Editing Expansion draft (section)

===American football===
During [[History of the National Football League|its history]], the [[National Football League|NFL]] has held eight expansion drafts in order to accommodate newcoming teams. Half of them took place in 1960s, when the league was expanding quickly, facing the competition from [[American Football League|AFL]]. The last was held in 2002, as the league reached its current state of 32 teams.

The [[1960 NFL expansion draft|first NFL expansion draft]] took place in 1960 to let the just-enfranchised [[Dallas Cowboys]] pick their initial players. Because the new franchise approval happened too late, this was the only time in NFL history that a new franchise could not participate in [[1960 NFL draft|the normal league draft]] and thus missed on college players. Already in the next season, NFL added a 14th team to its roster, the [[Minnesota Vikings]]. In the ensuing [[1961 NFL expansion draft|expansion draft]], the new team picked three players from each of the other franchises (except the still very new Cowboys). Together with the participation in [[1961 NFL draft|the normal draft]], this gave the Vikings enough strength to score three victories in their first season.

Later in 1960s, NFL added two more franchises. In 1966, an [[1966 NFL expansion draft|expansion draft]] was held for the new [[Atlanta Falcons]], one year later [[1967 NFL expansion draft|another expansion draft]] happened for the 16th team of the league, [[New Orleans Saints]]. Like in previous drafts, new franchise could take three players from each of the existing teams (the still-new Falcons were exempt from giving up players to the Saints). However, existing teams were allowed to exclude large parts of their roster from the draft, to avoid losing their most valuable players.

During its ten-year existence, the American Football League had two expansion drafts, one in [[1966 AFL season|1966]] for the [[Miami Dolphins]] and one in [[1968 AFL|season]] for the [[Cincinnati Bengals]].

As of [[AFL–NFL merger]] in [[1970 NFL season|1970]], the league consisted of 26 teams. The merger itself didn't require expansion drafts, as AFL teams were already well-established and of comparable strength. So, [[1976 NFL expansion draft|the next expansion draft]] happened in [[1976 NFL season|1976]], when two new teams joined the NFL: the [[Seattle Seahawks]] and the [[Tampa Bay Buccaneers]].

The last three expansion drafts took place between [[1995 NFL season|1995]] and [[2002 NFL season|2002]]. In 1995, two new teams, the [[Carolina Panthers]] and the [[Jacksonville Jaguars]] were [[1995 NFL expansion draft|allowed to pick]] between 30 and 42 players each from existing teams' rosters. [[1999 NFL expansion draft]] was held for the [[Cleveland Browns]], the 31st team in the league. This one in particular was regarded as giving the new team too little, while letting existing teams to protect basically all players they wanted.<ref>{{cite news |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2002/01/23/sports/pro-football-nfl-expansion-draft-big-names-on-the-list.html |title=Pro Football; N.F.L. Expansion Draft: Big Names on the List | last=Pennington |first=Bill |date=January 23, 2002 |work=New York Times| access-date= 24 September 2008 <!--DASHBot-->}}</ref> Finally, as the [[Houston Texans]] joined the league in 2002 as the 32nd and, currently, the last team, [[2002 NFL expansion draft]] was held for them. The rules of the draft had been adjusted following the reception of the 1999 one.