The
All-America Football Conference (
AAFC) was a professional
American football league that challenged the established
National Football League (NFL) from
1946–
1949. One of the NFL's most formidable challengers, the AAFC attracted many of the nation's best players, and introduced many lasting innovations to the game. However, the AAFC was ultimately unable to sustain itself in competition with the NFL. Three of its teams were admitted to the NFL: the
San Francisco 49ers, the
Cleveland Browns and the
Baltimore Colts (not directly antecedent to the later second Colts team that would play in Baltimore in the NFL from 1953 through 1983, now the
Indianapolis Colts).