He struggled with breaking balls and with the specific demands of major league pitching.

He was better than average, but he was not the baseball phenomenon that the publicity surrounding his signing had implied he might become.

It was in professional football that the full scope of his athletic gifts continued to be visible.

He joined the Canton Bulldogs in 1915 and helped them win three Ohio League championships.

When the American Professional Football Association — the organization that would become the NFL — was formed in 1920, Thorpe served as its first president, a recognition of his standing in the sport even if the administrative role did not suit him particularly.

He played professional football until he was forty-one years old, competing for more than a dozen different teams across a career that lasted through the 1920s.