Pittsburgh Steelers second place in their division, or with a record better than .500 (). Pittsburgh did make history in by signing Byron White, a future Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court, to what was at the time the biggest contract in NFL history, but he played only one year with the Pirates before signing with the Detroit Lions. Prior to the 1940 season, the Pirates renamed themselves the Steelers. During World War II, the Steelers experienced player shortages. They twice merged with other NFL franchises to field a team. During the 1943 season, they merged with the Philadelphia Eagles forming the
History of the Pittsburgh Pirates World Series each time. In both 1991 and 1992, they lost closely contested League Championship Series to the Atlanta Braves. After the 1992 season, the front office set out to rebuild the team, giving up several high-payroll players in favor of a younger crew. The Pirates were unable to produce a winning season until 2013, accumulating a 20-year losing streak – the longest in any of the four major professional North American sports leagues. The closest the Pirates had come to fielding a winning team during that period was the 1997 team, which finished second in the NL Central despite