美國美式足球聯會

When the Oilers left Houston in 1997, no arrangement similar to the Browns/Ravens was made to retain the franchise name. When Oilers owner Bud Adams changed the name of his team to the Tennessee Titans in 1999, he specifically precluded any NFL team from ever using the name "Oilers" again. As a result, when the league did eventually put a new AFC expansion team into Houston in 2002, it was named the Houston Texans.

The remaining 16 teams are organized into four divisions (North, South, East, and West) of four teams each. Each team plays the other teams in their division twice (home and away) during the regular season in addition to 10 other games/teams assigned to their schedule by the NFL the previous May. Two of these games are assigned on the basis of the team's final record in the previous season. The remaining 8 games are split between the roster of two other NFL divisions. This assignment shifts each year. For instance, in the 2006 regular season, each team in the AFC East will play a game apiece against each team in both the AFC South and the NFC North. In this way division competition consists of common opponents, with the exception of the 2 games assigned on the strength of each team's prior season record. The NFC operates according to the same system.

At the end of each football season, there are playoff games involving the top six teams in the AFC (the four division champions by place standing and the top two remaining non-division-champion teams ("wild cards") by record). The last two teams remaining play in the AFC Championship game with the winner receiving the Lamar Hunt Trophy. The AFC champion plays the NFC champion in the Super Bowl.