NFL Properties
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NFL Properties is the merchandising and licensing arm of the
National Football League The National Football League (NFL) is a Professional gridiron football, professional American football league in the United States. Composed of 32 teams, it is divided equally between the American Football Conference (AFC) and the National ...
(NFL). The subsidiary of the league was founded in 1963 to maintain control of the brands of the league and its franchises and to license and negotiate with vendors to create official NFL merchandise. The NFL Properties head office is located in
New York City New York, often called New York City (NYC), is the most populous city in the United States, located at the southern tip of New York State on one of the world's largest natural harbors. The city comprises five boroughs, each coextensive w ...
.


Team NFL Heroes "mascot" program

A line of
mascot A mascot is any human, animal, or object thought to bring luck, or anything used to represent a group with a common public identity, such as a school, sports team, university society, society, military unit, or brand, brand name. Mascots are als ...
-like characters representing each team in the NFL was developed by NFL Properties in the early 1990s. Named "Team NFL Heroes", various types of merchandise such as stuffed dolls, school supplies, t-shirts, and lamps featuring the characters were manufactured and marketed mainly to children and teenagers. Mascot costumes of each character were created and people wearing these costumes made an appearance at the
1995 1995 was designated as: * United Nations Year for Tolerance * World Year of Peoples' Commemoration of the Victims of the Second World War This was the first year that the Internet was entirely privatized, with the United States government ...
Pro Bowl The National Football League All-Star Game (1939–1942), Pro Bowl (1951–2022), or Pro Bowl Games (since 2023) is an annual event held by the National Football League (NFL) featuring the league's All-star, star players. The format has changed ...
.
Pictures of the costumes at the game can be seen online.
Most of the Team NFL Heroes characters only lasted a season or two but a handful ended up being adopted as official mascots by their respective teams, either immediately after the Team NFL Heroes project was canceled or years later; Revere, the
New England Patriots The New England Patriots are a professional American football team based in the Greater Boston area. The Patriots compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member of the American Football Conference (AFC) AFC East, East division. The Pa ...
Team NFL Hero (name later changed to Pat Patriot after becoming the team's live mascot), is an example of the former while
Miles The mile, sometimes the international mile or statute mile to distinguish it from other miles, is a British imperial unit and United States customary unit of length; both are based on the older English unit of length equal to 5,280 English f ...
the
Denver Broncos The Denver Broncos are a professional American football team based in Denver. The Broncos compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member of the American Football Conference (AFC) AFC West, West division. The team is headquartered in E ...
Team NFL Hero is an example of the latter. During the Team NFL Heroes campaign the
Green Bay Packers The Green Bay Packers are a professional American football team based in Green Bay, Wisconsin. The Packers compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member of the National Football Conference (NFC) NFC North, North division. They ar ...
had a
bear Bears are carnivoran mammals of the family (biology), family Ursidae (). They are classified as caniforms, or doglike carnivorans. Although only eight species of bears are extant, they are widespread, appearing in a wide variety of habitats ...
for a mascot despite their arch rivals being the
Chicago Bears The Chicago Bears are a professional American football team based in Chicago. The Bears compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member of the National Football Conference (NFC) NFC North, North division. They are one of two remaining ...
. Specifically a
polar bear The polar bear (''Ursus maritimus'') is a large bear native to the Arctic and nearby areas. It is closely related to the brown bear, and the two species can Hybrid (biology), interbreed. The polar bear is the largest extant species of bear ...
, the Packers' Team NFL Hero's name was "Bayer", a play on Green Bayer (meaning a citizen of
Green Bay, Wisconsin Green Bay is a city in Brown County, Wisconsin, United States, and its county seat. It is located at the head of Green Bay (Lake Michigan), Green Bay (known locally as "the bay of Green Bay"), a sub-basin of Lake Michigan at the mouth of the F ...
) while simultaneously being a
homonym In linguistics, homonyms are words which are either; '' homographs''—words that mean different things, but have the same spelling (regardless of pronunciation), or '' homophones''—words that mean different things, but have the same pronunciat ...
of "bear".


Comic books

The NFL branched out into comic books in the early 1990s when
Marvel Comics Marvel Comics is a New York City–based comic book publishing, publisher, a property of the Walt Disney Company since December 31, 2009, and a subsidiary of Disney Publishing Worldwide since March 2023. Marvel was founded in 1939 by Martin G ...
created the character
NFL SuperPro ''NFL SuperPro'' is a comic book series published by Marvel Comics, centered on Phillip "Phil" Grayfield, an ex-National Football League (NFL) player who survives a freak accident and wears a near-indestructible football uniform. Produced in coll ...
. The comic book and character was widely panned and only 12 issues of the comic book were printed. The NFL also promoted SuperPro at some events by using a mascot.


Video games

Long before video games, The National Football League began licensing Electric Football in 1967. The Game was produced by Tudor Games. There have been several American football video games based on NFL teams created for various consoles and computers over the years, from NFL Pro League by Micro Sports Inc. to
10-Yard Fight is a 1983 American football video game developed and published by Irem for arcades. It was published overseas by Taito in the Americas, by Electrocoin in Europe, and by ADP Automaten GmbH in West Germany. Gameplay ''10-Yard Fight'' is viewe ...
and the
Tecmo Bowl is a 1987 American football video game developed and published by Tecmo for arcades. The game features a large dual screen cabinet with up to four players between two fictitious teams. A port for the Nintendo Entertainment System was release ...
series for the
NES The Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) is an 8-bit home video game console developed and marketed by Nintendo. It was first released in Japan on 15 July 1983 as the and was later released as the redesigned NES in several test markets in the ...
to the more well known Madden series that have been released annually since 1988. The Madden series is named after former coach and American football commentator
John Madden John Earl Madden (April 10, 1936 – December 28, 2021) was an American professional football coach and sports commentator in the National Football League (NFL). He served as the head coach of the Oakland Raiders from 1969 to 1978, leading them ...
. Prior to the 2005–2006 football season, other NFL games were produced by competing
video game publisher A video game publisher is a company that publishes video games that have been developed either internally by the publisher or externally by a video game developer. They often finance the development, sometimes by paying a video game developer ...
s, such as
2K Games 2K is an American video game publisher based in Novato, California. The company was founded as a subsidiary of Take-Two Interactive in January 2005 through the 2K Games and 2K Sports sub-labels. The nascent label incorporated several developme ...
and
Midway Games Midway Games Inc. (formerly Midway Manufacturing and Bally Midway, and commonly known simply as Midway) was an American video game company that existed from 1958 to 2010. Midway's franchises included ''Mortal Kombat'', ''Rampage (franchise), Ra ...
. However, in December 2004, Electronic Arts signed a five-year exclusive agreement with the NFL, meaning only Electronic Arts will be permitted to publish games featuring NFL team and player names. This prompted video game developer
Midway Games Midway Games Inc. (formerly Midway Manufacturing and Bally Midway, and commonly known simply as Midway) was an American video game company that existed from 1958 to 2010. Midway's franchises included ''Mortal Kombat'', ''Rampage (franchise), Ra ...
to release a game in 2005 called '' Blitz: The League'', with fictitious teams and players. In February 2008,
EA Sports EA Sports is a division of Electronic Arts that develops and publishes sports video games. Formerly a marketing gimmick of Electronic Arts, in which they imitated real-life sports networks by calling themselves the "EA Sports Network" (EASN) ...
renewed their exclusivity agreement with the league through
Super Bowl XLVII Super Bowl XLVII was an American football game between the American Football Conference (AFC) champion Baltimore Ravens and the National Football Conference (NFC) champion San Francisco 49ers to decide the National Football League (NFL) champio ...
in 2013. According to
The Sporting News ''The Sporting News'' is a website and former magazine publication owned by Sporting News Holdings, which is a U.S.-based sports media company formed in December 2020 by a private investor consortium. It was originally established in 1886 as a ...
, as of October 2015 "it’s not publicly known when, or if, the contract will end."


Legal issues

NFL The National Football League (NFL) is a professional American football league in the United States. Composed of 32 teams, it is divided equally between the American Football Conference (AFC) and the National Football Conference (NFC). The N ...
Properties was taken to court by former supplier American Needle, Inc over
antitrust Competition law is the field of law that promotes or seeks to maintain market competition by regulating anti-competitive conduct by companies. Competition law is implemented through public and private enforcement. It is also known as antitrust l ...
violations. The issue was NFL Properties granting exclusive license to one supplier over making a product. Court decisions varied on whether the league and it franchises were acting as a single entity, or whether franchises were competing with each other off the field in merchandising sales. The case was eventually appealed all the way to the
United States Supreme Court The Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) is the highest court in the federal judiciary of the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all U.S. federal court cases, and over state court cases that turn on question ...
.


References

{{NFL
properties Property is the ownership of land, resources, improvements or other tangible objects, or intellectual property. Property may also refer to: Philosophy and science * Property (philosophy), in philosophy and logic, an abstraction characterizing an ...