Sports Reference Blog

Pro Football Reference Adds NFL Statistics from the 1920-31 ‘Pre-Stats’ Era

Posted by Mike Lynch on September 8, 2026

Thanks to a donation from sports research titan David Neft, Pro Football Reference has added never-before-seen unofficial NFL player statistics for the 1920 through 1931 (and in some cases, 1932) seasons, covering the era before the NFL began officially tracking individual yardage and attempts.

Neft (the legend behind the Macmillan Baseball Encyclopedia) originally released some of this data, along with Richard Cohen, in Pro Football: The Early Years (An Encyclopedic History 1895-1959), a seminal work uncovering pro football's early history. Neft's season totals were included in this encyclopedia and updated in subsequent efforts. But he has shared with us the game-level details that undergird those season totals, which allows us to publish them for the first time. Notably, this even includes some improvements to the data from when it was last published.

This is one of the murkiest and most fascinating periods in professional football history. The league was founded in 1920 as the American Professional Football Association, became the NFL in 1922, and spent much of its first decade looking very little like the league we know today. Teams arranged many of their own games. Season lengths varied wildly. Standings were often disputed. Winter league meetings regularly included arguments over records, standings, and which games should count.

As previously mentioned, the NFL did not officially track individual statistics until 1932 (and more on those dubious 1932 totals later). There were no league press guides or yearbooks compiling player totals. As Neft, Cohen and Rick Korch wrote in 1994's The Football Encyclopedia, "There is hardly any newsreel film left of the games. Photographs of games tantalize us with frames of action, but cannot tell us of the pace of a game or what it was like to watch.”

Hopefully these statistics can help tell the story of this era of football.

While these numbers are not official NFL statistics, they also are not merely estimates. They come from the actual contemporary record: newspaper accounts and printed play-by-plays, gathered from the places where the early NFL was covered most closely. Big-city papers might give a game only a short column. In many cases, the most complete accounts came from local papers in places like Canton, Rock Island, Green Bay, and other towns where professional football was a community event and Monday sports sections preserved the details. Consequently, some teams have better coverage than others in these statistics.

The football itself was dramatically different. Rosters were small, with players expected to play offense, defense and special teams. Regulars often played most of the game as the rules around re-entering a game after leaving were quite strict. The ball was fatter, easier to drop-kick and harder to throw. Passing was rare not only because of the shape of the ball, but because the rules made it difficult and dangerous. Before 1934, an incomplete pass in the end zone was a touchback. Until 1933, a forward pass had to be thrown from at least five yards behind the line of scrimmage. Anything more than a single incompletion on a set of downs even counted as a penalty in these days.

Furthermore, there were no hashmarks until 1933, so the ball stayed where the previous play ended. This made using wide parts of the field a dangerous strategy where you might need to waste a subsequent down just to re-center the ball. Offense was harder to sustain, passing was less inviting, and field position mattered enormously.

This made punting central to the sport. In the early NFL, punting was not merely what a team did when a drive failed. It was a primary strategic weapon. Teams punted on 3rd and long (and sometimes even earlier in particularly disadvantageous part of the field!), because you could punt it over the safety's head if he guarded against a throw, or attempt a conversion if the safety dropped back to field the punt. Flipping the field and forcing the opponent to make a mistake was often the smartest path to winning. Across the first 13 NFL seasons, just seven teams averaged more than 20 points per game.

The new data also gives more visibility to the players who built the league before it became a major national institution. Many were part-time professionals who held day jobs and joined their teams on weekends. Stars might earn $150 to $300 per game. Benny Friedman’s $10,000 annual deal in 1929 was a major breakthrough. Careers were short, even for great players. This also illuminates the performance of legends like Jim Thorpe and Red Grange. Curly Lambeau, Johnny Blood, Ernie Nevers. The list goes on.

The data also includes the small group of Black players who participated in the NFL from 1920 through 1933, before an unofficial color ban kept Black players out of the league until the late 1940s. Players such as Fritz Pollard (who led the league in yards from scrimmage in both 1920 and 1921), Paul Robeson, Duke Slater, Bobby Marshall, and others were part of the NFL’s earliest history. Making more of this era searchable and visible helps place their careers, and their presence in the league, more firmly in the historical record.

Users should understand that coverage from this period remains uneven. Some teams and seasons were documented in great detail by local reporters. Others were not. Some games left behind printed play-by-play accounts. Others left only brief summaries. History is complicated, but we think it is important to present what we know thanks to David Neft.

Here's a bit more details on the presentation of the data and some import notes and caveats:

  • On player and team pages from 1920-31, we have added new columns of data titled 'G Cmp' and 'G Inc.' These indicate how many games a given player has complete coverage for in any given season and how many games have incomplete coverage. As alluded to above, many teams such as Green Bay have incredibly thorough coverage because game stories were often essentially full play-by-plays. Sometimes other games might only have a handful of plays mentioned (or somewhere in between the two extremes) and so the coverage is incomplete.
  • For further details on what games are complete/incomplete, and for which stats, you can click through to a player's gamelogs. In the gamelogs (and also on the box score page) incomplete totals are underlined. If a given total is not underlined in gamelogs or in the box score, then it is complete. In some cases a player may have complete passing stats and incomplete rushing or receiving stats in the same game. In season games, that would count as an incomplete game, but in the gamelogs and box scores we can show a little more nuance.
  • We have game-level stats for nearly all games between 1920 and 1932. We have used these game stats to create season totals for passing, rushing and receiving from 1920-31 and punting from 1920-32. We have left the 'official' 1932 season-level passing, rushing and receiving statistics in place, but Neft's work here shows that the 1932 'official' totals are actually incomplete. For instance, Arnie Herber is the 'official' leader in passing yards in 1932, with 639. However, Neft's work shows 765 passing yards. There is some amount of evidence that certain games may have been excluded from the official season totals in 1932 or that the statistics are incomplete. We are leaving them in place, but showing Neft's game totals. For a team like the Packers, with full coverage, the Neft game totals are more accurate than the existing season totals.
    • The exception to the above is a limited number of cases where reported season totals were more comprehensive than summed gamelog totals and so we use those more comprehensive totals for the season stat lines. They are, as follows:
      • 1931 Red Grange: 111 rushes, 599 rush yards (1 game missing)
      • 1931 Bronko Nagurski: 79 rushes, 401 rush yards (1 game missing)
      • 1931 Dick Nesbitt: 75 rushes, 372 rush yards (1 game missing)
      • 1931 Joe Lintzenich: 65 rushes, 268 rush yards (1 game missing)
      • 1931 Keith Molesworth: 45 rushes, 196 rush yards (1 game missing)
      • 1931 Carl Brumbaugh: 59 rushes, 148 rush yards (1 game missing)
      • 1931 Herb Joesting: 29 rushes, 136 rush yards (1 game missing)
      • 1931 Paul Franklin: 19 rushes, 101 rush yards (1 game missing)
      • 1931 Laurie Walquist: 25 rushes, 68 rush yards (1 game missing)
      • 1929 Red Grange: 130 rushes, 552 rush yards (0 games missing)
      • 1927 Charley Rogers: 120 rushes, 508 rush yards, 38 receptions, 541 receiving yards (13 complete games, 5 games missing)
      • 1927 Ken Mercer: 104 rushes, 368 rush yards (12 complete games, 1 incomplete game)
      • 1927 Ned Wilcox: 53 rushes, 179 rush yards, 7 receptions, 132 receiving yards (9 complete games, 5 incomplete games)
      • 1927 Hap Moran (Frankford stint only): 32 rushes, 125 rush yards, 2 receptions, 67 receiving yards (3 complete games, 3 incomplete games)
      • 1927 Adrian Ford (Frankford stint only): 16 rushes, 50 rush yards, 1 reception, 8 receiving yards (7 complete games, 2 missing)
      • 1927 Two-Bits Homan: 18 rushes, 59 rush yards, 11 receptions, 254 receiving yards (10 complete games, 1 incomplete game)
      • 1927 Paul Fitzgibbon: 29 rushes, 113 rush yards, 4 receptions, 26 receiving yards (9 complete games, 2 incomplete games)
      • 1927 Bill Donohoe: 9 rushes, 39 rush yards (5 complete games)
      • 1927 Dick Moynihan: 23 rushes, 79 rush yards, 13 receptions, 173 receiving yards (6 complete games, 3 incomplete games)
      • 1927 Russ Daugherty: 2 rushes, 7 rush yards (1 complete game)
      • 1927 Chris Cortemeglia: 2 rushes, 10 rush yards (2 complete games)
      • 1927 Frank McGrath: 1 rush, 4 rush yards, 10 receptions, 65 receiving yards (7 complete games, 5 incomplete games)
      • 1927 Ed Weir: 2 rushes, 8 rush yards, 1 reception, 8 receiving yards (12 complete games, 6 incomplete games)
      • 1927 Joe Weir: 1 rush, 1 rush yd, 3 receptions, 59 receiving yards (8 complete games, 4 incomplete games)
      • 1927 Tony Kostos: 2 receptions, 16 receiving yards (7 complete games)
  • This data does not include any statistics for the several dozen 1920 games that were played by NFL teams against non-league teams (though these games count in the standings).
  • Otherwise, there are only 3 NFL games between 1920 and 1932 with no statistical coverage:
  • Officially, sack yards lost were never tracked before 1947 (when they were known as Yards Lost Attempting to Pass). Before 1947, these yards were simply subtracted from the passer's rushing yards. This is why yards per rush jumped from 3.4 in 1946 to 4.1 in 1947. Or, to take a different view, Paul Governali went from -186 rushing yards in 1946 to 151 rushing yards in 1947, thanks to the new category of 280 YLAP. However, thanks to the fact that this new data is unofficial, we have license to treat things as we felt appropriate. Helpfully, Neft identified plays where a player was tackled while attempting to pass and tracked them separately. This means that we have kept such losses out of rushing statistics and have them tracked separately as times sacked and sack yards lost. This is not the convention in official statistics from 1932-46, but it is how we decided it would be best to display 1920-31 season stats (and 1920-32 game stats).
  • This information is now incorporated into the Versus Finder, Player Season Finder and Player Game Finder in Stathead Football.
  • It is also incorporated into our leaderboards. The statistics in this era were generally modest enough that you will not notice much impact, but there are some exceptions.
    • You will see that Verne Lewellen is now the single-season punting yardage leader with 5,593 yards in 1928.
    • The yards per rushing attempt leaderboard features some of these players, as well, and I'd like to call out yards per attempt statistics, in particular. Because some of these games have incomplete data, there is no guarantee of an unbiased sample. For instance, in a game with limited data, a long gain was more likely to be noted. However, to some extent this is usually (but not always) counterbalanced by a couple things:
      • Touchdown lengths were the most likely to be noted and those were mostly plunges, which drives down many yards per rush attempt numbers.
      • If a runner only had their long gains mentioned, it wouldn't be enough attempts for them to qualify for the leaderboard or it would represent a small share of the player's overall carries.
      • Here's a few examples:
        • Les Hawes in 1924 is listed with 61 rushes for 503 yards (8.2 yds/rush).
          • In games with complete coverage he averaged 8.5 yds/rush
          • In games with incomplete coverage he averaged 8.1 yds/rush
        • Tex Hamer in 1924 is listed with 103 rushes for 789 yards (7.7 yds/rush)
          • In games with complete coverage he averaged 5.0 yds/rush
          • In game with incomplete coverage he averaged 8.7 yds/rush
          • Hamer is an example where his true yds/rush is likely closer to 5-6 range.
        • Paddy Driscoll in 1923 is listed with 50 rushes for 367 yards (7.3 yds/rush)
          • In games with complete coverage he averaged 5.4 yds/rush
          • In games with incomplete coverage he averaged 21.8 yds/rush
        • Benny Friedman in 1928 is listed with 87 rushes for 575 yards (6.6 yds/rush)
          • In games with complete coverage he averaged 6.1 yds/rush
          • In games with incomplete coverage he averaged 7.5 yds/rush
        • Red Grange in 1930 is listed with 77 rushes for 470 yards (6.1 yds/rush)
          • In games with complete coverage he averaged 4.9 yds/rush
          • In games with incomplete coverage he averaged 9.6 yds/rush
        • Benny Friedman is listed with 18.7 yds/completion in 1930
          • In games with complete coverage he averaged 16.7 yds/completion
          • In games with incomplete coverage he averaged 22.3 yds/completion

Now, here's some of the fun stuff:

Pre-Official Leaders

Totals from 1920-1931:

  • Passing Yards
    1. Benny Friedman: 6,744
    2. Red Dunn: 4,641
    3. Curley Lambeau: 4,493
    4. Ernie Nevers: 4,012
    5. Jack McBride: 2,585
  • Rushing Yards
    1. Tony Latone: 2,648
    2. Verne Lewellen: 2,278
    3. Paddy Driscoll: 2,260
    4. Red Grange: 1,951
    5. Ernie Nevers: 1,947
  • Receiving Yards
    1. Johnny Blood: 1,917
    2. Lavvie Dilweg: 1,599
    3. Charlie Mathys: 1,489
    4. Jimmy Conzelman: 1,427
    5. Verne Lewellen: 1,238
  • Yards from Scrimmage
    1. Verne Lewellen: 3,516
    2. Johnny Blood: 3,175
    3. Tony Latone: 2,910
    4. Paddy Driscoll: 2,879
    5. Jimmy Conzelman: 2,539
    6. Red Grange: 2,398
    7. Curly Lambeau: 2,385
    8. Eddie Kotal: 2,074
    9. Ernie Nevers: 1,947
    10. Tex Hamer: 1,945
  • Total Offense
    1. Benny Friedman: 8,482
    2. Curly Lambeau: 6,099
    3. Ernie Nevers: 5,916
    4. Red Dunn: 5,166
    5. Paddy Driscoll: 4,362
    6. Verne Lewellen: 4,210
    7. Jack McBride: 4,187
    8. Wildcat Wilson: 3,374
    9. Hust Stockton: 3,188
    10. Jimmy Conzelman: 3,133
  • Punting Yards (1920-1932)
    1. Verne Lewellen: 26,895
    2. Paddy Driscoll: 11,140
    3. Cub Buck: 9,728
    4. Ken Strong: 8,377
    5. Tex Hamer: 6,750

Single Season from 1920-1931

  • Passing Yards
    1. Benny Friedman, 1927: 1,721
    2. Benny Friedman, 1929: 1,700
    3. Ernie Nevers, 1927: 1,362
    4. Benny Friedman, 1928: 1,348
    5. Benny Friedman, 1930: 1,246
  • Rushing Yards
    1. Tex Hamer, 1924: 789
    2. Chuck Bennett, 1930: 744
    3. Barney Wentz, 1926: 727
    4. Herb Joesting, 1930: 656
    5. Barney Wentz, 1925: 656
    6. Red Grange, 1931: 599
    7. Tony Latone, 1925: 593
    8. Tony Latone, 1926: 578
    9. Benny Friedman, 1928: 575
    10. Wally Diehl, 1928: 569
  • Receiving Yards
    1. Charlie Mathys, 1924: 579
    2. Charley Rogers, 1927: 541
    3. Eddie Kotal, 1928: 508
    4. Jimmy Conzelman, 1927: 500
    5. Charlie Mathys, 1923: 494
  • Yards from Scrimmage
    1. Charley Rogers, 1927: 1,049
    2. Tex Hamer, 1924: 826
    3. Eddie Kotal, 1928: 806
    4. Chuck Bennett, 1930: 756
    5. Barney Wentz, 1926: 741
    6. Ken Strong, 1930: 735
    7. Johnny Blood, 1930: 723
    8. Les Haws, 1924: 710
    9. Red Grange, 1931: 695
    10. Johnny Blood, 1931: 685
  • Total Offense
    1. Benny Friedman, 1929: 2,080
    2. Benny Friedman, 1927: 1,879
    3. Benny Friedman, 1928: 1,876
    4. Ernie Nevers, 1927: 1,653
    5. Benny Friedman, 1930: 1,611
  • Punting Yards (1920-1932)
    1. Verne Lewellen, 1928: 5,593
    2. Verne Lewellen, 1926: 4,711
    3. Verne Lewellen, 1927: 3,997
    4. Verne Lewellen, 1930: 3,603
    5. Verne Lewellen, 1929: 3,559

Single Game from 1920-1932

  • Passing Yards
    1. Red Dunn: 313 on 11/23/24
    2. Benny Friedman: 310 on 10/19/30
    3. Ernie Nevers: 305 on 10/23/27
    4. Jim Kendrick: 295 on 11/7/26
    5. John Armstrong: 238 on 10/14/23
  • Rushing Yards
    1. Chuck Bennett: 166 on 12/7/30
    2. Benny Friedman: 164 on 10/28/28
    3. George Sullivan: 161 on 11/29/24
    4. Bill Glaver: 160 on 11/18/23
    5. Wally Diehl: 157 on 11/23/29
    6. Red Grange: 152 on 11/22/30
    7. Cliff Battles: 144 on 10/30/32
    8. Joe Guyon: 144 on 12/3/21
    9. Bill Senn: 137 on 11/28/26
    10. Paddy Driscoll: 136 on 10/28/23
  • Receiving Yards
    1. Evar Swanson: 195 on 11/23/24
    2. Chuck Corgan: 144 on 11/8/24
    3. Tommy Hughitt: 140 on 10/9/21
    4. Murray Shelton: 137 on 11/14/20
    5. Chuck Corgan: 135 on 11/15/25
  • Yards from Scrimmage
    1. Evar Swanson: 195 on 11/23/24
    2. Bill Glaver: 184 on 11/18/23
    3. Marty Norton: 181 on 10/11/25
    4. Cliff Battles: 173 on 10/30/32
    5. Chuck Bennett: 166 on 12/7/30
    6. Bill Senn: 166 on 12/4/26
  • Total Offense
    1. Benny Friedman: 341 on 10/14/28
    2. Ernie Nevers: 328 on 10/23/27
    3. Red Dunn: 313 on 11/23/24
    4. Benny Friedman: 310 on 10/19/30
    5. Jim Kendrick: 307 on 11/7/26
  • Punting Yards
    1. Jesse Brown: 792 on 12/18/26
    2. Verne Lewellen: 742 on 9/26/26
    3. Earl Britton: 736 on 9/29/28
    4. Cub Buck: 687 on 11/4/23
    5. Paddy Driscoll: 683 on 9/26/26

One player who you will notice is all over these lists is one that Neft considers a glaring omission from the Pro Football Hall of Fame: Verne Lewellen. In an era where small rosters and strict limits on substitutions made versatility paramount, Lewellen was a truly special player who was a weapon as a passer, a runner, a receiver and was unrivaled as a punter. The punting had great value in this era. Additionally, he was a dangerous defender who made a great number of interceptions (something we hope to be able to add to the site with a future update).

Another thing that must be pointed out is how special Benny Friedman was. While we cannot be 100% sure what the case would be if we had full coverage for all games, it is likely that Friedman led the NFL in both passing (1,348 yards) and rushing (575 yards) in 1928. No other player in NFL history has accomplished this feat. Additionally, he is the only pass thrower of note in this era with more pass touchdowns than interceptions. While there may not have been statistics tracked at the time, the voters who made him First-Team All-Pro every season from 1927-30 seem to have gotten it right.

To give you an idea of the depth of coverage, here's a coverage map showing how complete the passing, rushing, receiving and punting data is:

Percentage of Games with Complete Data by Season

For a look at the source material, here's a couple of examples:

1932 Green Bay Packers Stats

1920 Akron Pros Stats

If the statistics are in black, that means they are complete. If they are in red, they are incomplete. You'll notice the Packers are complete, while the Pros have quite a bit of red. You'll also notice some return yards, team statistics and defensive interception data that we do not currently have. We hope to add those to the site in the future.

If you think you have information that would allow for us to flesh out any of these totals, please let us know.

 

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