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| - The two teams that play in the Pro Football Hall of Fame Game are selected by the league well in advance of the rest of the schedule (usually about the same time as the new Hall of Fame members are announced and the Super Bowl of the year before). From 1971 to 2008, and again in 2010, the opponents were one AFC team vs. one NFC team. In 2009, as recognition of the 50th season of the charter members of the American Football League, the game paired two of the "original eight" franchises of that league, the Tennessee Titans (dressed as their previous incarnation, the Houston Oilers) and the Buffalo Bills, whose owner, Ralph Wilson, was inducted into the Hall that year. The two teams were chosen because Wilson and the Oilers'/Titans' owner, Bud Adams, were the last original AFL owners still al
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| abstract
| - The two teams that play in the Pro Football Hall of Fame Game are selected by the league well in advance of the rest of the schedule (usually about the same time as the new Hall of Fame members are announced and the Super Bowl of the year before). From 1971 to 2008, and again in 2010, the opponents were one AFC team vs. one NFC team. In 2009, as recognition of the 50th season of the charter members of the American Football League, the game paired two of the "original eight" franchises of that league, the Tennessee Titans (dressed as their previous incarnation, the Houston Oilers) and the Buffalo Bills, whose owner, Ralph Wilson, was inducted into the Hall that year. The two teams were chosen because Wilson and the Oilers'/Titans' owner, Bud Adams, were the last original AFL owners still alive and owning their teams. Because this game and the Hall of Fame's induction ceremonies are scheduled on the weekend before the league's regular four-week exhibition season begins, both teams end up playing five exhibition games instead of the normal four, and unlike the Canadian Football League, the league does not remove an exhibition game from another week. Since 1995, expansion teams usually played the Hall of Fame Game as their first ever NFL contest; the teams that have done so thus far are the Jacksonville Jaguars and Carolina Panthers matchup in 1995, and the Houston Texans in 2002. Furthermore, the Cleveland Browns (who were restocked with an expansion draft) were featured in the Hall of Fame Game upon their return to the league in 1999, despite the league's official stance that says the Baltimore Ravens (who did not play in the 1996 Hall of Fame Game, nor any Hall of Fame Game since) are the new team stemming from the Cleveland Browns relocation controversy. (The difference stems from the fact that although the Ravens began play as a new team in 1996, the league did not expand to 31 teams until 1999 when the Browns resumed operations; thus, the 1999 Browns, despite having existed from 1946 to 1996, were an expansion team that year, but not a new team.) Prior to the AFL-NFL merger, the Hall of Fame Game was played in September, at the end of the preseason. In 1970, it was moved to the beginning of the preseason, and until the 2002 realignment (stemming from the admission of the Texans), it was not uncommon to see the game be played in July. Since the aforementioned expansion, the game has always been played in August. The 2011 Hall of Fame Game was also originally scheduled to feature two teams from the same conference, contrary to established tradition: the St. Louis Rams and the Chicago Bears. Unlike 2009, no official explanation was given for the choice of teams. That game was never played; a labor dispute had disrupted almost all league activity during the 2011 offseason, and the Bears and Rams had set a deadline of July 22 to ratify a resolution to the dispute. The league and its players did not ratify the agreement until July 25, forcing the game to be canceled. It is the only time the game has been canceled because of labor problems, and only the second such preseason game (the 1974 Chicago College All-Star Game being the first). During the years the game used the AFC-NFC format, the Hall of Fame Game was never rematched in that season's Super Bowl. However, the 1971, 1989, and 1996 matchups would be seen in later Super Bowls, and the 2003, 2004, and 2006 games were rematches of past Super Bowls. The 2012 game again broke from tradition in featuring the New Orleans Saints, for which 2012 enshrinee and offensive tackle Willie Roaf played part of his career, facing the Arizona Cardinals in their first appearance in the game since moving to Arizona in 1988.
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