Professional Sports
In professional sports, as opposed to amateur sports, participants receive payment for their performance. Professionalism in sport has come to the fore through a combination of developments. Mass media and increased leisure have brought larger audiences, so that sports organizations or teams can command large incomes. As a result, more sportspeople can afford to make sport their primary career, devoting the training time necessary to increase skills, physical condition, and experience to modern levels of achievement. This proficiency has also helped boost the popularity of sports.Andy Miah Sport & the Extreme Spectacle: Technological Dependence and Human Limits' (PDF) Unpublished manuscript, 1998 In most sports played professionally there are many more amateur than professional players, though amateurs and professionals do not usually compete. History Baseball Baseball originated before the American Civil War (1861–1865). First played on sandlots in particular, scoring ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Ronaldo - Manchester United Vs Chelsea
Ronaldo is a Portuguese given name equivalent to the English Ronald. It became a common name in all Portuguese-speaking countries, being also prevalent in Italy and Spanish-speaking countries. People Notable people known as Ronaldo include: Association footballers * Ronaldo, full name Ronaldo Luís Nazário de Lima (born 1976), Brazilian footballer, was known as "Ronaldinho" in his early career * Cristiano Ronaldo (born 1985), Portuguese footballer * Ronaldinho, full name Ronaldo de Assis Moreira (born 1980), Brazilian footballer, also known as "Ronaldinho Gaúcho" * Ronaldo Cezar Soares dos Santos (born 2000), Brazilian footballer * Ronaldo da Silva Souza (born 1996), Brazilian footballer * Ronaldo de Oliveira Strada (born 1996), Brazilian football goalkeeper * Ronaldo Guiaro (born 1974), Brazilian footballer * Ronaldo Giovanelli (born 1967), Brazilian football goalkeeper and pundit * Ronaldo Henrique Ferreira da Silva (born 1994), Brazilian footballer * Ronaldo Henrique Silva ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Baseball Color Line
The color line, also known as the color barrier, in American baseball excluded players of black African descent from Major League Baseball and its affiliated Minor Leagues until 1947 (with a few notable exceptions in the 19th century before the line was firmly established). Racial segregation in professional baseball was sometimes called a gentlemen's agreement, meaning a tacit understanding, as there was no written policy at the highest level of organized baseball, the major leagues. A high minor league's vote in 1887 against allowing new contracts with black players within its league sent a powerful signal that eventually led to the disappearance of blacks from the sport's other minor leagues later that century, including the low minors. After the line was in virtually full effect in the early 20th century, many black baseball clubs were established, especially during the 1920s to 1940s when there were several Negro leagues. During this period Native Americans, and native Hawai ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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George Halas
George Stanley Halas Sr. (; February 2, 1895October 31, 1983), nicknamed "Papa Bear" and "Mr. Everything", was an American professional football player, coach, and team owner. He was the founder and owner of the National Football League's Chicago Bears, and served as his own head coach on four occasions. He was also lesser-known as a Major League Baseball player for the New York Yankees. Halas was one of the co-founders of the American Professional Football Association (now the National Football League (NFL)) in 1920, and in 1963 became one of the first 17 inductees into the Pro Football Hall of Fame. Halas was the oldest person in NFL history to serve as a head coach, as he was 72 years and 318 days old when he coached the final game of his career in December 1967, until Romeo Crennel 54 years later, who was 73 years and 115 days old when he became the interim head coach of the Houston Texans. Early life and sports career Halas was born in Chicago, Illinois, into a family of ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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National Football League
The National Football League (NFL) is a professional American football league that consists of 32 teams, divided equally between the American Football Conference (AFC) and the National Football Conference (NFC). The NFL is one of the major professional sports leagues in the United States and Canada and the highest professional level of American football in the world. Each NFL season begins with a three-week preseason in August, followed by the 18-week regular season which runs from early September to early January, with each team playing 17 games and having one bye week In sport, a bye is the preferential status of a player or team that is automatically advanced to the next round of a tournament, without having to play an opponent in an early round. In knockout (elimination) tournaments they can be granted eit .... Following the conclusion of the regular season, seven teams from each conference (four division winners and three wild card teams) advance to the p ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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New York Pro Football League
The New York Pro Football League (NYPFL) was a professional American football league, active in the 1910s, and based in upstate New York, primarily Western New York. Between 1920 and 1921, the league's best teams were absorbed into the National Football League, though none survive in that league today. It was one of the biggest challengers to the Ohio League in professional football in the 1910s. Its formation was highly informal. The teams were largely clustered around the two cities of Rochester, New York and Buffalo, New York, with rural teams to fill the differences. Rochester had built its reputation around a strong "sandlot football" circuit, for instance, and was most popular when it consisted mostly of local teams. Rochester's best team, the Jeffersons, was instrumental in bringing the NYPFL and the Ohio League together to form the American Professional Football Association. The circuit continued to exist even after the birth of the APFA (with the NYPFL teams continuing to ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Ohio League
The Ohio League was an informal and loose association of American football clubs active between 1902 and 1919 that competed for the Ohio Independent Championship (OIC). As the name implied, its teams were mostly based in Ohio. It is the direct predecessor to the modern National Football League (NFL). A proposal to add teams from outside Ohio, such as the Latrobe Athletic Association, to form a formal league known as the "Football Association" fell through prior to the 1904 season. Though a champion was declared by the group throughout its existence, a formal league was not founded until 1920, when several Ohio League teams added clubs from other states to form the American Professional Football Association. In 1922, the APFA became the National Football League. All but one of the remaining Ohio League teams left the NFL after the 1926 season, with the sole remaining team, the Dayton Triangles, surviving until 1929, before moving several times and eventually ending up in Dalla ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Western Pennsylvania Professional Football Circuit
The Western Pennsylvania Professional Football Circuit was a loose association of American football clubs that operated from 1890 to approximately 1940. Originally amateur, professionalism was introduced to the circuit in 1892; cost pressures pushed the circuit to semi-professional status from about 1920 through the rest of its existence. Existing in some form for 48 years, it was one of the longest-lived paying football loops to operate outside the auspices of the National Football League. The football clubs of the 1880s and 1890s were amateur teams. They were under the membership of an athletic club, which provided both sports and the ability to wager money on the sports. However, the prestige and increased membership that could come from a successful team, led these clubs to begin secretly hiring talented players. The amateur athletics that these clubs engaged in were policed by the Amateur Athletic Union (AAU). By the mid-1890s allegations of professionalism became known to the ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Ben "Sport" Donnelly
Benjamin Shenstone "Sport" Donnelly (October 18, 1869 – August 3, 1922) was an American football player and coach. He was the second-ever known professional football player, behind Pudge Heffelfinger. He was paid $250 for one game on November 19, 1892 by the Allegheny Athletic Association, for a game against the Washington & Jefferson Presidents football team. The November 19 date was exactly seven days after the team paid Heffelfinger $500 for a game. In 1893, Donnelly was hired by the Allegheny Athletic Association as player-coach, making him the first man to ever coach a known pro team. Heffelfinger once said that Donnelly was the only man that he had played against who "could slug you and at the same time keep his eyes on the ball". Donnelly also served as the second head football coach at the University of Iowa for a single season in 1893, compiling a record of 3–4. College football playing career Donnelly began his college football career at Princeton University. Whi ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Pudge Heffelfinger
William Walter "Pudge" Heffelfinger (December 20, 1867 – April 2, 1954), also spelled Hafelfinger, was an American football player and coach. He is considered the first athlete to play American football professionally, having been paid to play in 1892. Early life William Walter Heffelfinger was born in 1867 in the then-small city of Minneapolis, Minnesota, to Christopher B. Heffelfinger and Mary Ellen Totton, both of whom were born in Pennsylvania. Heffelfinger's father came by riverboat to Minneapolis, eventually joining the Union Army at the outset of the Civil War. He was wounded during the Battle of Gettysburg, and after the war started the family shoe manufacturing business. During Heffelfinger's lifetime, the family rose to prominence in Minneapolis. As a boy, Heffelfinger was nicknamed "Pudge". He played baseball and football in high school. Occasionally, during his junior and senior years of high school he also played for the University of Minnesota, in baseball, ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Posting System (KBO)
The posting system is a baseball player transfer system that operates between Korea Baseball Organization (KBO) and the Major League Baseball (MLB). The system is based on the original posting system that was put in place between MLB and Nippon Professional Baseball (NPB) in 1998. To be eligible for posting, a player must have first played at least seven years in the KBO. Under this system, when a KBO player is "posted," MLB holds a four-day-long silent auction during which MLB teams can submit sealed bids in an attempt to win the exclusive rights to negotiate with the player for a period of 30 days. If the KBO team accepts the winning bid, then the player is free to negotiate with the highest-bidding MLB team. If the MLB team and the KBO player agree on contract terms before the 30-day period has expired, the KBO team receives the bid amount as a transfer fee, and the player is free to play in MLB. If the KBO team rejects the winning bid or if the MLB team cannot come to a co ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Posting System
The is a baseball player transfer system that operates between Nippon Professional Baseball (NPB) and Major League Baseball (MLB). Despite the drafting of the United States – Japanese Player Contract Agreement, unveiled in 1967 to regulate NPB players moving to MLB, problems began to arise in the late 1990s. Some NPB teams lost star players without compensation, an issue highlighted when NPB stars Hideo Nomo and Alfonso Soriano left to play in MLB after using loopholes to void their existing contracts. A further problem was that NPB players had very little negotiating power if their teams decided to deal them to MLB, as when pitcher Hideki Irabu was traded to an MLB team for which he had no desire to play. In 1998, the Agreement was rewritten to address both problems; the result was dubbed the "posting system". Under this system, when an NPB player is "posted", his NPB team notifies the MLB Commissioner, with the posting fee based on the type of contract a player signs and ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Nippon Professional Baseball
or NPB is the highest level of baseball in Japan. Locally, it is often called , meaning ''Professional Baseball''. Outside Japan, it is often just referred to as "Japanese baseball". The roots of the league can be traced back to the formation of the in Tokyo, founded in 1934, and the original circuit for the sport in the Empire two years later – Japanese Baseball League (1936–1949), and continued to play even through the final years of World War II. The league that is today's NPB for Japan was formed when that sports organization reorganized in 1950, creating two leagues with six teams each in the Central League and the Pacific League with an annual season-ending Japan Series championship play-off series of games starting that year. The NPB also oversees the Western League (Japanese baseball), Western League and the Eastern League (Japanese baseball), Eastern League, NPB's minor league, minor leagues. Since the first Japan Series in , the Yomiuri Giants have the most cha ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |