The

1925 Events January * January 1 ** The Syrian Federation is officially dissolved, the State of Aleppo and the State of Damascus having been replaced by the State of Syria. * January 3 – Benito Mussolini makes a pivotal speech in the Itali ...

Chicago Cardinals The professional American football team now known as the Arizona Cardinals previously played in Chicago, Illinois, as the Chicago Cardinals from 1898 to 1959 before relocating to St. Louis, Missouri, for the 1960 through 1987 seasons. Roots ...

season resulted in the Cardinals winning their first NFL championship. The 1925 championship is contested and never awarded by the NFL after the Pottsville Maroons were suspended. The end of the Cardinals season was centered on two historic, but controversial, situations. The first was a team scandal with the

Milwaukee Badgers The Milwaukee Badgers was a professional American football team, based in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, that played in the National Football League from 1922 to 1926. The team played its home games at Athletic Park, later known as Borchert Field, on Mil ...

. The scandal involved a Chicago player,

Art Folz Arthur F. Folz a.k.a. Art Foltz (March 31, 1903 – August 18, 1965) was a professional American football player who played with the Chicago Cardinals of the National Football League (NFL) from 1923 to 1925. He is best known for his role in the 1 ...

, hiring a group of high school football players to play for the Milwaukee Badgers, against the Cardinals. This would ensure an inferior opponent for Chicago. The game was used to help prop up their win–loss percentage and as a chance of wresting the 1925 championship away from the first place

Pottsville Maroons The Pottsville Maroons were an American football team based in Pottsville, Pennsylvania, in the northeastern part of the state. Founded in 1920, they played in the National Football League (NFL) from 1925 to 1928. In 1929 they relocated to Bosto ...

. When NFL president

Joseph Carr Joseph Francis Carr (October 22, 1879 – May 20, 1939) was an American sports executive in American football, baseball, and basketball. He is best known as the president of the National Football League from 1921 until 1939. He was also one of ...

learned high school players had been used in a league game, he told reporters the 58–0 Cardinals win would be stricken from the record. However, the league had never got around to removing it and the game is still a part of the NFL records. Cardinals' owner Chris O'Brien was also fined $1,000 by Carr for allowing his team play a game against high schoolers, even though O'Brien claimed that he was unaware of the players' status. Finally Badgers' owner, Ambrose McGuirk, was ordered to sell his Milwaukee franchise within 90 days. Folz, for his role, was barred from football for life. However, by the summer of 1926, the $1,000 fine against O'Brien was rescinded, probably since the amount would have put the Cardinals out of business. McGuirk though had already sold his Badgers franchise to Johnny Bryan, a fullback with the Chicago Bears. Two of the high school football players used in scandal even earned high school all-star recognition at the end of their season. Art Folz reportedly told the high schoolers that the game was a "practice game" and would in no part affect their amateur status. The Milwaukee scandal did have implications for the 1925 NFL Championship and the second controversy. In December 1925, the Pottsville Maroons had their title removed by the NFL and given to the Cardinals for playing in an unsanctioned game against the Notre Dame All-Stars. To this day, Pottsville residents and supporters still demand to know why Chicago was awarded the title even though they too were found by Carr to have violated the NFL's rules. According to Bob Carroll of the Professional Football Researchers Association, "The Cardinals didn't defy the league", Carroll said. "Pottsville did. It was a great team, but the owner made a mistake." However, it is still not entirely known if O'Brien knew of the high school players on the Badgers team. For his part, Cardinals owner Chris O'Brien refused to accept the championship title for his team. At the owners' meeting after the season was over, he argued that his team did not deserve to take the title over a team which had beaten them fairly. It appears that his reasons for scheduling the Milwaukee and Hammond games had been not to take the title, but rather to convince the cross-town Chicago Bears to play his team again – the Bears, with

Red Grange Harold Edward "Red" Grange (June 13, 1903 – January 28, 1991), nicknamed "the Galloping Ghost" and "the Wheaton Iceman", was an American football halfback for the University of Illinois, the Chicago Bears, and the short-lived New York Yankees ...

in their roster, were a very lucrative draw. The NFL said it would revisit the issue later, but never did. It was only later, under the ownership of

Charles Bidwill Charles W. Bidwill (September 16, 1895 – April 19, 1947), sometimes known as Charley Bidwill, was an owner of the National Football League's Chicago Cardinals. He owned the team for 14 seasons, from 1933 through 1946. Early years Bidwill was ...

and his son Bill Bidwill, that the Cardinals began claiming the championship title.

Regular season

* Game in ''italics'' was against a non-NFL team.

Standings

References

Cardinals on Pro Football Reference
{{DEFAULTSORT:1925 Chicago Cardinals Season

Arizona Cardinals seasons National Football League championship seasons

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