Cleveland Rams

Cleveland Rams
Cleveland Rams logo
Founded1936
Based inCleveland, Ohio
LeagueAmerican Football League (1936)
National Football League (1937–1945)
Team historyCleveland Rams (1936–1942, 1944–1945)
Suspended operations (1943)
Los Angeles Rams (1946–1994, 2016–present)
St. Louis Rams (1995–2015)
Team colorsRed, dark blue (1936–1937)
   
Royal blue, gold (1938–1945)
   
NFL Championship wins1 (1945)
Home field(s)League Park
Shaw Stadium
Cleveland Stadium

The Cleveland Rams were a professional American football team that played in Cleveland from 1936 to 1945. The Rams competed in the second American Football League (AFL) for the 1936 season and the National Football League (NFL) from 1937 to 1945, winning the NFL championship in 1945, before moving to Los Angeles in 1946 to become the first of only two professional football champions to play the following season in another city.[1][2]

The move of the team to Los Angeles helped to jump-start the reintegration of pro football by African-American players and opened up the West Coast to professional sports. After being based in Los Angeles for 49 years, the Rams franchise moved again after the 1994 NFL season to St. Louis where the franchise stayed for 21 seasons before moving back to Los Angeles after the 2015 NFL season.[3]

  1. ^ The other occasion was in 1962 with the Dallas Texans of the American Football League. Five months after winning the championship, franchise owner Lamar Hunt, realizing he had no prospect of the Texans competing with the NFL's Cowboys in Dallas, relocated the Texans to Kansas City and rebranded them as the Chiefs.
  2. ^ "1946 – The First African-Americans are Signed to Play in the NFL". Pro Football Hall of Fame. Retrieved March 30, 2022.
  3. ^ SI Wire (October 20, 2014). "Report: Rams considered most likely team to move to Los Angeles". Sports Illustrated. Retrieved January 16, 2016.