFL, XFL, not to mention the World Football League and World League of American Football, have all come and gone. But in the autumn of 1959, the NFL had just 12 franchises, and it was fighting for its survival in the face of the newly launched, eight-team American Football League (AFL). When NFL Commissioner Bert Bell died of a sudden heart attack at Philadelphia's historic Franklin Field in a late October game between the Pittsburgh Steelers and the Philadelphia Eagles, the league was thrown into disarray. SURPRISE MERGER. The subsequent, critical NFL owner's meeting to elect a new commissioner resulted in a deadlock after 22 different votes. On the 23rd ballot and 7th day of the meetings, Pete Rozelle, the 33-year-old general manager of the Los Angeles Rams, was elected as a compromise choice (he was famously in the men's room when he learned of his election). In the war against the upstart AFL, the NFL owners clearly figured Rozelle would be their pawn. But the new commissioner surprised his benefactors and belied his inglorious start by formulating his own strategy to checkmate the AFL, eventually forcing the rival league to overspend on draft picks and finally merge its teams into the NFL in 1967. Rozelle even initiated a series of clandestine meetings regarding the merger that left many NFL owners drop-jawed in surprise when the deal was announced. Over the next two decades, Rozelle brought a CEO's management style to his self-appointed task of changing America's "national pastime" from baseball to football. He created the Super Bowl, negotiated the most lucrative TV contract in sports, and cemented a devoted nationwide TV audience with vehicles like Monday Night Football. And perhaps most important for the league's long term health, the mild-mannered Rozelle somehow convinced some of the richest and most powerful owners in sports to accept revenue sharing, a parity-inducing watershed that other sports have proven unable to emulate on the same scale. LOW MOMENT. Alvin Ray Rozelle was born on Mar. 1, 1926, in South Gate, Calif., and grew up in Lynwood, a suburb of Los Angeles. His father's grocery store failed during the Depression, and Rozelle did odd jobs to help support the family. After a stint in the Pacific in World War II, he attended the University of San Francisco, where he started to work as a publicity director for the athletic department. He graduated in 1950 and became the assistant athletic director. Soon, it was on to the Rams, where he rose to be the youngest general manger in the league. Rozelle's 29-year tenure as NFL commissioner was defined by pitched battles against many formidable adversaries. One former AFL executive in particular -- Oakland Raiders owner Al Davis -- served as Rozelle's chief nemesis. Davis dealt Rozelle the worst defeat of his career when a jury ruled in 1982 that Davis could move his Raiders to Los Angeles. When the team went on to win the Super Bowl that year and Rozelle had to hand the Lombardi trophy to a gloating Davis, it was one of Rozelle's lowest moments. Much more common, though, were victories. Two NFL work stoppages in the 1980s, for example, did little to hurt the league's reputation because Rozelle saved the playoffs and Super Bowl both times. In contrast, it took years for Major League Baseball to recover from the cancellation of the 1992 World Series due to a strike. And when the USFL brought a $1.6 billion antitrust suit against the NFL, the upstart was awarded just $3 in damages, putting it out of business forever. After he retired in 1989 and before his death in 1996 of brain cancer, Rozelle often said it was the growth of the Super Bowl for which he wants to be remembered. It's easy to see why. That game is the ultimate showcase for a league that wasn't predestined to succeed, but did so largely through the marketing and management genius of one man.  As part of its 75th anniversary celebration, BusinessWeek is presenting a series of weekly profiles for the greatest innovators of the past 75 years, from science to government. BusinessWeek Online is joining in by adding more online-only profiles of The Great Innovators. In late September, 2004, BusinessWeek will publish a special commemorative issue on Innovation Brewster is a New York-based writer
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