What are your sources?
Please direct me to them. Would love to read the books, accounts, etc.
Thanks!
You have yet to provide one iota of evidence for anything you've posted.
My main source is me and my vast knowledge of football past and present. I pointed you in the right direction for other sources that can still be found on the internet, for you simple people who still think it ain't true if it's not on the internet.
As is the case with everything, all is forgotten in time and you're left with nothing but slanted accounts of what happened by the very entities who profited most. You won't have the prevailing feelings and understanding, fans had back then, now.
Back then, the World Championship games (not yet referred to as Super Bowls) between the AFL and NFL lost their appeal real quick with the Packers' shellacking of AFL teams in the first 2 World Championship games. The talk and predominant feeling back then was this World Championship was lame and not needed. It's also the evidence that the unfounded bullshit, you've been spewing about the AFL being a threat to the NFL, was indeed just bullshit.
So the real talk was the NFL championship game should decide the real champ. That would leave the AFL out in the cold but it would also leave the NFL out in the cold because they'd be missing out on a great chance to expand quickly by taking on the 10 AFL teams. As far as the NFL was concerned, the AFL was not a threat to their established league but more an opportunity for a massive expansion which meant more massive money. So going into the 1969 World Championship it was in the NFL's best interest that the AFL won in order to get fans to accept AFL teams as legitimate and make the merger a complete success.
Bubba Smith was not the first to claim that game was fixed but obviously got the most attention being an active participant in that game. Speculation was fueled back then by a story that broke shortly after that game about Namath's ties to organized crime and illegal gambling through a nightclub he owned. NFL commissioner, Pete Rozelle, ran some damage control and told Namath to either sell the bar, proven to have been used in illegal NFL gambling by phone taps, or face suspension. Namath chose instead to retire and announced his decision during an interview with Howard Cosell. He and Rozelle would later have more talks and he agreed to sell.
After the merger was complete and the 2 conferences in place in the NFL and money from TV contracts came pouring in the Jets would never sniff the playoffs with Namath again. So you look at his shit numbers and horrible W/L record while you realize the only big game he ever won was likely fixed and you have to think he should be noted more for wearing pantyhose than ever being a great NFL football player.
[video=youtube;_BCWvH2ISyI]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_BCWvH2ISyI[/video]