The bidding war behind the NFL Draft

GREEN BAY – On May 19, 1935, the NFL club owners approved a plan for a college player selection process, now known as the NFL Draft.

“The players were free to sign with any team before this,” said Packers Hall of Fame Curator Brent Hensel, “and then, Bert Bell, who at the time was the Eagles owner but would become the future NFL commissioner, called for teams to select players in inverse order of how they finished from the previous season.

“The NFL owners would adopt this college draft with altruistic intentions in mind. Basically, the decision was driven by the high-price bidding war that would take place over one player, a player from Minnesota named Stan Kostka.”

Stanislaus “Stan” Kostka was the son of Polish immigrants, born in St. Paul in July 1912.

“The six-foot-tall, 220-pound, blonde, fullback initially played at Oregon but transferred home to Minnesota for his sophomore year,” recalled the Minnesota Golden Gophers The Daily Gopher in April 2017.

“Kostka had a monster college career. In his first game as a Gopher, Stan scored four touchdowns in the first half. Over his three seasons in… he averaged 6.8 yards per carry. After going undefeated in 1934, Kostka’s junior year, the Big Ten announced that Stan had used all of his eligibility. The eligibility committee had decided to retroactively count his year on the freshman football team at Oregon. Despite Bernie Bierman’s protests in the offseason, Stan had no choice but to turn pro.

“As soon as the end of Stan’s college career was announced each NFL franchise contacted the Minnesota Golden Gophers star. All nine teams in the NFL attempted to sign Stan. Rumors spread that various teams were close to signing Kostka, but the two teams with the most resources to throw at him were the Brooklyn Dodgers (the football team), and the Philadelphia Eagles.

Kostka had an interesting negotiating tactic, ‘A team would send me a wire and say they’d give me $3,500,’ he recalls. ‘I’d send a wire back and say Green Bay or the Chicago Bears said they’d give me $4,000. I kept that up.’

“The Philadelphia Eagles were so angry about missing out on Kostka that they convinced the NFL of the need for the Draft. Instead of letting players go to the highest bidder, the draft would level the playing field by granting the worst team from the previous year the first pick.”

Koskta only played one season of professional football.

He later coached several seasons with North Dakota State and served as a Navy lieutenant during World War II.