Fausto Batella
Fausto Batella, a journalist specializing in economics and finance, published in the USA "Gridiron Gladiators" (2007), "Halfback Jack Kerouac" (2010) and " Il Vincente, la vera storia di Vince Lombardi" (2015). In 2016, for SPORTeBOOK, he published t
The Italian American stars in US sports: Football 3 of 3 (from 80s to 90s and College Football)
“The Italians were better fitted for games of quickness, dexterity, and skill, rather than rugged strength, and were too fiery and impulsive of feeling for contact sports”. Compared to American athletes, Italians' “tendency to the extreme of elation, or to the opposite extreme of despondency” made them “fearless, daring, and reckless” but also “mor...
The Italian American stars in US sports: Football 2 of 3 (from 50s to 70s)
In the 1950s the NFL continued to expand. The Cleveland Browns, the dominant team of the AAFC competing league that during the decade in the league, won the NFL title in 1950 on their first participation. In 1951, after a stop that lasted from 1942, the Pro Bowl came back. In 1953 the racial policies of the league were challenged by a Federal Court...
The Italian American stars in US sports: Football 1 of 3 (from 20s to 40s)
At the beginning of the 1920s, the idea of "business of sport" was replacing the idea of the "sport of business". In 1920 the APFA-American Professional Football Association organized the first pro football tournament. Football, coming out of university campuses, summoned paying spectators, paid players and companies supporting the activity of th...
The Italian American stars in US sports: Boxing
After the First World War, with the increase in industrialization and well-being, the American people grew increasingly interested in entertainment and sports. The newspapers of that time often titled about the "Jazz Age" and the "Golden age of sports", in an enthusiastic race towards the '20s. Many Italian Americans, especially of second generatio...
The Italian American stars in US sports: Basketball and Bowling
Forrest "Red" DeBernardi was the first Italian-American star to shine in the firmament of American basketball in the twenties (All-Conference in '22 and '23). After college, he played for 11 seasons in the National Athletic Amateur Union (AAU), collecting 7 selections for the AAU American Team. In '38, the Associated Press elected him "best center"...
The Italian American stars in US sports: Baseball 2 of 2
After World War II, American sports becomes a very important content for the television business, and everybody starts looking to buy sports television rights and also the market of image rights. Let's think about the commercial success of the trading cards: they were already widespread and sponsored in the early twentieth century, but after the wa...
The Italian American stars in US sports: Baseball 1 of 2
Joe DiMaggio was the greatest, but he was not the first neither the last; hundreds of Italian Americans and some Italians pursued like him the dream of a better life by hitting a ball. DiMaggio came in with an incredible impact on the lives of the American people, on the pages of glossy magazines: he was a modern star, the new hero of the Land of O...
IT and US: (American) Football in Italy, an interesting story (#2 of 2)
Robert Carey, the president of NFL Properties Inc., spoke at the Versilia tournament, pledging his interest to Italian leaders in promoting the game in Italy. In March 1978 a contract was signed, under which the NFL committed to designing the logos of Italian teams, reserving all rights with respect to the latter outside Italy, and allowing the new...
IT and US: (American) Football in Italy, an interesting story (#1 of 2)
On January 29, 1972 in the typical restaurant "Il Toro" in Sampierdarena (Genova) a table of sportsmen decided to found the first Italian Football Federation (Federazione Italian Football Americano, FIFA), with the desire and hope to be able to introduce in the peninsula the fascinating agonistic image of this stars and stripes sport.