Not only the day that Sunday football finally began in the City of Brotherly Love, November 12th also marks the technical birth of “professional” football itself — in Pittsburgh, the birthplace of the man who became the all-time passing leader on this date as well. Lastly, just one year ago, a hot-shooting rookie PG drained a record number of 3PM in a single quarter on the same day that Mike Fiers dropped a bombshell on the baseball world about his former team. Spanning well over a century, the deep history of this date is impossible to overstate.

Jaime Segui & Alex Raphael covered the MLB & NBA sections in this article.

NFL Passing Leader

#OnThisDay ... in 1995, @DanMarino passed Fran Tarkenton to head the list of @NFL career passing yards. It only required a 9-yard toss to Irving Fryar for Marino to surpass Tarkenton's 47,003yds mark as the @MiamiDolphins lost 34-17 to New England.#NFL100 pic.twitter.com/DM5bMfqmAp
— Gridiron (@Gridiron) November 12, 2019

YEAR: 1995

SIGNIFICANCE: Dan Marino passed Fran Tarkenton to become the all-time leader in PASS YDS

By the time he was on the cusp of Fran Tarkenton’s all-time passing yardage record, Dan Marino already owned 21 NFL records, including passing yards and TDs in a single-season, the most 3,000-yard seasons, and the most completions in NFL history — the latter of which he broke just a month earlier. Though Miami would fall to New England 34-17 due in part to his two INTs, Marino quickly surpassed Fran Tarkenton’s all-time record of 47,003 career passing yards in the first quarter.

What took the 4x NFC Champion 18 seasons to accomplish, “Dan the Man” was able to smash it in just 13 — one of which he missed all but five games (1993). Almost exactly a year later, he would extend both his passing yards and completions record to unprecedented milestones on the same day. Marino and his abundance of records is now cemented in Canton forever as a first-ballot Hall of Famer and one of the greatest passers of all-time.

Astros Cheating

YEAR: 2019

SIGNIFICANCE: Former Astros SP Mike Fiers reveals the team’s sign-stealing scandal from 2017, the year they won the WS

Two years after winning the World Series with the Houston Astros, SP Mike Fiers spoke to Evan Drellich and Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic detailing how the Astros created a system that would allow them to steal the opposing catcher’s sign and communicate them to the batter before the pitch was thrown. Fiers, now a member of the Oakland Athletics, pointed out that the Astros used a center field camera that would transmit the live feed to a TV in the area behind the dugout.

Once they knew what the catchers’ signs were, they would bang a trashcan to indicate what pitch was coming. Major League Baseball later investigated and found that the Astros did in fact steal signs and did so for the majority of 2017. The cheating scandal brought upon suspensions for Jeff Luhnow and AJ Hinch, which led to their ultimate dismissal from the franchise they brought it’s first Championship. Alex Cora and Carlos Beltran, who were members of the ’17 squad, and managers of other teams at the time of the investigation, were fired by their respective teams after their involvement in the cheating became public knowledge.

1st Pro Football Player

On November 12, 1892, William Heffelfinger became the first known professional football player when the Allegheny Athletic Association paid him $500 to play in a game against the Pittsburgh Athletic Club. #NFLHistory

Read More: https://t.co/bK7aJMkFKM pic.twitter.com/QLOSUuem9t
— NFL Legacy (@NFLLegacy) November 12, 2017

YEAR: 1892 & 1933

SIGNIFICANCE: William “Pudge” Hefflelfinger became the 1st “professional” football player

A former All-American Guard at Yale (1888-1891), “Pudge” Heffelfinger moved on to the Chicago Athletic Association after his graduation in 1892, where he was compensated double his expenses. Leading into a heated rivalry game on this date with the aforementioned Allegheny club, the Pittsburgh Athletic Club looked to gain an advantage by offering Heffelfinger $250 to suit up for them. He declined, opting to retain his amateur status, but Allegheny decided to double their rivals’ offer to $500 — which he accepted. Though controversial and contested by Pittsburgh, Heffelfinger would make the investment worthwhile by scoring the game’s only TD and delivering a victory.

Unanimous Legends

YEARS: 1986 & 1997

SIGNIFICANCE: Roger Clemens became the 2nd unanimous AL Cy Young & Ken Griffey Jr. was the 9th-ever unanimous AL MVP

On this date in history, Boston Red Sox SP Roger Clemens won the American League Cy Young award by an unanimous vote, becoming the first AL pitcher to do so since Denny McLain in 1968. This was Clemens’ first career Cy Young, and it came after a campaign that saw him lead the majors in Wins (24) and ERA (2.48). Rocket also led the AL in WHIP (0.969) and H/9 (6.3). In addition to winning the AL Cy Young unanimously, he also won the AL MVP, starting a run of dominance few players in the history of the game have ever matched. Clemens led the Red Sox to a 95-66 season that saw them lose to the Mets in Game 7 of the World Series. The very next season, Clemens would repeat and become the first back-to-back Cy Young winner in over a decade.

11 years later, Seattle Mariners OF Ken Griffey Jr. became the ninth unanimous AL MVP in history. ‘The Kid’ had an unbelievable season, hitting .304 with 56 HRs and a major league-high 147 RBI. 1997 was Griffey’s age-27 season, and he already was an 8x All-Star and Gold Glover, a 5x Silver Slugger, and he now won his MVP award that instantly placed him among the all-time greats and the greatest player in Seattle Mariners history. After Griffey’s unanimous victory in ’97, it took until 2014 for Mike Trout to become the 10th undisputed AL MVP.

Coby's 3PM Record

YEAR: 2019

SIGNIFICANCE: Coby White became the 1st rookie, 1st Bulls player, and the youngest ever to sink 7 3PM in 1 Qtr

Two historic Eastern Conference rivals, New York Knicks and Chicago Bulls, competed in what was a tied ballgame at 85-85 through three-quarters of play exactly a year ago. The game was readily pivoted, however, by the Chicago Bulls’ 1st round (7th overall) draft pick from the University of North Carolina Coby White, whose scolding hot stroke tallied him seven fourth-quarter 3-point daggers.

Despite missing his first five shots and entering the fourth with a measly four points, he still managed to carry his Bulls to an 18-point landslide-victory (120-102) in the United Center, checking out with 27 points. The 19-year-old rookie was not only the youngest player and the first rookie to achieve such a feat but the first player in Bulls franchise history to drain that many 3’s in a quarter as well.