AFL III
| Sport | American football |
|---|---|
| Founded | 1940 |
| Inaugural season | 1940 |
| Ceased | 1941 |
| Claim to fame | 3rd competitor of National Football League |
| No. of teams | 6 (1940), 5 (1941) |
| Country | United States |
| Last champion(s) |
Columbus Bullies |
American Football League, also known retrospectively as the AFL III to distinguish it from earlier organizations of that name, was a major professional American football league that operated from 1940–1941. It was created when three teams, the original Cincinnati Bengals, the Columbus Bullies, and the Milwaukee Chiefs, were lured away from the minor-league American Professional Football Association and joined three new franchises in Boston, Buffalo, and New York City in a new league. It competed against the National Football League (NFL), the oldest existing professional football league.
The organization was the third major league to bear the name . Its establishment resulted in the dissolution of the American Professional Football Association, which had just announced its intentions to compete with the NFL as a major league organization. In 1941 American Football League became the first football league to play a double round robin schedule (five home games and five away games). However, it folded after the end of the 1941 season.
Although the third American Football League was not directly connected to any previous American football leagues of the same name, its formation was at the cost of an already-existing minor football league of the same name.
By the spring of 1940, the former American Professional Football Association announced intentions of turning itself into a major league with the addition of a Milwaukee team for the upcoming season over the protests of the Green Bay Packers. As the teams prepared for the upcoming season, the announcement of a rival major league resulted in the fracturing of this edition of the American Football League.
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