The biggest NFL trade you never heard of

I hope everyone enjoyed the nifty throwbacks the Steelers wore tonight... they're in celebration of the Steeler's 75th anniversary. According to this site, the yellow helmets with the U.S. Steel logo on one side were only briefly used during the 1962 season.

Both the Steelers and the Philadelphia Eagles are celebrating their 75th anniversary this season. Whenever David starts to complain about the Browns 'franchise' staying in Cleveland while the actual Browns team moved to Baltimore, I remind him of the convoluted, intertwined history of the Steelers and the Eagles.

After the 1940 season, the Eagles moved to Pittsburgh and renamed themselves the Steelers, while the Steelers moved to Philly and became the Eagles. I've read about this a million times (the book America's Game talks about it a bit) and I still don't understand why this was done, but the NFL (wisely I think) pretty much pretends this never happened.

And let's not forget the 1943 season, when a manpower shortage during World War II forced the Eagles and Steelers to merge for one year, forming the infamous Steagles. They were okay, going 5-4-1, certainly better than the next season's merger, where Pittsburgh tried to go the season merged with the Chicago Cardinals and the combined team went 0-10 and got fined for 'indifferent performance.'

So the moral is this: do not try to make sense of NFL franchise histories. That way madness lies.