Baltimore’s loss is Indianapolis’ gain. It’s been 39 years since the Indianapolis Colts’ stunning relocation from Baltimore, MD in the spring of 1984.

The Colts and their team staff boarded several Mayflower fans that arrived in Indy on March 28, 1984.

The Horseshoe has been representing the Circle City and the Hoosier State from that point onward. Indeed, time flies fast.

Let’s take a trip down memory lane and relive the events that led to the rebirth of the Indianapolis Colts.

 

Laying the Groundwork for the Colts’ Move to Indy

Indianapolis Mayor Bill Hudnut helped lay the groundwork for a local professional football team when he took office in the mid-1970s.

According to BizVoice Magazine’s Rebecca Patrick, Hudnut commissioned deputy mayor and lawyer David Frick to use amateur and professional sports to rejuvenate the Circle City.

Hudnut and his staff eventually developed a long-term vision – the city would eventually build an extension of the convention center in the downtown area. Not only will the convention center ramp up its business operations, but it will also host an NFL football team – something Indianapolis never had.

Before long, Frick met with NFL commissioner Pete Rozelle and presented Hudnut’s bold vision. The stadium would eventually become known as the Hoosier Dome.

Unfortunately for Hudnut and the people of Indianapolis, fate threw a wrench in their plans.

 

Initial Expansion Efforts to Indianapolis Foiled in 1982

Alas, Indianapolis’ chances of having its own football team diminished considerably after Oakland Raiders owner Al Davis moved his franchise to Los Angeles prior to the strike-shortened 1982 NFL season.

It was a double whammy for Hudnut and Co. – the litigations surrounding the Raiders’ move and the strike made it impossible for the NFL to expand to Indianapolis that year.

Nonetheless, the Mayor and his staff remained undaunted. They continued building the Hoosier Dome, anyway.

Coincidentally, Baltimore Colts owner Robert Irsay had a major dilemma – his team’s Baltimore Memorial Stadium was old and dingy. Worse, the Colts played the entire 1983 NFL season with no lease on top of dwindling attendance, per Patrick.

Baltimore businessman Tom Shine soon found out about Irsay’s plans of possibly moving the Colts to another city. His initial targets were Jacksonville, FL; Memphis, TN; and Phoenix, AZ.

Word of the Colts’ impending exodus eventually leaked out to Hudnut, who told Frick to probe deeper into the matter. The latter convinced Irsay to visit Indianapolis and check out the city for himself.

The two sides eventually met on February 11, 1984. The Colts told Hudnut and Co. they wanted a long-term relationship with a fan base that would flourish in the National Football League.

For their part, the Mayor’s team wanted a franchise that would become a long-term asset to the community.

Rozelle’s willingness to let Irsay move the team made the possibility grow by the day – the commissioner’s plate was already full because of the Raiders’ move to Los Angeles two years earlier.  At the time, Rozelle was still handling the legal repercussions of the Silver and Black’s relocation to Southern California.

Plus, the state of Maryland threatened to exercise eminent domain – the state’s right to seize private property for public use – on Irsay’s Colts.

Apparently, that sealed the deal on Indianapolis’ new NFL team.

Irsay’s legal counsel Michael Chernoff spoke with the Colts owner in the morning of March 28, 1984. They agreed to move the Horseshoe to Central Indiana that same evening.

Chernoff emphasized to Patrick in 2011 Baltimore’s unwillingness to iron things out with the Colts was the final straw.

You are not going to turn over something that you worked your life for – that you put your blood and money into; you prevent that from happening.

We had been negotiating with the city of Baltimore toward trying to get some reasonable resolution of the problems, but now it was wrecked. They demolished it.

 

The Colts Ride the Mayflower Van to Indy

It turned out Hudnut’s next-door neighbor was Mayflower CEO John B. Smith. The latter agreed to move the Colts from Baltimore to Indy without charging Hudnut a single dime, per BizVoice Magazine.

With hundreds of local reporters swarming the Colts’ facility in Baltimore, the team packed its bags and loaded them onto several Mayflower vans in late March 1984.

The vans soon headed out west for Indianapolis on a snowy evening. The Colts officially bid Baltimore adieu.

Irsay’s welcoming committee included Hudnut and Frick, who met him at the Indianapolis International Airport.

Hudnut and Frick then drove Irsay to the unfinished Hoosier Dome in downtown Indianapolis. To Irsay’s astonishment, 10,000 people gave him a warm welcome on a Monday morning, no less.

When Irsay first toured the Hoosier Dome, Frick rememebered the Colts owner telling him the stadium’s colors of blue and white accurately represented the Horsehoe.

For his part, Frick never intended that to happen. He insisted to Patrick in 2011 it was just a fortuitous turn of events.

“It was a brand new stadium in a town hungry for NFL football,” Irsay’s son Jim, the current Colts owner, told BizVoice Magazine some 27 years later.

Since then, the Colts have won eleven division titles and one Super Bowl title for the city of Indianapolis.

In the bigger scheme of things, the Colts’ rebirth paved the way for more jobs, better infrastructure, and Hoosiers’ passion for the gridiron – nobody would’ve guessed a storied football franchise would make a profound and life-changing impact on a basketball state.

It all began with the long-term vision of former Indianapolis Mayor Bill Hudnut.