Germany welcomes Falcons with a deep link to American football
BERLIN — The popularity of American football in Germany has been traced to when the game was played on American military bases after World War II.
Club teams started to sprout in the late 1970s, followed by the German Football League.
The NFL got into the action with the World League of American Football in 1989. Then it started to peak in the early 2000s with NFL Europe and NFL Europa.
Because of those efforts, when the Falcons (3-5) face the Colts (7-2) at 9:30 a.m. Sunday at Olympic Stadium, they will be greeted by a raucous and knowledgeable crowd. (The purists call soccer “real football” in these parts. Some don’t understand why you get to use your hands in American football.)
Former Falcons executive Nick Polk was the senior director of football operations for NFL Europe from 2000 to 2004.
“It was a great time because a lot of these guys were playing the game for the love of the game,” Polk told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution on Wednesday. “I mean, they just really enjoyed being a part of American football. Some of them had opportunities and wound up going over, as you know, you look at the number of international players that are now in the league. That all didn’t happen overnight. It was all part of initially commissioner (Paul) Tagliabue and then later on commissioner (Roger) Goodell. But you know, the drive to try and develop international talent was important.”
The German fans in Berlin and other cities are legendary.
“Then there was a lot of interest,” Polk said. “The German fans are fanatics.”
The pregame festivities were legendary.
“When we played games, whether it was in Berlin or Frankfurt or Cologne or Düsseldorf, there were some great crowds,” Polk said. “They also knew how to do things with what we call “Power Parties.” The pregame festivities would start four or five hours before kickoff and go all day long.”
Sounds like the tailgate before a Green Bay Packers game outside Lambeau Field.
“If you look up on YouTube and look up the ‘Frankfurt Galaxy’ or the ‘Rhein Fire Power Party,’ you’ll see what I’m talking about,” said Polk, who spent 17 seasons with the Falcons. “There’ll be videos that you’ll see, and you’ll be going, holy mackerel. I can’t believe that many people were there.”
The Berlin Thunder won three World Bowls (2001, 2002 and 2004). They also reached the World Bowl in 2005, but lost to the Amsterdam Admirals. Former LSU quarterback Rohan Davey and former Falcons offensive coordinator Dave Ragone were stars for the Thunder.
“I loved our time there,” Polk said. “We were really on the front edge of starting player development over there internationally. We had a bunch of tryouts all over the world. Germany was really, really good.”
The Falcons benefited from NFL Europe.
Undrafted cornerback Brent Grimes, who was discovered by former scout Bruce Plummer, went to Germany to refine his skills. Grimes played for the Hamburg Sea Devils in 2007. He helped the Sea Devils win World Bowl XV before returning to join the Falcons and go on to play 12 seasons in the NFL.
Former Colts player Bjoern Werner is a native of Berlin, and current lineman Bernhard Raimann is from the DACH region — Deutschland (Germany), Austria and Confoederatio Helvetica, the Latin name for Switzerland. Werner, who played at Florida State, was a first-round pick in 2013. He played in 38 NFL games and made 13 starts.
“(Werner is) now a major NFL media voice in Germany,” said Peter O’Reilley, the NFL’s executive vice president of club business, international and league events. “It’s also a bit of a homecoming for the DACH region, the Colts left tackle Bernhard Raimann, who is from Austria.”
The NFL is elated to play a regular-season game in Berlin.
“(With) 20 million NFL fans in Germany, it’s our largest fan base in Europe,” O’Reilley said. “Our German fan base is really strong. It certainly ties back to the history of our game there going way back and then certainly to the strong support in Germany during the NFL Europe days. When we returned three years ago, that really sparked a resurgence of fandom in the market.”
In other markets in Europe, the fans are not as knowledgeable about the rules.
“Those of you who have watched or been in stadiums in either Munich or Frankfurt previously, that is a passionate and knowledgeable German fan base cheering on those teams in addition to singing some great ‘Country Roads,’” O’Reilley said. “The NFL passion and the team passion, which I think you’ll see in this Colts-Falcons game, will be massive.”
“Take Me Home, Country Roads” by John Denver is considered the unofficial American football anthem Germany.
Polk, who’s currently the general manager at the University of Florida, remembers his NFL Europe days fondly.
“The experience in NFL Europe as a whole was fantastic,” Polk said. “It gave opportunities to start looking at players that were playing American football that were from different countries. There were tryouts all over the world. We had tryouts in Japan, Italy, Spain (and) France.
“Germany was really a big one because they have the GFL, which was the German Football League. So they were very organized, even back in 2000 with how they organized their league. So, there was a lot of good young talent that came through the GFL.”
In NFL Europe, teams had to have eight international players on each 36-man roster. Teams had to have an international player on the field on offense and defense in each of the series.
Patrick Esume, who worked with Polk at NFL Europe, was commissioner of the Europe Football League until recently. Falcons kicker Lenny Krieg played for the Stuttgart Surge of the EFL.
“It really was the beginning of … now you look at it, and one of the things we had always hoped for was the ability to have an academy,” Polk said. “Now you look over in the (United Kingdom), the NFL is running an academy. Very similar to a lot of the Premier Soccer League teams and such that they all have academies. Now, the cost to put those on is a lot different for soccer, or, as they say, for football versus American football.”
The NFL also has an academy in Australia.
“But there were a lot of players there that you know had traits to be good American football players,” Polk said. “The measurables, the height, the weight and the athletic ability. It’s just they didn’t all have the background of being able to grow up with the game.”
About the Author
Honored by the Pro Football Hall of Fame in recognition of his "long and distinguished reporting in the field of pro football," D. Orlando Ledbetter, Esq. has covered the NFL 28 seasons. A graduate of Howard University, he's a winner of Georgia Sportswriter of the Year and three Associated Press Sports Editor awards.
