In 1920, the first official year of the NFL’s storied history, its success was anything but assured. The still chaotic league needed a headliner to excite fans and generate sales, someone unlike any other player who’d come before. As one of just a handful of African Americans to play pro football back then, Fritz Pollard was that once-in-a-generation player. He would suffer every racial indignity on his way to proving he was not only worthy, but was, in fact, the very best.

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