In 1946, one year before Jackie Robinson broke Major League Baseball’s color barrier, four largely unheralded football players – Kenny Washington, Woody Strode, Marion Motley, and Bill Willis – re-integrated the NFL and changed the game forever. In the NFL’s first decade, there had been some black players including Fritz Pollard and Frederick “Duke” Slater, but owners banned African-Americans from the league in 1933. In 1939, Washington, a UCLA football teammate of Robinson, led the nation in total offense and later impressed Bears coach George Halas, who unsuccessfully lobbied NFL owners to lift a ban against black players. The spark for re-integration came in 1946, when the Cleveland Rams moved to Los Angeles. Thanks to pressure from the Los Angeles Coliseum Commission and Halley Harding, a Los Angeles Tribune sports editor, the Rams were required to integrate as a condition of their lease at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum. The Rams signed Washington, now a semi-pro player, along with his teammate Strode. Also in 1946, the AAFC’s Cleveland Browns signed two African-American players: Willis and Motley. Like Washington, who averaged 7.4 yards per carry in 1947, the newly-integrated players encountered much racial abuse and intimidation.