Why Does Los Angeles Have Two NFL Teams?

Some people might wonder why Los Angeles has two NFL teams when other cities have none. The answer is simple: because Los Angeles is a huge market with a lot of football fans.

Having two teams gives fans more options to choose from, and it also allows the teams to compete against each other for fans and resources. In the end, it benefits everyone involved.

The History of Football in Los Angeles

The first professional football team in Los Angeles was the Los Angeles Buccaneers, who played their inaugural season in 1926. The Buccaneers were a part of the American Football League, which was founded in 1960. The AFL was the first major professional football league to have a team in Los Angeles.

The Early Years: The Los Angeles Rams

professional football franchise, the Los Angeles Rams, was founded in 1936. The Rams played their home games at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum until 1979. In 1946, the franchise won their only NFL Championship. Forty-three years later, in 1989, the Rams returned to Los Angeles. In 1995, the franchise again won an NFL Championship, this time as awild card team. After the winning season, the Rams moved from Anaheim Stadium to St. Louis where they remained for 21 seasons. The return to Los Angeles was announced on January 12th, 2016 and the Rams began playing in their current home stadium, SoFi Stadium, in 2020.

The Los Angeles Raiders

The Raiders were one of the most successful teams of the 1980s, winning Super Bowl XVIII in 1983. The team was led by head coach Tom Flores and featured such star players as quarterback Jim Plunkett, running back Marcus Allen, and linebacker Ted Hendricks. The team’s image was defined by its “bad boy” reputation, as many of its players were involved in on-field fights and scuffles with opposing players and fans.

In 1995, the Raiders announced their intention to move back to Oakland, which they did prior to the start of the 1996 season. The move was greeted with anger by many Los Angeles fans, who felt that the team had abandoned them. The Raiders would go on to have success in Oakland, winning Super Bowl XXXVII in 2002.

The Return of the Los Angeles Rams

The Rams moved back to Los Angeles in 2016 after being located in St. Louis since 1995. The franchise originally was based in Los Angeles from 1946 to 1994. The decision to move back to Los Angeles was due to the new stadium being built in Inglewood, which is set to open in 2019. The Rams are not the only team in Los Angeles, as the Chargers also moved from San Diego in 2017.

The St. Louis Rams

The Los Angeles Rams are a professional American football team that play in the National Football League (NFL). The Rams franchise was founded in 1936 as the Cleveland Rams in the short-lived second American Football League (AFL) before joining the NFL the next year. In 1946, the franchise moved to Los Angeles. The Rams franchise remained in the metro area until 1994, when they moved to Anaheim. The team returned to Los Angeles in 2016.

The Rams franchise was founded in 1936 by attorney Homer Marshman and player-coach Damon Wetzel, who was part of Marshall’s championship Akron Pros squad from 1928. The Rams began play that year as charter members of the second AFL, and finished their only season with a 7–5 record under Wetzel. They played their home games at Venice Beach Municipal Auditorium; however, attendance was lackluster and profits were few.

The Los Angeles Rams (Again)

The Los Angeles Rams are a professional American football team that play in the National Football League (NFL). The Rams franchise was founded in 1936 as the Cleveland Rams in the short-lived second American Football League before joining the NFL the next year. In 1946, the franchise moved to Los Angeles. The Rams franchise remained in the city until 1994, when they moved to St. Louis. The team played in St. Louis until the end of the 2015 season, when they again relocated back to Los Angeles.

The Los Angeles Chargers

The Los Angeles Chargers are a professional American football team based in the Greater Los Angeles Area. The Chargers compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member club of the league’s American Football Conference (AFC) West division. They were established on August 14, 1959, and began play on September 10, 1960, as charter members of the American Football League (AFL).

The San Diego Chargers

The Chargers began life in 1960 as the Los Angeles Chargers of the American Football League. The team’s first owner was Barron Hilton, grandson of Conrad Hilton, founder of the Hilton Hotels chain. The Chargers were unique among the eight original AFL franchises in that they were not established by an NFL team; all the other AFL teams were set up to challenge the NFL’s dominance of professional football. In fact, it was because of the AFL-NFL rivalry that Super Bowl I (then still known as the AFL-NFL World Championship Game) was played between representatives of those two leagues.

Los Angeles was not a particularly strong market for professional football; at the time, it was also home to the Rams (who had only moved from Cleveland in 1946), and attendance at Rams games far outpaced that of the Chargers. After playing their first season at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum (sharing it with the Rams), for their second season in 1961 the Chargers moved to Balboa Stadium in San Diego, where they would remain for 56 years.

The Los Angeles Chargers (Again)

In 1960, the Los Angeles Chargers were founded in Los Angeles, California. The team played their first season in the American Football League (AFL) and their home games at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum. After one season in Los Angeles, the team moved to San Diego, where they would play for 55 seasons. In 2017, the Chargers announced they would move back to Los Angeles, and they currently play their home games at SoFi Stadium in Inglewood, California.

Some fans are confused as to why Los Angeles now has two NFL teams – the Rams and the Chargers – when other cities have multiple teams in different sports but not football. There are a few reasons for this: firstly, when the Chargers moved to LA in 2017, there wasn’t an available stadium for them to share with the Rams (who had moved to LA just one year prior), so each team needed their own facility. Secondly, it’s notoriously difficult to get a new NFL team approved/awarded (the last time it happened was in 2002 when the Houston Texans were founded), so it makes more sense for existing teams to move to a city with an available market than it does to try and start anew. Finally, as big and populous as Los Angeles is considered to be, it’s actually a very spread out city and can support multiple teams in different areas – whereas a city like New York is much more condensed, making it more difficult to justify having multiple teams within close proximity to each other.

Why Does Los Angeles Have Two NFL Teams?

Los Angeles is home to two NFL teams: the Los Angeles Rams and the Los Angeles Chargers. This is a unique situation, as most cities only have one team. There are a few reasons for why Los Angeles has two teams. One reason is that the city is so large, it can support two teams. Another reason is that Los Angeles is home to many transplants from other parts of the country, so there is a large fan base for both teams.

The Business of Football

Los Angeles is home to two NFL teams, the Los Angeles Rams and the Los Angeles Chargers, who both play their home games at the Coliseum. Theoretically, this should lead to more interest and support for NFL football in the city. In reality, however, Los Angeles is a notoriously difficult market for NFL teams. So why does the city have two teams?

The answer has to do with the business of football. Los Angeles is the second largest media market in the United States, behind only New York City. This makes it an attractive market for NFL teams, who can generate a lot of revenue from broadcasting their games to a large audience.

The Rams originally moved to Los Angeles from St. Louis in 2016, while the Chargers relocated from San Diego in 2017. Both teams were drawn to the city by the promise of new stadium construction that would generate even more revenue. So far, however, these stadium plans have not come to fruition, and both teams are playing in temporary homes while they wait for a permanent solution.

It is still unclear whether Los Angeles can support two NFL teams long-term. For now, both teams are committed to making it work, but it remains to be seen if they will be successful in the long run.

The Los Angeles Market

In the early 1980s, the NFL was a much different league than it is today. There were only 28 teams in the league, and most of them were located in cold weather cities. At that time, the Los Angeles market was the only major market without an NFL team.

In 1982, the NFL added two new expansion teams, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and the Seattle Seahawks. This brought the total number of teams in the league up to 30. At that time, there were still no teams in Los Angeles.

In 1983, the USFL (United States Football League) was founded. The USFL was a rival football league to the NFL, and it had plans to expand into Los Angeles. In order to prevent the USFL from gaining a foothold in Los Angeles, the NFL decided to place two expansion teams in Los Angeles. These two teams were the Los Angeles Raiders and the Los Angeles Express.