Sport: Pro Prospects

A new coast-to-coast professional-football league is a dead certainty for 1945—if everyone doesn't get killed in the rush.

Born of surplus wartime dollars and a seductive box-office boom, various plans for postwar leagues had been growing quietly since last winter. By last week three rival groups, each padded with big names and bankrolls, had announced intentions to sponsor such a league, and already had begun battling for stadium rights, coaches and players. The line-up (in order of appearance): All-America Football Conference—organized by Arch Ward, Chicago Tribune sports editor; Trans-America Football League—John Francis...